Boston University Cycling

We’re in New England, it’s Winter, but you want to keep riding outside because the trainer sucks after a while, even with lots of movies to catch up on. The sun is setting ever earlier, and you have fewer and fewer daylight hours to take advantage of even as base season kicks up and you need to put in longer rides and bigger mileages. Luckily, you have many options for continuing to ride safely in the darker seasons, many of which are within reach with a worthwhile investment of your time and a little $$.

The first thing you can do is hit up Landry’s Bicycles on Comm Ave and ask for advice on lights. Massachusetts riders are required by law to run lights between ½ hour after sunset and ½ hour before sunrise, but you don’t need to limit yourself to nighttime illumination. Some lights make you more visible during the day and in slightly less ideal conditions as well as in the pitch dark, but anything is better than nothing. If you’re in a pinch, talk to someone at the BU office of Transportation Solutions for Commuters (BU TransComm) at 710 Albany St. to get a couple for free!

Lights on the front and rear keep you in sight in those directions, but you may still be invisible from the sides. You can remedy this with ankle reflectors, spoke lights, rim lights, and/or reflective clothing. ‘Tis the season, and nothing catches the eye better than a rolling Christmas tree.

As always, be wary of other road users, and especially so as it gets darker. Pedestrians can be particularly difficult to see on poorly lit shared-use paths, so a good, strong headlight is more than handy and can save you and them from a bad crash. Right hooks, left hooks, and dooring are all the more likely to happen at night or in bad weather conditions, so you’ll need to be even more cautious and alert. Riding in traffic rather than the shoulder will make you more visible to motorists, and can save you from inadvertent buzzing if the road narrows.