By
Ken Ellingwood, Los Angeles Times
MEXICO
CITY ‑ On wheels, we charge: a vast and exultant army of cycling, skating,
spinning, scooting, sweating warriors in the thrill of conquest.
We
rule this city ‑ at least for a few hours.
Every
Sunday morning, some of the biggest streets in car-flooded Mexico City are
handed over to bicyclists, who roll in by the tens of thousands. Joining them
are skateboarders, Rollerbladers, toddlers on push toys and parents behind
strollers in what has become a weekly festival on (small) wheels.
The
leftist government of Mayor Marcelo Ebrard launched the program in 2007,
barring cars, trucks and buses from the regal Paseo de la Reforma and other
streets around historic downtown. Once a month, the route is expanded to form a
20-mile engine-free circuit called the Cicloton.
The
cyclist’s gain is the motorist’s loss. But city officials seek to limit traffic
snarls by opening alternative routes and letting cars across key downtown
junctions once the bikes have passed. On short stretches, cars and bikes share
the street in rare harmony, separated by orange traffic cones. (If only the
exhaust fumes stayed in their own lane.)
Though
mocked by some as a political gimmick, the Sunday ride has proved highly
popular since opening in May 2007. The shorter downtown rides routinely draw
10,000 or more participants, and the Cicloton as many as 70,000.
It’s
an upside-down day. For a change, cars are the intruders while cyclists get a
leisurely, intimate view that makes this huge and tumultuous city seem, well,
not so huge and tumultuous.
We
strap on helmets and spend two to three hours on a citywide loop: zooming past
the glassy high rises and triumphal statues of Reforma, through
graffiti-spattered precincts where sidewalk stands send up a tang of raw
seafood, along normally jammed commercial boulevards lined with chain stores
and billboard ads.
There
are gleaming road bikes and creaking wrecks that appear to have predated the
1968 Olympics here. Signs abound of classic Mexican innovations, like the tiny
wooden chair converted, by straps and blind faith, into a child’s bicycle seat.
The
party mood is accentuated by a string of roadside tent stations set up to offer
everything from open-air exercise classes to refills on water. You can get your
bike tire fixed for free, too.
Mostly,
there is an air of relief in the sprawling megalopolis, whose 20 million
residents spend much of the week dueling each other on the roads.
“Traffic
is chaotic. People are racing around, stressed. Cars don’t respect bicyclists,”
said Edgar Campos, 37, who slowly pedaled an undersized bike near the leafy
downtown park known as the Alameda Central. “Today is a completely different
day.”
His
twin daughters, 11, rode bikes, along with a 10-year-old son. Another son, 14,
shuffled along on roller skates.
For
Campos, even police are a welcome sight on these Sundays. Usually viewed as
more interested in seeking payoffs than protecting residents, the officers are
posted at intersections to keep cars at bay.
“It’s
one day,” Campos conceded. “Still, it’s difficult to get even that.”
If
biking here feels like a novelty, it’s not hard to see why.
While
it is safe to ride in the relative calm of certain neighborhoods or a few big
parks, venturing into Mexico City traffic can feel like the cycling equivalent
of the running of the bulls. About four million vehicles jam the streets daily,
and drivers appear to share a guiding tenet: Anything goes if it gets you there
quicker.
Motorists
switch lanes suddenly and dart around corners without using blinkers. Red
lights are often treated as suggestions. Newcomers may gasp the first time they
see cars darting in opposite directions around big traffic circles.
Because
there is not much of a cycling culture, drivers pay little heed. On a bike,
you’re basically on your own. As a result, few people try. Polls show that 1 in
100 Mexico City residents gets around by bicycle.>
“The
main barrier to people using bicycles as a form of transportation is the fear
people have of getting in an accident caused by a vehicle,” said Jesus Gil
Aldeco, who belongs to Bicitekas, a group that promotes cycling as a daily
transportation.
Mexico
City has few bike lanes, and plans for a 400-mile network snaking through the
city are stuck in bureaucracy. With slim odds of improvement any time soon,
Bicitekas plans to open a school to train bicyclists on how to survive the
hostile conditions. A better solution, cyclists say, is to create a climate in
which motorists respect riders ‑ or fear prosecution if they don’t.
“The
culture of the road is very poor,” said Gil.<
Riding
through the historic downtown, we bump over cobblestone streets a few blocks
from where the Aztecs worshipped, then wheel down a stretch of cut-rate dress
shops thumping with music.
Beyond
markets selling Dora the Explorer pinatas and glittery fabric masks worn by
“lucha libre” wrestlers, the route becomes grittier, following a power line and
drab apartment clusters along a long flat roadway before the first climb
appears.
A
hill? Hardly. It’s a highway overpass. On top, Raul Lopez is catching his
breath and peering out over an outdoor subway station and eight-lane highway
leading away from town. From below comes the low roar of cars and buses, the
wail of an ambulance.
Lopez,
54, knows well the hostile ways of these roads. He drives a bus. For six days a
week he’s a man in combat, piloting his boxy vehicle through choked streets
along the city’s edge.
On
this day, though, Lopez and his wife, Marta, 53, a nurse, are pedaling Mexico
City’s streets with the sweaty abandon of schoolchildren.
Soon,
he’ll slip back into the driver’s seat for another week’s stresses. But right
now, astride his shopworn 10-speed, his wife beside him on a road free of car
traffic for miles ahead, Lopez feels good. Better, actually.
“Perfect,”
he said.