Biking around Zagreb

Thanks to the zealous work of Sindikat biciklista, Zagreb has made big progress improving the infrastructure of city routes and activating the citizens with bikeful events.

Bike-friendly events

The most popular bike-events are Pedalafest and the one-month campaign Biciklom na posao (Biking to work).

Biciklom na posao takes place all over Zagreb in spring. Its motto is Life is too short for traffic jams, promoting the main purpose of showing how biking is an ecologically aware mean of saving time and money. Anybody can join the campaign by signing up at www.biciklomnaposao.hr and logging kilometres. Hundreds of organisations join the cause to show their support and thousands of citizens take their bikes out of the basement to hit the streets.

Pedalafest is an awesome event with a fixed point in park Ribnjak in the city centre. For a couple of days, everybody can enjoy educational workshops, good music and fun atmosphere. I personally adore Pedalafest as it takes place in my neighbourhood. So every day during the whole festival, I get consumed by the positive vibes, see awesome cycling contraptions and learn a couple of new things on how to take better care of my pet-bike and, and of equal importance, how to take better care of myself in traffic. This year they stretched a couple of tires between the branches of a huge tree and made a giant hammock. The only problem was that there was a queue waiting to try it out.

 Image credit: Vilim Hlušička, Sindikat biciklista (Facebook page)

Back to the Routes

Zagreb has approximately 260 kilometres of bike routes. Some of them are perfectly built, neon-colour marked and wide, and some of them are lumpy, mind-bending and a source of frustration. Trust me, I really didn’t know I had it in me when cruising the latter ones. But no matter the quality of the route, you should always have your safety gear, especially bike lights and a bell. It is the city and your shouting at people to move is just going to blend with the rest of the city’s music. Your bell, on the other hand, is a perfect tool of signalising, highlighted (or high sounded) in the noise of the crowd. Be sure to ring the bell before you get to the person. Otherwise, you’ll just hear shrieks of terror and judging looks. Not that I know.

To explore the mere city on concrete grounds, follow this map. You can view the legend to see  which parts are developed and which are not so enjoyable.

Try a different kind of touring and join Blue Bike Zagreb tour. Skip grabbling around town with a huge map, hop on one of the blue bikes and explore in a good company.

Image credit: Blue Bike Zagreb (Facebook page)

Pedala.hr is a cool website for a cyclist which gathers a bunch of information on places and routes suitable for cycling. It unifies experiences developing a friendly network to help out adventurers and tourists find their way not only in Zagreb but also across Croatia. Here you can find a couple of routes. Most of them have maps and descriptions of the routes’ features.

Hit the streets all over the region and explore the nature surrounding Zagreb. Check out these 13 maps, categorised by how challenging they are. Or join the community bikemap.net and try one of these personally created routes. 

Bikers' Goodies

One of my favourite things as a city biker is the Bike Totem. I pass it almost every time I go to class or work. The totem on Stjepan Radić square was put up in 2014 and counts how many bikes pass in two directions. This monument is not only fun, as you see the number changes when you pass it by but also a symbol of Zagreb becoming stronger and more accepting of bikes.

 Image credit: Sindikat biciklista (Facebook page)

As a student, one of my biggest nightmares, well one of my wallet’s biggest nightmares, is going to the bike service. Why? Because every time I have a flat tire, it turns out I only think I have just a flat tire and turns out my bike is a hazardous machine which must be immediately fixed, and it ends up with me being broke. That didn’t happen to me in a while thankfully, thanks to the city’s superheroes in Frankopanska 1, Biciklopopravljaona (Bike repair shop). Every Thursday between 5PM and 8PM, without calling up ahead, the volunteering heroes await! This is not a free bike service – this is an educational journey in which you learn how to repair your own bike. You can get parts of your bike replaced, so if you think you have something to donate, feel free to give it away over there.

So what are you waiting for? Harness your bike and start exploring!

Header image credit: Vilim Hlušička, Sindikat biciklista (Facebook page)

Author: Karla Knežević