bixi-bike-montreal12,000 people have signed up to ride their bicycle to work Friday in the Washington, D.C. area in celebration of the 57th annual Bike To Work Day. The nation’s capitol ranks sixth on a new list of the Ten Most Bikable Cities.

America is way behind much of the rest of the world in urban cycling opportunities. In fact, Montreal is the only city in North America to make a list of top 20 biking cities globally, but there are some bright spots.

Biking map site BikeScore has ranked the country’s most forward-leaning cities for cycling, accounting for factors like bike lanes, hilliness, route options, and number of commuters.

Small cities, like Cambridge, Boulder and Davis, Calif., ranked higher but were too small to make it on this list. Of all the big cities with populations of 500,000 people or more, these ranked highest:

  1. Portland (70.3)
  2. San Francisco (70)
  3. Denver (69.5)
  4. Philadelphia (68.4)
  5. Boston (67.8)
  6. Washington, D.C. (65.3)
  7. Seattle (64.1)
  8. Tucson (64.1)
  9. New York (62.3)
  10. Chicago (61.5)

Among the worst are Fort Worth, Texas, scoring 38.5, and Charlotte, NC, with 35.

(READ the full story in Fast CoExist)

Photo credit: Bixi Bike Share program, Montreal

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