For one reason or another, I never used to ride bikes. Ever. It might have had something to with the fact that I didn’t even learn to ride a bike until I was about thirteen (already a full man in my Jewish tradition). I still remember one vivid incident where I fell and cut my lip, and actually cried out of pain and frustration as my 7-year-old competeror got his first sucessful launch into manhood on two wheels.

I first learned to love biking this past year in Amsterdam, as I cruised around the grey city and its Ã¼ber-hip inhabitants on a fixie fixer-upper straight out of Portlandia (see video above – ugh, lofts, why?!). As I navigated the city to some sweet bicycle tunes, it became abundently clear to me that the one thing I wanted to bring back to Tarawno with me was my newfound love of cycling (in addition to an impractical preference for tiny coffee and some weird clothes with big buttons and leather patches). 

Upon my return, I found that Toronto can suck for cyclists. The reason, perhaps pretty obvious to most of you, is the city’s serious lack of bike lanes. It’s terrifying to ride next to drivers on Yonge, who really seem like their sole mission is to reenact the bike accident scene from that Cronenberg movie when a woman grows a penis under her arm. 

With the lack of bike lanes, and BIXI’s financial woes, at least Torontonians have Ride the City, a website that helps to plan your bike route. Paying special attention to greenbelts and bike lanes, the website also allows users to rate its paths, and thus becomes more and more reliable with more users. Check it out, and get ready to gear up for summer. 

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Jeremy Schipper is an intern at Toronto Standard. You can follow him on Twitter at @jeromeoschipps.