The same high standard as for cars
Bicycle parking is like car parking: you want a place to park that’s convenient, which you can count on being available, and where you can expect your vehicle to be safe when you get back.
If any of those criteria are lacking—parking is too far away, you think you’ll have trouble finding a spot, or you’re going to seriously worry about your equipment being stolen—you will think twice about making the trip.
Bicycling is no different. What you expect about the parking is a big influence on whether you travel that way at all.
Good bike parking isn’t rocket science, but it does have some basic requirements.
1. High‑security, frame‑lockable racks
The first key is a strong, theft‑resistant bike rack that allows the user to lock their bicycle’s frame, along with at least one wheel, to the rack.
Experts have long been settled on the best design: it’s an “inverted U,” a simple shape of thick bent tubing that resembles an upside‑down letter “U.” It’s so called a staple rack or a hoop rack.
Measurement‑wise, it has two vertical posts typically spaced about 2 feet apart that turn towards each other at a height of about 3 feet and connect. The rack is bolted or otherwise fixed into concrete and spaced at least 2 feet away from anything else.
The inverted U is the gold standard in part because it is uniquely compatible with all different bicycle sizes and shapes. That means bikes with wide wheels, bikes that are long (i.e., “longtail” cargo bikes), bikes with frames that have limited access points, and bikes that use front and rear cargo mounts.
Other styles of racks tend to create problems for users, including that they tend to be incompatible with bikes that vary at all from the picture of a traditional skinny-wheel bike without any racks or gear.
The inverted U is simple to install and maintain (essentially a single bent steel tube connected to concrete with a few anchor bolts), inexpensive (a good one to hold two bikes is under $200 and less than $100 in bulk), and easy to find (lots of manufacturers make them). And it doesn’t have to be exactly a “U”—other variants that can work include a rounder half‑circle, a squarer shape, and designs with a crossbar.
Here’s a detailed bike rack selection guide.
2. Dependable availability
The second key to good bike parking is that riders can rely on finding a spot.
Mostly this means there needs to be a sufficient number of spaces. For starters, that’s at least two racks (which each hold two bikes) for any kind of establishment that has parking for cars: a corner shop, a café, a small office. If people are coming to you with a car, they can and want to come to you on a bike.
The number goes up from there and is based on the volume of people who visit. The basic idea is that if it’s ever full, you need more bike parking. Otherwise, it’s not parking a rider can depend on. Here’s a sizing chart for the amount of bicycle parking needed for buildings of different sizes and uses.
Bike parking that’s dependably available also needs to be in a convenient location that is protected from being taken up by other uses, such as cars, motorcycles, stored items, or other material that gets in the way of parking bikes.
3. In addition to short‑term parking, locked enclosures for longer stays
The third key is that places where riders intend to park their bikes for more than a few hours—otherwise known as long‑term parking—generally need a locked physical enclosure.
There are at least four groups of people who need long‑term bicycle parking:
- Residents of multidwelling housing. These are people who live in multifamily buildings such as apartments, condos, co‑ops, dorms, and similar complexes. It also includes students in dorms, shared apartments, and co‑ops who rely on bikes for daily trips.
- Workers who need to park extended periods for their job. This means employees in office, retail, service, and industrial settings. It also includes commercial and delivery riders, both gig workers and cargo fleets, who require a stable base of operations.
- Longer‑stay visitors. People doing errands and other tasks that can go more than a few hours. This could be shoppers, patients, and clients. It includes participants in meetings and conferences, and students going to class and using campus facilities for longer periods. It is people completing everyday business and also less common activities that take a while.
- Travelers connecting with mass transit. People who ride their bike to connect with buses, trains, and ferries. This category also includes people flying who find biking the best way to get to and from the airport.
Here’s a briefing with more detail on the types of needs for users who are staying for longer periods.
For these groups, parked bicycles are extremely vulnerable: no matter how good their personal lock or the quality of the bike rack, a determined thief with a battery‑powered saw from a hardware store can defeat anything in less than a few minutes.
Moreover, bicycles are easy to carry (or just ride) off. They are valuable, pound‑for‑pound, and easy to sell on the black market. And the bicycle’s components and stored cargo are just sitting out in the open.
So, for a user to park a bicycle for more than a few hours and have peace of mind, they need something more than a rack—they need a locked physical enclosure with carefully controlled access.
Types of such enclosures include an indoor bike room, a secure cage in a garage or parking structure, a standalone secure shed or dedicated bike building, a modular, movable bike station or pod, and individual bike lockers. Here is a guide with more detail on types of locked enclosures for long‑term bicycle parking stays.
For enclosures that are accessed by multiple users (essentially, all except individual lockers or space controlled by an insured valet), you still need bike racks, and the staple of those needs to be inverted U racks mounted on the ground.
Here’s a briefing with more detail on types of locked enclosures for long-term bicyle parking stays.
4. A network of good bike parking everywhere
The last important key to good bike parking is to make good bicycle facilities—the kind described above—ubiquitous.
In other words, good bike parking isn’t just here or there. It’s everywhere.
It’s a network of facilities in which you don’t have to change the mode you take because of gaps, or uncertainty, or time spent thinking about it.
It’s a confident expectation you have that it will be where you need to go, like you have with parking for a car.
What does it take to create a network of good bike parking everywhere in communities? The most direct way is public policy, and there are two basic approaches. The first is to enact legally mandated minimum parking standards. Many U.S. cities have done this with a focus on requirements for developers of new buildings.
The upside of this approach is that it’s an essentially fail‑safe way to make sure great bike parking is established when new developments are built. The downside is that the pace of installing new bike parking is limited to the pace of new building—which, in the typical U.S. town that is already well‑developed, means it will take many decades to catalyze a meaningful new bike parking network.
The second approach is to go beyond codes for new developments and be creative about closing the gap today. This is new territory for city governments and will require problem‑solving and partnerships. It’s also an opportunity for private pro
These four keys to good bike parking are not exhaustive. There are some additional requirements, which are generally modest and intuitive, like making sure bicycle parking areas are near front entrances and feel safe to be in. And there are some things you can do to really make bike parking sing, like building roofs over outdoor racks to protect users from the elements. perty owners and managers as well as service providers to step in and lead. (Here’s a fuller installation guide for bike racks and short-term bike parking more generally.)
But these four keys—(1) high‑security, frame‑lockable racks, (2) dependable availability, (3) locked enclosures for longer stays, and (4) a network of conforming facilities everywhere—overcome the most important and issues and get communities on their way to bike parking their residents and visitors deserve.
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