Written by Amanda Marie Hourt
With green fever and difficult economic times, Harding students have found that bicycles are a fast and inexpensive way to get across campus.
According to junior Alyssa Davidson, bicycles are becoming a popular alternative to walking or driving while in college because they are fast, convenient and cheap.
“It usually cuts down travel time between classes by half,” Davidson said. “And it doesn’t cost anything.”
Riding a bicycle has other benefits too, like being healthy and environmentally friendly, junior Richard Hill said.”We are becoming a society that values fitness and shrinking our carbon footprint as much as possible,” Hill said. “Biking has become the ‘in’ thing to do. What was once ridiculed as a children’s toy is finally being recognized as one of the fastest, healthiest and most Eco-friendly ways to get around campus.”
Hill said he also thinks that bicycles are more common on campus than they used to be. He said that when he came to Harding as a freshman, he often saw two or three bicycles parked outside a building at any given time, but now he is not surprised to see 10 or 20.
“There are definitely more bikes now than there were when I was a freshman, but more importantly, there are more bike riders,” Hill said. “I know this because they’re taking my parking spots.”
Bicycles are fun too, Hill said. “I love the feeling of the wind rushing past my face and through my hair. It’s almost an addiction.”Mathew Benthin, a student in theCAMTprogram, said his bicycle was stolen while he was on a mission trip to Japan last summer, and that he really misses it. He said he was able to get places faster, and that it was easier to stay cool during hot weather when he had a bicycle, because the wind created by his speed cooled him off.For more information on college students who ride bicycles, go to Nate Desmond’s article “Why every college student should ride a bike.”
