To bike or not to bike?

This is Paola's bike. It's a Devinci Milano. She bought it yesterday for $429 from the Bike Doctor, on West Broadway. Paola is the web production coordinator here at Granville Online, and she has thoughts about digital media, and today she rode to work for the very first time. It was a ten-kilometer trip.

Well, actually it would have been ten kilometers. Paola rode her bike to Broadway Station, and let the train take her the rest of the way to work. She plans to ride all the way home, she says. We're laying bets at the office; we reckon the odds are fifty-fifty she'll actually do it.

Paola decided to get on her bike because, as she says, it's a good way to reduce her carbon output while getting some exercise. She's not alone: so far in 2008, according to the Vancouver Area Cycling Coalition, cyclists in Vancouver have ridden to work 10,976 times, covered 179,073 kilometres, and kept 42,261 tonnes of carbon out of the air.

A survey from Harris/Decima in the Vancouver Sun found 75 per cent of B.C. residents are willing to significantly alter their behaviour to fight climate change. I don't know about that stat—those "would you help out?" questions are the easiest ones in the world to lie on.

Extra watching: A StreetFilms short about Bike Day in four American cities: Austin, San Francisco, and Portland. Check it out.

Did Paola ride all the way home?