The 5 Most-Bikeable Large Cities within the USA — Can You Identify Them?

PeopleForBikes does annual rankings of the most-bikeable cities within the USA. It ranks cities in three classes — massive, medium, and small. Varied components go into the rankings. Naturally, it takes time to make large modifications in bike infrastructure or launch large bike packages, so rankings don’t change dramatically, however some distinctive packages and insurance policies can shoot a metropolis up the rankings pretty quick.

This 12 months has a brand new #1, however there’s additionally a slight asterisk there. PeopleForBikes determined this 12 months to separate out the 5 boroughs of New York Metropolis (NYC) as particular person “cities.” The brand new #1 is Brooklyn, NY, with 73 factors. It knocked former #1 Minneapolis to #2, however when you take a look at the graph under, Brooklyn would have gained in 2024 as properly, after a pointy rise in bikeability from 2023 to 2024. Minneapolis scored 72 factors on the PeopleForBikes score system.

Seattle claimed third (with 66 factors), after which Queens and San Francisco tied for 4th (with 63 factors every).

Within the midsized metropolis class, #1 was David, California, which has been essentially the most bikeable metropolis within the US for … many years. It scored 81 factors. In 2nd place was Berkeley, CA, with 73 factors. Corvallis, Oregon, took third place with 71 factors, and Boulder, Colorado, took 4th place with 70 factors. Rounding out the highest 5 was Cambridge, Massachusetts, with 68 factors.

You’ll have a tougher time figuring out the cities within the small metropolis class, however on the high is a metropolis with an ideal rating of 100! That’s Mackinac Island, Michigan, which is car-free. Therefore the right rating. Provincetown, Massachusetts, took 2nd place with a rating of 96, and Sauk Metropolis, Wisconsin, took third place with a rating of 90. There was then a four-way tie for 4th! With a rating of 89, now we have Springdale, UT; Washburn, WI; Fayette, MO; and Murdock, NE.

One good factor to see is how a lot geographical variation there’s throughout these rankings. True, the East Coast and the West Coast do dominate, however there are additionally cities from states in the midst of the US. Right here’s a chart displaying the highest 10 cities in every class:

“These famous person cities gained their spectacular scores on the power of gradual native velocity restrict insurance policies, linked and guarded bike lane networks, next-level knowledge transparency and three different components that collectively make up the group’s methodology. However they didn’t outshine the lower-ranked cities on the listing, a minimum of when it got here to 1 key metric: how rapidly they’re getting higher,” Streetsblog writes.

“And contemplating that 234 U.S. cities scored 50 or greater within the rankings this 12 months — up from simply 33 cities in 2019 — the race for ‘most-improved’ was arguably steeper than the race for the highest spot.” Certainly! And that’s the large, nice takeaway — tons of of cities throughout america are enhancing their bikeability 12 months after 12 months. Bike infrastructure retains enhancing, roads are being made safer, and increasingly more bike-oriented packages are being launched. A easy however extremely efficient coverage, nevertheless, is simply reducing velocity limits (which additionally makes vehicles extra gasoline environment friendly). One small metropolis — Hailey, Idaho — jumped from 24 factors to 77 factors after town dropped velocity limits to fifteen to twenty mph on many streets.

Circling again to New York Metropolis, PeopleForBikes writes: “For the primary time, this 12 months’s rankings divide New York Metropolis into its 5 boroughs, recognizing the local-level work being finished to enhance bicycling. Three boroughs landed within the high 10 greatest massive U.S. cities for biking for 2025: Manhattan took the #10 spot with a rating of 51 (out of a attainable 100), Queens got here in at #4 with a rating of 63, and Brooklyn took this 12 months’s #1 spot with a rating of 73, narrowly surpassing final 12 months’s top-scoring massive metropolis, Minneapolis.

“So how did Brooklyn turn out to be the very best massive U.S. metropolis for biking? A powerful community of secure and linked locations to trip. New York Metropolis as an entire is residence to 1,550 miles of motorcycle lanes, bike paths, and neighborhood greenways, making it North America’s largest bicycle community. Brooklyn particularly has extra miles of motorcycle lanes than every other borough.”

I sit up for seeing the 2026 rankings and the way issues change!

Many extra particulars on this 12 months’s rankings might be discovered right here and right here.