Roadbiking in Chicago Suburbs

Do you have the problem I had until recently of not knowing the local roads to bike on, loosing your way, ending up on a gravel trail on your nice road bike, or a heavily trafficked highway? Here’s how to solve this. Go to

http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/

This website, based on Google Maps, lets you create routes by putting markers on each intersection etc, and then exporting them to gpx format, which most handheld gps devices can read. And if it seems like you need to go on a more busy road, zoom in and switch to satellite view to check if the shoulder is wide enough to bike on. Now if you use an old Mapsource version, like me, you need to go to http://www.gpsbabel.org/ after creating the gpx file so you can convert it to mps format before importing it in mapsource and transferring it to your gps. The route I biked today shows up on Google Earth like this.

Although I am surprised how courteous suburban drivers are towards bicyclists (more so than Santa Barbarian drivers), next time I would avoid Naperville Road going up through Wheaton, where certain drivers got the ‘if looks could kill’ look aimed at their rear view mirrors after passing less then a foot away from the handle bars. Other than that, I have to say most drivers here go all the way to the left of their lane and give you plenty of space. But that said, you only need one driver who is dialing somebody on their phone to spoil the fun so keep your helmet on… I rarely carry my SLR camera on my road bike on short rides, but here’s a couple of pics snapped with my cell phone in the Wheaton College area (sorry for the bad quality….).