Getting that stroller on your bike can vastly increase your cycling joy. (Photos: Shannon Johnson/BikePortland)
While I am making changes to our family’s lifestyle to make it more bikeable, I have also found that I can do much of what I was already doing without the car. As I continue to ask myself, “why not bike?” when I reach for the car keys, I often discover that there is a bike-possible solution for my car plans.
One of my biking deterrents was that I didn’t have a stroller once I arrived at my destination. Originally, I just took a baby carrier and I would carry my little guy once we arrived wherever we were going. But at age one, he’s heavy and squirmy and I really needed a place I could put him down without having to chase him every second. This particularly applies to library visits, as I am unable to bend down and pick books off shelves while trying to hold or corral a wiggly toddler. The temptation was to drive to the library so that I could haul a stroller in the minivan trunk. But, like so much else, I soon discovered that carrying the stroller by bike, with the kid(s), is possible.
In my case, the solution was simple: I purchased some Voile straps after seeing them used on other bikes like mine to lash a child’s bike to the mama bike. (Newer Bunch Bikes come with nifty hooks so that you can use these straps to carry backpacks and other cargo from the sides of the box.) Using these straps, I am able to easily secure an umbrella stroller to the front of my bike box. I strap around my canopy rails, but I imagine these useful straps could be rigged to work with different bikes.
Nifty rack attachment for carrying baby strollers.
What if you don’t have a box bike? Don’t give up! A Dutch company has a solution for that too: the Steco Buggy Mee is a carrier for an umbrella stroller that attaches easily to a back rack on a standard bicycle (see how easy it is in this video).
While you can’t order the Buggy Mee directly from the company, I have found a few for sale with other online retailers or resale marketplaces. I would love to see a Portland bike shop become a Steco dealer, so we can get this Buggy Mee stroller caddy stocked in local shops (along with a lot of other cool Steco bike accessories). If you are a local Portland-area shop, and you are able to order the Steco Buggy Mee, please let us know.
Getting even more creative, parents might consider this Taga bike which converts into a stroller.
This is all to say that you can do a lot more by bicycle than you might originally think. When you are tempted to believe that your bike can’t do what you need, step out of the car-centric box and look for a biking solution. You might be surprised by what you can find!
If you have found a creative way to tote your stroller by bicycle, let us know. We’d love to see how you do it.
