The Paynes are a one-car family, and they rarely use that one car. In addition to their own bikes, they have a beautiful bright red bakfiets (box bike) called Ruby that makes carless family travel pretty painless. Its wooden box provides the space of a small car trunk, without having to pay for the gas.
To drive or to bike?
Their travel mode depends on the load and distance. Mostly, they drive when grandma comes for a visit, their destination is too far, or they have a load too big to carry by bike, like Ikea furniture or their 95 lb dog.
How much can they haul?
I often see Sara at the farmer’s market with a week’s worth of produce in her bakfiets. She can also haul a week’s worth of shopping from Costco and Trader Joe’s, which she picks up all in one day. She loads Ruby up with the groceries carefully packed around Liam.
How far can they go?
Sean, their 3rd grader, is capable of riding 15 miles round trip. Liam, their little guy, doesn’t go that far, but Sara has ridden him in Ruby as far as the Stanford Shopping center and through the Stanford campus.
More about the family:
The Paynes live at the Mountain View / Los Altos border near Saint Francis High School. Their whole family is into cycling on a variety of levels.
- Bryan is a former racer turned recreational cyclist who also enjoys using a bike as a primary means of transportation. When it isn't soccer season, he enjoys taking long rides on the weekends up to Skyline. His city bike also gets plenty of miles between getting to work, shopping, and shuttling the kids around town.
- Sara is an indoor cycling instructor at the El Camino YMCA. She loves using the bike as her primary mode of transportation. She also enjoys recreational cycling including weekend get-a-ways and gran fondos.
- Sean is their soon-to-be 3rd grader. He proudly rides his Islabike to school every day, and to soccer games, and more.
- Liam is about to enter kindergarten. He recently graduated from a Cleary Hedgehog to an electric green 20" Islabike. He rides it as much as possible, including to and from pre-school last year, camps this summer, and regular visits to the Mountain View Library.
Because of their kids, and also because they believe that improving cycling infrastructure will improve the city, their entire family are strong advocates for things like Vision Zero, 8 to 80, protected bike lanes, and much more. They are some of Safe Mountain View's newest members, and we're happy to have them on the team!
