Pardon me if this is a stupid question, but why did bicycles

>>2242457


Roads

well, the nobles rode horses and carriages so what was the point?
mobility of the lower classes wasn´t desirable in medieval europe

>>2242457
Rubber.

>>2242483
>>2242492
game over

>>2242483

But you did have roads, especially within cities.

>>2242488

The ability of moving messages, supplies, goods to market, etc wasn't important? The ability to expand a metropolitan's work base wasn't important?

>>2242492

And why is rubber necessary? Sure, a wooden wheel won't be as good as a modern tire, but again, carriages got around just fine.

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>>2242492

>>2242513
>But you did have roads, especially within cities.
Ever cycle on cobbles? After 5 minutes it gets extremely annoying, after a few hours you'll need medical attention.

>>2242523
And if the wheels are made of wood instead of rubber, well, forget about it.

>>2242523
>>2242533


But that's exactly what the Draisine was, and it was fairly widespread; a wooden wheeled primitive bicycle that primarily went on cobblestone.

>>2242541
And they were not practical. Bikes started to become mass produced only when Macadam allowed roads to be smooth.

> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macadam

>>2242561

I'm only really going off of wikipedia here, so take it with a grain of salt, but they were apparently "commercially viable" and several thousand were made and sold. That doesn't sound impractical.

Also, the use of "mass production" is tricky when you're talking about something manufactured in a country that still hadn't fully industrialized: You didn't even have trunk rail-lines by that point, and you're going to have a tough time arguing that those weren't practical.

>>2242578
Some of the early bikes were give n names such as "Bonebreaker" et cetera, quality of roads = quality of transport