Bike sales spike: More Tucsonans taking the road less travelled for their commutes

TUCSON, Ariz. (KGUN) — “Biking used to be a thing of the past and now it’s probably going to be a thing of the future,” said Jacob Jarvis, Tucson resident.

Jarvis rides his bike almost everywhere. He says Tucson’s loop and bike lanes make it easy to get around.

“Every road has really wide bike lanes, especially Broadway," Jarvis said. "It's like four bikes wide and the loop will take you anywhere. Theres nowhere that’s been hard for me to get to on the bike.”

Compared to drivers, he’s saving hundreds on his commute.

“After the initial investment of buying the bike, just getting spare tires and tubes I probably only pay like $30-40 a month, and that’s riding 150 miles a week,” Jarvis said.

Commuting by bike used to be the road less traveled, but now many Tucsonans are making the switch.

“We have had people coming in specifically saying I'm looking at riding a bicycle because of high gas prices,” said Brett Stueland, Manager of Roadrunner Bicycles.

Stueland says they hit a slump in bike sales at the beginning of February. But since gas prices increased, bike sales jumped.

“We went from like one to two per week to one to two per day so that’s really good for us,” Stueland said.

Bike shops around town are seeing the same trend.

“Sales of commuter bikes have definitely gone up in the past 2-3 weeks,” said Jenna Majchrzak, Owner of Transit Cycles.

Majchrzak says more people are upgrading their old bikes to be more commuter-friendly

“They’re asking for more comfortable seat, they’re asking for racks and panniers to make commuting easier for them so they don’t have to wear a backpack," Majchrzak said. "So we’ve been outfitting a lot more older bikes into comfortable upright commuters.”

It’s a trend bike shop owners and cyclists expect to continue for a while.