How wheel lights helped my kids pedal past night riding fears

Kids are almost universally afraid of the dark. Even in their safe spaces, with their own comfort items and the safety of being at home with their family, the darkness of night can still feel scary to a child. They can’t see. They don’t know what is lurking in the darkness. Monsters and imagination fill the corners of the night. Kids move tensely, nervously, until the space is lit.

Knowing this, I’m not surprised my children complained about riding bikes in the dark. They are afraid and they don’t like it. Can’t we just drive instead? They ask. I try not to force my children to do something that makes them uncomfortable. When it comes to night biking, the danger of darkness has more reality than the ubiquitous monster-under-the-bed: they’re afraid that cars won’t see them. And that’s a very legitimate worry.

Last year we tried to mitigate this fear by picking up my son from swim practice. He rode his bike to practice in the daylight, but by the end of practice, winter darkness fell thickly round. My husband or I would ride out to meet him, accompanying him home so that he didn’t have to ride home alone at night. Still, he didn’t like riding at night, even with a parent along. Our presence wasn’t enough to make him feel safe.

All my children share these fears. But if we give up on night biking, we’ll have to drive most everywhere come fall/winter. It gets dark early. And I really don’t want the coming of the night to force us into our minivan, especially for our short-distance trips (many of which are less than a mile). 

This fall, I’ve been trying to troubleshoot the various scenarios that push us to drive, to see if I can find solutions that will get us out biking more often. For example, biking often takes more time, and when we’re worried we’ll be late, or when we are simply feeling overwhelmed with all of our “to dos,” we drive to save time. To address this, I’ve been trying to do a better job with advance planning and preparation.

We are trying to get ready-to-go earlier, and leave earlier, so that we aren’t tempted to drive at the last moments. I have also begun to do big-batch-bulk cooking, which doesn’t sound “bike related” — but it is! I have a garage freezer full of dinners, lots of soups, chilis, and pasta-bakes. I have dinners that are ready to just warm up and eat, which means I am not feeling stressed about getting home and cooking–which would otherwise have been a reason to drive and not-bike, because I wanted to save a few minutes and the energy expenditure of pedaling. With dinner already made (on the weekend or slow days when time is plentiful), I can enjoy an evening bike ride home, without feeling stressed about the cooking.

As for that night biking problem, the solution I’ve found are wheel spoke lights. I don’t know why it took me years to finally invest in these! My children love them. They were won over immediately. As soon as the first set was installed, the kids were captivated and all begging for their bike to be next. They were so excited, they begged me to take them for a night time bike ride. 

So out into the night we’ve gone, and the lights are brilliant. My husband has laughed at how incredibly bright and visible we are — like our own, lit-up bike parade. Cars have stopped and stared at us, and noticeably slowed down when passing us. The change in driver behavior has been striking. My kids recognize they are brightly visible, and they feel confident and empowered to ride at night.

On a particularly late ride, my daughter exclaimed, “That was so much fun! We were the only ones on the road!” With the low traffic and bright lights, I might even feel safer to night-time bike with the kids than in daylight during rush hour. With the bright flashing lights, my kids are visible even when behind a parked car. The lights alert drivers they’re coming, before their body or bike is visible around an obstruction. 

These wheel spoke lights have turned night biking from a scary dread to a favorite activity. 

My son said he was the talk of swim team practice and everyone thought his wheel lights were so cool! And for the first time, he decided to make the night-time ride home on his own, wheel lights blazing.

— Some local bike shops carry lights like this. But I’d call before heading over. You can also find all sorts of wheel lights for sale online by searching for “wheel lights.”