http://www.straightdope.com/mailbag/mgirlbikes.html
I don’t have the sources to back it up, but I have always believed (was told?) that the design of girls bikes was a hold over from the early days of the bicycle when women wore long dresses. Obviously a straight bar would require the women to lift their legs or dresses high enough to see too much for most tastesand once on, the dress would ride up in the middle, thus exposing their forbidden ankles or worse!
Well, looks like the author of the article agrees with you.
SDSTAFF Jill
I hope you aren’t a engineer proposing to make the step-over bar lower. :mad: I like an occasional glimpse of ankle.
As someone who used to wear a skirt as part of a school uniform and ride a bike to school, I can tell you that the lower bar does make it a bit easier to mount the bike with one’s modesty intact even with modern knee-length skirts. However, you certainly can ride a boy’s/men’s/high-bar bike in a skirt without hearing songs about London and France - the mounting just takes a little practice, is all. I imagine with a longer skirt there’d also be a question of where you put all that fabric…
Also, Jill says “most women and men ride bicycles with top tubes now because it makes for a stronger frame” which is true, but I think strong frames were possible before–they were just heavier. And now bikes are lighter than horseshoes.
The traditional design of girls’ bike, with the parallel down-tubes, is bloody awful, and is heavier, weaker and bendier than the usual diamond frame. The lack of top-tube was more to facilitate elegant mounting/dismounting than to accomodate a skirt while in motion.
Fortuntely the trend for mountain bikes with low or sloping top-tubes as standard has stifled the sales of the old girls’ monstrosity.
If you want a proper ladybike, get a mixte design frame. They’re light(ish), strong and rigid. Don’t forget the woman-specific saddle (different pelvis bone shape) and to match the crank lengths to your leg length, if you can be bothered to take it that far. Long cranks with short legs don’t work well, and vice-versa.
What? Of course they were possible before, by using a top tube, exactly as Jill said. Her point is that once, only men rode them, whereas NOW, women also ride them, because female bicyclists are no longer so obsessed with “modesty.” Are you so desperate for something to quibble at that you’ll make one up if no one provides it?
Yeah, this is a moot point as to the OP, as JillGat mentioned that.
Just to chime in that I am female, and had a racking experience on the crossbar of a bike as well. Didn’t outright puke, but had hit hard enough that I sure felt like it. Almost passed out…Nature’s way of letting ya know that those reproductive structures are to be protected.
Well, as one who drives a vintage style ladies’ bike every day, I’d like to add my five cents: it’s safer in case of an accident. Not a one involving a head-on collision with a car, no, but a one where you tip sideways until the ground stops you.
I’ve nearly fallen on my side twice, trying to turn on an icy road, but without the crossbar, I managed disentangle myself from the bike so that only the bike that went down.
The one time I actually had a fall with a bike was driving a similar make of bike as mine, but a men’s model. I just wasn’t limber enough to leap from the seat, and down I went. But I bet the dress is the reason for the lower bar. Better entanglement-avoidance’s just an added plus.
