Sustainable mobility meets culture and, specifically, the culture of the bicycle understood as a chosen means of transport capable of proposing a different city model. It happens in Foggia with the cycle-presentation on Saturday 4 May at 6pm in the Parcocittà amphitheater which will welcome Ilaria Fiorillo, author of the book entitled ‘Of bicycles and other happiness’ (De Agostini, 2024). The green event will begin at 5.30 pm in the square in front of the church of Santa Maria del Carmine (Viale Primo Maggio) from where the writer and the participants will set off on two wheels (or with any sustainable means) to reach Parcocittà. The bicycle ride is part of the ‘Via Libera!’ initiatives, the campaign for the promotion of sustainable mobility in the city of Foggia and which for this event involves ‘DiVento’, Ubik, ‘Funny bike’ and ‘Fiab Foggia Ciclo Amici’.
‘Of bicycles and other happiness’. Moving around on your own legs without consuming anything other than your own energy, enjoying a slower pace, noticing the trees, the shops, the people we meet along the way, arriving at work awake and ready to face the day. But also enjoying the silence of a path through the fields, venting your emotions by pushing on the pedals, or knowing that you can arrive directly in front of the cinema without worrying about parking: there are many possible happinesses if you choose to live a life on two wheels. Riding a bicycle you explore, make friends, fall in love, keep your body and mind trained, learn empathy and discover the best bars in which to stop and eat a croissant.
Yet there are still many prejudices that often discourage those who would like to approach this means of transport. Ilaria’s love for cycling developed over time, one ride after another, along the streets of the cities in which she lived: Foggia, Rome and Milan each taught her something new, providing the backdrop for the birth of a passion that has become a real lifestyle.
In these pages Ilaria condenses her experience as a cyclist, activist and popularizer to provide lots of useful advice both to those who would like to use the bicycle but don’t know where to start, and to those who want to make the most of all its hidden potential and show us how it can change. a city improves – also for pedestrians and motorists – when it leaves more space for sustainable mobility. Of bicycles and other happiness is the manifesto of the modern cyclist, and at the same time a passionate declaration of love for the most beautiful means of transport of all. Because the bicycle is universal, free and democratic, and everyone can benefit from it. Just want it.
Ilaria Fiorillo. Born in ’92, Apulian by birth and Milanese by adoption, she is a cycle activist, that is, she works to promote cycling mobility. On the Instagram profile @milano_in_bicicletta she talks about her urban pedaling and long journeys, with the aim of encouraging the use of the bicycle, creating a community, telling stories, generating change. Her notoriety exploded in 2021, when in less than a month she crossed Italy by bike, from Lombardy to Foggia, documenting the feat on the internet. She writes the weekly newsletter ‘Cose di bici’, organizes events on two wheels and in 2023 she was elected ‘Bicycle Mayor of Milan’ by bycs, the global NGO based in Amsterdam that promotes urban change through the use of bicycles .
