BIKES OF MELBOURNE: EMILY CONLIN

It has become unavoidable to walk around the city of Melbourne and not come across someone using a bike as transportation. Proven to be better for your health and the environment, many commuters opt for the use of a bike in order to get to and from their destination instead of trains, cars and buses. Hence, the CBD of Melbourne has become chaotic with thousands of bicycles being rode daily and not enough space to house them all. Within this collection, this chaos and variety of purpose that people exhibit while using a bike is displayed. Specifically around RMIT and the State Library, bike racks are overloaded by the common bicycle. Yet, not all of them are used for the same purpose.

This particular shot not only captures the chaos of Melbourne in the background; busy people crossing the intersection alongside the tram, but too presents the different purposes people have when riding a bike in the city. Food delivery services have risen in popularity in the recent years, so much so that there is high demand for riders in the city for services such as Uber Eats. Here in this photo is an Uber Eats Driver, signified by the bulky backpack (something I have come to recognise well whilst living in Melbourne.) The rider is using a bicycle which is common due to the bike’s capability in getting to and from a location faster and being able to cut through alleys. Not only is there a food service rider in the frame, but a normal commuter in an orange helmet. It shows how difficult it is to capture a shot of a single rider at a time in Melbourne due to the high amount of bike users within the city.

No matter what there will always be bikes within the city, it is what they are used for that can be intriguing.