Word.ws English Dictionary

bikewashing

bikewashing noun: the practice by people, organizations and states of presenting themselves as bike-friendly without making meaningful changes to promote the use of active means of transport.

Noun

bikewashing (uncountable)

  1. The practice by people, organizations and states of presenting themselves as bike-friendly without making meaningful changes to promote the use of active means of transport.
    • […] today the phrase bikewashing has also taken on another meaning. The phenomenon is the two-wheeled equivalent to greenwashing. It’s when companies attempt to make their products seem “bike-friendly” even if what they are advertising has absolutely nothing to do with bikes or bettering the bike...2017 August 22, “Bikewashing: The Two-Wheeled Equivalent to Greenwashing”, in Ground Control Systems
    • Local groups like Bike Portland have challenged the street-level alterations included in the I-5 project, which make up just a small fraction of total costs, as being used by the Oregon DOT for “greenwashing, bikewashing, and safety-washing yet another massive investment in automobile-oriented...2019 June 28, Gideon Weissman, “Boondoggle: Portland Takes a Step Backward”, in Streets Blog USA

Examples of bikewashing in a sentence

  • […] today the phrase bikewashing has also taken on another meaning.2017 August 22, “Bikewashing: The Two-Wheeled Equivalent to Greenwashing”, in Ground Control Systems:
  • Then there was bikewashing, the same thing but for bikes.2019 August 13, Matt L, “Safety-washing?”, in Greater Auckland:

Forms of bikewashing

alternative formbike-washing

Origin of bikewashing

Blend of bike + whitewashing (or bike + -wash + -ing), patterned after greenwashing.

Questions about bikewashing

What does bikewashing mean?
Bikewashing means the practice by people, organizations and states of presenting themselves as bike-friendly without making meaningful changes to promote the use of active means of transport.
How do you use bikewashing in a sentence?
[…] today the phrase bikewashing has also taken on another meaning.
What part of speech is bikewashing?
Bikewashing is a noun.

Words near bikewashing in the dictionary

  1. bikeshedded
  2. bikeshedding
  3. bikesheds
  4. biketard
  5. biketards
  6. bikewashing
  7. bikeway
  8. bikeways
  9. bikewear
  10. bikey
  11. bikeys

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: bikewashing (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “bikewashing.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/bikewashing. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.