Over the last few years a cargo bike has become something much bigger to us than just a way of getting around the city. It’s a bit of a second car, a bit of a daily mini-expedition, and a bit of a way of taking the city back with the kids.
We’ve ridden quite a few cargo bikes around Warsaw already. The Dutch Dolly we use daily, the Polish Stork, regular trailers and child seats. But sooner or later one topic always came back. Babboe. Because it’s hard to talk about family cargo bikes without ever riding the most classic long john in Europe.
The Babboe Mini, in the Mountain version, is a typical urban cargo bike, but a non-typical long john. The Mini version is 20 cm shorter than the larger Babboe City, which makes the bike easier to manoeuvre and a bit lighter. We got the chance to test it pretty intensively for more than two weeks, taking Mania and Jas to nursery almost every day, and Basia along for trips. Karolina also rode it to work.
Babboe is a Dutch brand that Warsaw residents got to know a while ago. Babboe was one of the first to partner with Warsaw City Hall, lending their bikes to a few selected cafes around the city so they could be borrowed for free. Thanks to that, the urban cargo bike became a permanent part of the city’s landscape.
O tym przeczytasz
Babboe Mini, the short cargo bike
A lot has changed since then. Babboe has also gone through a big shift, an image one. Their bikes started attracting attention on the streets just by how they look. The box design changed, from clunky to beautifully rounded shapes. When we first saw the Babboe Mini at a picnic organised by towarowe.pl, we were really curious whether it would handle more easily than the other cargo bikes we’d had a chance to test.
As daily users of a cargo bike, the first question we get from people we meet at traffic lights is the price. Right after that comes the question of how an urban cargo bike like this rides. It rides very easily, and the Babboe Mini does ride more easily still. Those 20 cm really do make a noticeable difference when it comes to the bike’s turning. Sometimes the manoeuvrability is even surprising. But more on that in a moment.
Since the bike is shorter, the box itself is smaller. As often happens in nature, something for something. With two older kids, the truth about the Mini version comes out very quickly. The kids fit comfortably. The backpack, not necessarily. The shopping ends up at their feet, and jackets hang on the handlebars.
The first kilometres around Warsaw
We have to honestly admit that Babboe surprised us with the quality of the components. Nowhere can you see anyone making compromises in the design or the build. Although of course small flaws do happen :-). The bike is really comfortable, the perfectly shaped handlebars improve confidence while riding, and holding them for a longer time doesn’t tire you out, the way it did, for example, on the Stork.
The centrally mounted Yamaha motor, which comes with the Mountain version, was also a positive surprise for us. It provides assistance comfortable enough that even our “favourite” hill on the way to nursery doesn’t raise our heart rate. Assistance cuts out at 25 km/h. There’s no need to go any faster anyway, especially with kids on board. The motor is paired with a fairly interesting NuVinci 330 hub. You have to get used to it, because gear changes are smooth (you don’t feel any clicks, because there are no clicks), and the gear indicator is shown as a cyclist, either riding on the flat or climbing a hill.
The weakest element of the Babboe Mini
Considering that everything has its place on this bike and is well thought out, there’s one thing that’s a real outrage: the kickstand. We get that the Dutch designed the bike for the standards of Western European bike paths and routes, but what happens to the kickstand on our Warsaw paths and streets is really irritating. The stand itself is very convenient, and putting the bike up and down on it is easy (even with two kids on board, for Karolina who weighs around fifty-some kilos), but why it isn’t secured during the ride, that we can’t understand. Any kerb and it bounces up and down so much that you get the feeling that if you hit it badly (one pothole after another), the bike will catch on the kickstand. Of course you can rig up your own extra lock (magnet or velcro), but is that what you’d expect from a bike costing 17,000 PLN (around €4,000)? Probably not.
Less room, more manoeuvrability
Why do we want to give the box its own paragraph? Apart from being very well made and good-looking at the same time, it’s assembled from five separate panels. At first, even in conversation with towarowe.pl, we said it was a fairly odd solution. Obviously it has its basis in physics. The European beech plywood used here would simply be subjected to too much stress during riding if it were a single piece. This solution also has one more serious advantage that we found out about ourselves. When Karolina met a bollard on a pedestrian crossing, we damaged the front panel of the box. With any other cargo we’d have had to replace the whole box. With Babboe you only need to replace that one element.
The box itself, as we mentioned earlier, is in our view too small for two kids plus any luggage. But we have to be very honest and say that two kids sit in there very comfortably. On top of that, the only cargo space under the bench is partly taken up by the battery, which lives there.
How does it work with kids?
In most cargo bikes we’ve tested, including the Babboe, the kids’ belts are pretty poorly solved. Their attachment point sits at shoulder-blade height, which makes them hard to adjust so they don’t slip off the kids’ shoulders during the ride. Although we have to admit that the belts are vastly easier to fasten than in our Dolly. Seems like nothing, and yet the system of separately fastening the left and right belt really does make a difference here.
Over the nearly 100 km we covered on the Babboe Mini, not once did we feel unsure on it. Even Karolina, just before meeting the bollard, dodging a fast-moving car, was confident she’d fit through :-).
Another interesting solution for kids who can already sit, but not stably enough to stay on the bench by themselves, is an additional insert. Interestingly, it’s universal enough that you can use it in most cargo bikes. As you can see, Basia took to it.
Mini or the bigger version?
We were asking ourselves this question from the very start. Who is the Babboe Mini Mountain for, and why not go for the bigger version, which costs essentially the same, the Babboe City Mountain? Just to remind everyone, they only differ in length. Together we came to the conclusion that the Mini is for people who are fighting with length, meaning they need to fit the bike into a lift, for instance, or have limited space in the garage. Otherwise it’s definitely worth going for the City version, which is also confirmed by sales statistics in Poland.
After those two weeks we had a sense that Babboe really understands urban family life. It isn’t perfect, because that bike probably doesn’t exist, but for the first time we really understood why for so many families in Europe a cargo bike has become a normal means of transport, and not just a curiosity.
Stick around for more.
