River-side cycling roads.
Hello Warren,
This is Travis.
Riding in Tokyo really depends on where you live, but for uninterrupted riding on flat ground with no traffic lights, you have to hit the rivers.
The main ones are:
Arakawa.
Tamagawa.
and Edogawa.
My personal preference is Arakawa; It's wide, and it goes up for at least 70km/40miles. However, as Pete has already mentioned, the wind can be really nasty - depending on when (in which season) you ride.
Tamagawa is not too bad for distance, but it's very narrow, and a lot of people use it on weekends - old couples, families etc, just going for a stroll, or taking their kids out on their new bikes. Only after you've gone up a certain distance can you really pick up the pace.
Edogawa is similar to Tamagawa in road width - ie. pretty narrow - but it's not as crowded. After you ride up about 10km/6miles, there are very few people. It's not as long as the other rivers (only 50km/30miles), but after that, it joins onto Tonegawa - the border between Chiba-prefecture and Ibaraki-prefecture.
I've never ridden along Tonegawa, but apparently, although it's really long, the road condition is not too good.
In the warmer months though, you can hit the mountains - Okutama-ko is a favorite! It's starting to get a bit too cold now, and it snows up there.
But come spring, there are quite a few good mountain roads in the Takao, Otsuki area - Training grounds for hill-climbing races.
Hope this helps!
Your best bet though, is to grab a map, and find your closest river.
Rubber down! T
