Steve Allen opens his garage door at his Northside Indianapolis house just before sunrise and prepares for one of those rituals of parenthood: taking his 6-year-old daughter, Emma, to school.

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Who needs a car? Steve Allen regularly uses a bicycle to transport his children, Emma and Greysen. Allen, a lifelong bicycling enthusiast, estimates he saves $12,000 a year by using a bike as his primary mode of transportation.(Robert Scheer)

At work: Steve Allen lights candles at his job as a waiter at St. Elmo Steakhouse. He gets to work -- how else? -- by bike.(Robert Scheer)

A place to park it: Steve Allen pushes one of his bicycles through the kitchen before starting a shift at St. Elmo.(Robert Scheer)

Only this is a morning commute with a two-wheeled twist.

Allen uses a bicycle — actually one of his five bicycles — for almost all of his daily transportation needs. He rides year-round in rain or snow, hot or cold.

Emma, dressed in her plaid-skirt school uniform, straps on her helmet and hops into the back of a yellow bike trailer. Allen, donning his own helmet, covers her with a blanket to guard from the morning chill and then mounts his Bianchi bicycle.

Allen, his bike and trailer shine and blink with a half-dozen lights and blinkers. “It looks like a Mardi Gras float,” he quipped.

Plenty of people already crisscross Indianapolis by bike, including urban hipsters delivering sandwiches aboard single-speed bikes Downtown and office workers heading to the Monon Trail for a weekend workout.

Yet few pedal with the zeal of Allen, who among the local cycling community is better known as “Tool” — a moniker he picked up two decades ago from co-workers when he was a rookie waiter battling for his share of tables at St. Elmo Steak House.

Allen, a 44-year-old ex-Marine with an affinity for punk rock, is a hard-core cyclist who typically rides 150 to 200 miles a week on daily errands and to his job as a waiter at St. Elmo Steakhouse.

He estimates he saves $12,000 a year on car insurance, gasoline, car payments and parking by living a close-to-carless lifestyle. His wife, Kellie, has a 2010 Subaru Outback, a vehicle Allen says he usually only drives or rides in when he’s with his wife or whole family.

The benefits are not just financial. Allen said cycling for transportation keeps his energy levels high and allows him the luxury of not counting calories.

“I’d rather start the day like that than sitting in the car cussing at my dashboard,” he said.

On a recent morning, Allen covered the roughly 6 miles from his home near Downtown to his daughter’s school on the Northside in roughly 25 minutes — roughly the time a motorist may allot for such a trip during the morning rush hour.

He pedals, trailer in tow, at a 12 to 15 mph pace — the speed limit Allen deems safest with the children’s trailer — navigating side streets until he reaches the nearly empty Monon Trail.

Those at Emma’s school have gotten used to her arriving by bike trailer. “I’ve heard some people refer to it as her chariot,” Kellie Allen said.

Bicycle experts and advocates point to people such as Allen as an example of just how many of life’s tasks can be accomplished without that staple of American life: the automobile. Bike advocates have touted cycling as part of the solution to lessening traffic congestion and creating more vibrant communities.

“In most American cities, it is still pretty difficult to live without a car for most people,” said Jeff Mapes, author of the book “Pedaling Revolution: How Cyclists are Changing American Cities.”

Yet Mapes — a cycling commuter who works as a reporter for the Oregonian newspaper in Portland, Ore. — also points to what he calls a quiet cycling subculture of people trading in cars for bikes.

For his book, Mapes visited with cycling commuters in communities stretching from Marin County in California to New York City to Amsterdam.

“It gave me a new sense of what you could do,” said Mapes, whose family has downgraded to one car from two.

Indianapolis has received some recognition for its cycling initiatives. The League of American Bicycles, a Washington-based advocacy group, recently recognized Indianapolis as a “bronze” level Bicycle Friendly Community. Bloomington and Carmel also were “bronze” cities — the group’s fourth level of recognition of bike friendliness.

The group looks for factors such as what resources have been dedicated to encourage cycling and what efforts have been made to educate cyclists and motorists.

In Indianapolis, bicycles accounted for just 0.3 percent of commutes in 2008, according to data tracked by the League of American Bicycles.

Though still small, the number of bicycle commutes in Indianapolis has increased 41 percent since 2000. Nationally, bicycles accounted for 0.55 percent of commutes.

While riding, Allen likens himself to a herding dog with traffic serving as two-ton steel-enchased sheep: He’s always scanning roads and intersections to be proactive in how his bike flows with traffic.

His bike is outfitted with a Garmin GPS device. He wears special water-resistant cycling knickers and carries a 25-pound messenger bag full of spare bike gear and clothes.

“When you see him, he looks like a Special Forces guy on a bike,” said Christopher Newgent, a 26-year-old Indianapolis cyclist who co-founded theindycog.com bike blog.

Allen said he’s particularly careful at stoplights because intersections are one of the most hazardous spots for cyclists.

He said the most dangerous time is when a light first turns green because traffic could be coming from just about any direction: A motorists may be making a quick left turn or trying to sneak through the light from the other direction as it turns red. When with his kids, he tries to stick to the Monon Trail and side streets.

“I’m on a 20-pound bike, and you’re in a 21/2-ton car,” Allen said. “I’m going to do the safest thing for me.”

Allen has had crashes and run-ins with angry motorists. On the morning of Oct. 30, he received a ticket from Indianapolis metro police for riding on the Monon between dusk and dawn — although police rescinded tickets given to Allen and other bike commuters after protests from local bike advocates.

After dropping Emma off at school on this recent day, Allen heads to Monon Coffee Co. for coffee — a caffeine refueling stop. Then it’s off to Fresh Market in Broad Ripple for groceries: yogurt, grapes and bananas.

Bicycling has been a constant for Allen. As the teenage son of a Coast Guard officer, he attended three high schools, two in California and Manual in Indianapolis. He’s raced road and mountain bikes.

But after all his years of riding, Allen said he still enjoys a sense of achievement from navigating a car-crazy society on his bike.

“When I get to work,” Allen said, “I’m so stoned on endorphins, I feel like I could be the best waiter in the world.”