I'm Dutch, but think we tend to underestimate the impact of the flatness of our country, and the size of other countries especially the States. I've cycled on my normal 7-gear bicycle (and that might be considered fancy) from Newcastle to Carlisle. Which is quite flat. I had to walk so much up hill as it was utterly impossible to climb 40 meters.
In the Netherlands quite a lot of people do live in a 50 km radius of their workplace. And 50 km would be a distance you'll travel by train or car. A daily comute of more then one hour in the Netherlands might be considered 'quite a while' but I guess this is different in the USA.