Bicycle friendly Bogota

Text from Mecanoo:

Sunday 8 January. I’m speeding on my bike across London. I get such a kick from cycling that I have to watch out not to take unnecessary risks. We’ve rented bikes for four days and all at once London seems manageable and small. It’s a sunny winter’s day and it feels like skiing – steering a middle path as I struggle to avoid cars and buses.

But it’s really scary. The asphalt is treacherous with its numerous potholes. The bike rental firm warned me to take particular care with pedestrians suddenly crossing my path, and, it’s true, they are every bit as dangerous. In the evening I read in the paper a call for people to protest against the miserable network of cycle paths after the umpteenth fatal accident involving bikes. The demonstrators are increasingly well organised and threaten that they will block the traffic until the network is improved - something that the London Transport Authority only intends to do after the Olympic Games.

Wherever I go, I always try to cycle – Boston, New York, Paris, Barcelona, San Francisco, Miami, Tokyo, Kyoto, Kaohsiung or Beijing. I don’t yet dare to chance it in Moscow or Birmingham. In the Netherlands we seem to regard cycling as a given, but it took a long, hard struggle to get us this far. Here as in many other countries, cycling was hugely popular right up until the Second World War.
The welfare boom however led to an explosion in the use of automobiles. Pedestrians, cyclists, children’s play areas – they all had to make way for cars. Many buildings were demolished, including in many cases historic monuments. The number of traffic accidents also rose, which led to ever more protest.
The persistent criticism, the oil crisis of 1973 and the growing awareness of the need for sustainable urban planning have forced local authorities and central government to decide to design a network of cycle paths of a quality that is unprecedented in the world. It consists of 29,000 km of independent paths and 7,000 km which form part of a road. On top of that, there is a cyclists’ union that campaigns vigorously for cyclists’ rights, a cycling exam for children, free transport for bikes on public transport systems, and increasing numbers of supervised and unattended cycle sheds, and above all, traffic regulations that are geared toward the presence of cyclists.

The Netherlands has the highest percentage of cyclists in the world per capita. Young, old, rich and poor – everyone cycles. It is a healthy and cheap means of transport and in the city, it is also a rapid one. Today, the circumstances that led to the formation of the bicycle network forty years ago are applicable to cities everywhere – traffic jams, the countless accidents and the high petrol prices. As a rule the large metropoli are situated in river deltas, where the land is as flat as it is in the Netherlands. There is a great desire to make them bicycle-friendly, following the Netherland’s example.

Bogotá has a network of cycle routes which were laid down with the aid of Dutch expertise. It is used increasingly even though it was initially associated with the poorer classes. In San Francisco parking spots have been surrendered to make room for cycle paths, and you can take your bike on the train with you. The city has an annual ‘Bike to Work Day’.

In Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo, it used only to be the poorest section of the population that you’d see riding bikes. Now the city’s youth also use them as a means of transport, defying the hazards of the urban jungle. It’s quite dangerous and uncomfortable, but people do it rather than put up with the invariable traffic jams. But in these Brazilian cities as well a battle is being waged to give bicycles a place in municipal policy-making.

It would make a fantastic, international statement if the London cycling movement were to take advantage of the momentum of the Olympic Games and all that attention from the media worldwide to realize the demand for a safe bicycle network in the British capital. Cycling improves the quality and sustainability of cities. Dutch expertise would prove a good export product if such a development were to occur.

Via: Mecanoo.nl in The Financial Daily