Cycling

This deck presents background information on the cycling infrastructure programme in London, its impacts and potential benefits.

This pack outlines the economic benefits of encouraging more walking and cycling in cities. It sets out the strongest evidence from London and elsewhere, grouped into six major topic areas.

It is aimed at policy makers, local communities, officers in local and national government, business networks and everyone else who is interested in how investment in walking and cycling can create more prosperous cities.

This document aims simply to collect in one place a range of urban cycle design guidance, for features great and small, from different countries. We looked up what Compendiummeans, and we’ve tried to adhere to the following definition: “A concise, yet comprehensive, compilation of a body of knowledge.” What we wanted to do was to help provide a reference resource for fellow practitioners and others involved in making streets more attractive to cycle along.

City administrations across Europe and beyond have made real progress in planning and providing for cycling in their cities. Support both for cycling measures and this book has come from the European Commission. Their support has been most valuable, but this was not the start of their involvement. In 1999, the then European Environment Commissioner, Ritt Bjerregard wrote the following foreword to their publication ‘Cycling: The way ahead for towns and cities’:

This study has investigated the decisions that cyclists in London make when deciding which route to take, and the relative importance of different route features. The study has also looked at more general preferences and attitudes among cyclists.

Background: Despite the well-recognised benefit for individuals and communities of increased active travel, cycling remains a minority travel mode in many high income countries. Fear of injury is often cited as a reason. Campaigns to promote cycle helmet wear are alleged to contribute to this. However, there is little information on whether head injuries to cyclists are an important cause of death in road travel fatalities, compared with other road users.

The potential of bicycle and pedestrian travel in the city has been underestimated in past decades and, as a result, there has been some deterioration of facilities and public space availability for these road users. However, in recent years the value of these transport modes has gained recognition and is being prioritised much more highly in cities’ mobility policies.

This paper analyses Active People Survey data (collected 2011/12 to 2015/16) on 789,196 English adults, providing new information on how a range of socio-demographic factors are associated with utility and leisure cycling. Substantial inequalities are found in relation to gender, age, disability, and ethnicity for both types of cycling. For gender and age, and perhaps for disability in relation to recreational cycling, inequalities are moderated by local cycling prevalence such that English authorities with more cycling see less inequality.

Urban utility cycling is being promoted widely due to various health, social, economic and environmental benefits. This study seeks to identify and rank which munic- ipal-level policies and other factors are most influential in increasing cycling as a means of everyday transport and improving the real and perceived cycling safety in car-oriented urban centres. This is achieved by identifying the key factors thought to influence cycle use and by establishing a hierarchy of effectiveness of municipal cycling policies.

The main aim of this study was to determine whether any real factors contribute to the exclusion of cyclists from some pedestrian areas. In these areas where cycling is permitted, it has been achieved by: (a) shared use of the whole, or certain sections of the pedestrian area; (b) combined use with selected motor vehicles (eg buses and service vehicles); (c) time-restricted access; (d) special paths for cyclists. This study was in two stages, in stage one, 1 hour video recordings of pedestrian areas at 12 sites in England and at 9 sites in mainland Europe were taken.