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| pedbikeimages.org/Ryan Snyder |
Every bicycle advocate and transportation planner dreams of going to Copenhagen and seeing its world-class bicycle infrastructure. My dream came true: I have been invited to join a study tour June 5-10, and will join Seattle elected officials, department of transportation staff, and other bicycle advocates in Copenhagen for five bicycle-intensive days!
Developed by i-Sustain and underwritten by scan/design Foundation, the study tour examines Urban Sustainability: Bicycling lessons from Denmark. It includes site visits, presentations, and of course, touring the city by bicycle.
Increasingly, American cities realize that bicycling can and should be a significant part of transportation planning, but few electeds or planners know how to get from 1-2% commuting rate to the Danish experience of +37%. Topics on the study tour will include:
- urban and suburban bicycle planning for commuting
- prioritizing bicycles over cars
- design of bicycle infrastructure including intersections, cycle paths and lanes, signals, signs and parking
- public campaigns and marketing
- bicycle safety
- bicycle path maintenance
- bicycle-specific technologies
- financial incentives for bicycle commuting
The study tour will be the easy part: applying the lessons from Copenhagen to Seattle and Washington cities will be the challenge and one the Bicycle Alliance will take as part of our Strategic Plan action plans.
4 Comments
Without “bicycle infrastructure”, we could probably get percentages closer to that, too, if … if:
1) our cities were pancake-flat like Copenhagen
2) our cities were dense, with everyone living cheek-by-jowl as they do in Copenhagen, making average travel distances far shorter
3) our gasoline cost $7-8/gal as it does in Copenhagen
4) our parents taught our kids that bicycling is not inherently dangerous, as they do in Copenhagen
I do not have statistics for Copenhagen, but I do know that in the Netherlands there were more bicycle trips per overall trip BEFORE they had ANY “bicycle infrastructure” (post-WWII). I.e., “bicycle infrastructure” is not what engendered the current mode split; it was the items mentioned above, among others.
http://www.speakdanish.dk/en/phrases/index.php
Audio phrase book of Danish Language in case you haven't been to a Scandinavian country before!
– bjhedahl@hotmail.com
Have a wonderful and educational time. Make sure those electeds get the message. Good bicycle infrastructure will get people on their bikes!
You might want to check out the latest Street Films on Bike Sharing in the city of Hangzhou.
http://www.streetfilms.org/the-biggest-baddest-bike-share-in-the-world-hangzhou-china/