Safe Cycling Around The World Is Goal Of New Guide

Between March and July 2020, there was an explosion of bike lanes around the globe. Nearly 400 cities added new ones in response to the Covid-19 pandemic to help people stay active and create socially distanced transport options.

Many were temporary “pop-up” bike lanes, but some experts see the cycling surge as an opportunity to transform streets and cities safely and sustainably on a broader scale.

A new guidebook was published earlier this month by the World Resources Institute (WRI) to do just that. “Safe Bicycle Lane Design Principles: Responding to Cycling Needs in Cities during COVID and Beyond” sets out recommendations based on decades of cycling and road safety experience to help cities plan, design and implement high-quality cycling lanes quickly, effectively, and safely. 

“Although it is affordable, people-friendly and offers immense social, economic and environmental benefits, cycling and the infrastructure to support it has always taken a back seat,”   Claudia Adriazola-Steil, acting director for urban mobility and director of health and road safety at the World Resources Institute’s Ross Center for Sustainable Cities, said in a statement. “The increase in cycling during Covid-19 comes when cities have been making more efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. We hope this guide will help policymakers and city planners who are looking to achieve safer, more equitable, more sustainable mobility for everyone.”

WRI collaborated with the Dutch Cycling Embassy, the Cycling Embassy of Denmark, the League of American Bicyclists  and other groups to distill the most essential recommendations to help build safe infrastructure for cycling in cities. 

Well-designed cycling networks are important, and temporary lanes should function as a foundation for any future transition to permanent cycling infrastructure, the guide noted. Good bike lane networks can help cities lower the dependency for so many private cars and assist with managing the issues related to health, pollution, space and equity that often accompany them. 

For example, in Ljubljana, Slovenia — which has been redesigning its city center to accommodate car-free zones to encourage pedestrians and cyclists — carbon emissions dropped by 70% and noise dropped by an average 6 decibels, researchers said.

In many cities, more people would like to bike than are currently comfortable doing so. One survey in the United States found that up to 56% of adults were interested in biking but concerned about safety or other infrastructure issues, according to the guide, which supports the idea that cycling should be treated as an integral part of a city’s transportation system.

“People will continue cycling only if they see it — and experience it — as a convenient, comfortable and safe option,” Rogier van den Berg, acting global director of the WRI Ross Center, said in a statement. “City agencies and leaders must collectively work to create cycle-friendly cities in which anyone would consider biking as a way to get to work or school, run errands and meet friends. This requires detailed and strategic planning, designs and solutions — but we know how to do it. This guide covers everything cities need to implement safe bike infrastructure for everyone.”  

The guide proposes five key principles of bike lane design that address everything from how best to protect bike lanes from common types of infringement, like parking and freight delivery, to vehicle speed and other safety issues. Temporary bike lanes, the report noted, can sometimes offer less protection to users than more permanent ones.

Road traffic deaths are a rising global public health issue, in both developing and developed countries. 

“Every year over 41,000 bicyclists die in road traffic-related crashes worldwide,” Kelly Larson, who leads Bloomberg Philanthropies’ Initiative for Global Road Safety, said in a statement. “This guide sets out effective design guidelines to help cities implement safer infrastructure. We hope cities use it to make quick and safe decisions to support cycling as a sustainable mobility option during, and beyond, the Covid-19 pandemic.”

To download the guidebook, click here.