A guest post by Marita Hunt

A handful of recent articles on cycling, gender and the climate demonstrate the value of centralising women when designing cycling infrastructure.

In February, a paper called Pedalling Towards Equity: Exploring Women’s Cycling in a New Zealand City by Marie Russell, Cheryl Davies, Kirsty Wild and Caroline Shaw was published in the Journal of Transport Geography. The study used qualitative research methods to understand women’s experiences of ‘cycling in a New Zealand city’ (the study participants were based in Lower Hutt).

A few weeks later, The Guardian published an article by Kate Jelly that was all over my social media feed, titled Want to make the streets safer for women? Start with cycling.

It was striking how similar the themes are in these two pieces, and fascinating to look at the Aotearoa-specific focus on Māori women’s experiences of cycling in the article by Russell et al. Both pieces begin with a description of just how different the cycling community looks between high-cycling and low-cycling countries. The Guardian article notes that:

Evidence from other countries shows that women are more likely to cycle than men when there is supportive cycling infrastructure in place, such as bike lanes that are well-lit and fully separated from traffic, and safe routes that facilitate diverse journeys (not simply commuting from the outer to inner city). In the Netherlands and Copenhagen for example, 55% of journeys by bike are made by women.

Women on bikes in Copenhagen, a high-cycling city. (Photo: Marita Hunt)

While the piece by Russell et al. leads with this:

In low-cycling countries, cycling tends to be unevenly distributed by gender, with women much less likely to cycle than men (Garrard et al. 2012). In Aotearoa New Zealand, three quarters of regular cyclists are male (Shaw et al., 2020b). […] In high-cycling cities and countries, however, gender variance in cycling is low or non-existent, (Aldred and Dales 2016; Bonham and Wilson 2012) suggesting these issues are context-specific and modifiable.

We know that cycling is a crucially important tool in our fight to reduce emissions and mitigate the effects of climate change. But low-cycling countries like New Zealand, the UK and Australia won’t increase numbers of people on bikes until women feel safe and comfortable on the streets.

Nothing stops a determined woman, but most New Zealand streets are not for the fainthearted. Yep, that’s a family cargo bike on Ponsonby Road. (Photo: Jolisa Gracewood)

The instinct can be to invest in increasing women’s confidence on and access to bikes. But the onus shouldn’t be on women to change their behaviour. The problem is the context, not women’s timidity. The Guardian piece reports that –

research has found that female cyclists in the UK are twice as likely as men to have faced “near misses” or harassment by drivers, while a US study found that drivers are 3.8 times more likely to pass female cyclists too closely than male cyclists.

The road is a scarier place for women than for men on bikes, just as it is on foot. As the participants in the New Zealand study reported, many people’s image of the ‘normal’ cyclist is male, able bodied, and Pākehā. The study found that women face a double or even triple burden when compared to this ‘normal’ cyclist. First, there is the safety burden that every cyclist takes on, then the additional burden of being exposed to greater risk due to being female, and the third burden of responsibility towards children or other dependents. Russell et al. note that rates of cycling drop off particularly quickly for mothers with young children – but not for fathers.

The bike school run in Auckland: do-able but not exactly delightful. (Photo: Heidi O’Callahan)

So what would make women feel safer on bikes? What does a feminist cycling infrastructure look like? Safe, well-designed cycling infrastructure is an obvious answer. Women feel happier on a bike when they can ride in separated, well-lit cycle lanes. But it’s also about where it is.

Women of all ages are still much more likely than men to be at home during the day, shifting children to and from school, running errands, getting to part-time jobs, visiting others. These are often short trips with multiple stops. Many New Zealand women, particularly in urban areas, could become local cyclists. They would be better served by a low-traffic neighbourhood that’s bike and pedestrian-friendly than by cycling superhighways and commuter bike paths.

https://twitter.com/TfL/status/1339193559333937156?s=20

I’m reminded of the mamachari bikes ridden by women in Japan: step-through ebikes often with a basket in the front and a couple of extra seats for children on the back. You see hundreds of these navigating quiet, narrow streets in Japanese cities throughout the day.

The morning school run in a central part of Tokyo, on a 30kmh street. Mama-chari bikes are set up to easily transport children, groceries, etc. (Photo: Jolisa Gracewood)

Māori participants in the study spoke in particular about being able to ride with whānau. For these wāhine, cycling was something they could do for fun, with a group of family and friends, to a destination such as the beach or a park. Cycle infrastructure needs to be designed with groups in mind, and should connect residential areas to local amenity and recreation spaces. Recreational cycling still looks too much like a group of able-bodied men on road bikes – not a whānau group of mixed ages and abilities out for a slow ride together.

The Ōtara Bike Burb runs “Wahine bike tours“, aimed at giving women the confidence to bike around the neighbourhood. The community bike hub, based at Ōtara Kai Village, also runs tours for tāne and tamariki, and for mixed age and ability groups.

The study also revealed the more subtle barriers that put women off cycling. Examples ranged from the practical, such as the expense of gaining access to a bike, lack of suitable bikes for older and less able-bodied women, and the difficulty of riding a bike in a long school uniform skirt; to the social – for some teenaged participants, being seen to ride a bike to school was a source of shame; for working women, they wanted to be able to look put together and in control when they arrived places.

Janette Sadik-Khan looking put-together and in control on an e-bike on Franklin Road (pre-transformation) during her 2014 Auckland visit.  (Photo: Frocks on Bikes Auckland)

Removal of these barriers relies on the normalisation of cycling, and changes made at a small-scale, granular level to make it easier to get around by bike. As well as safe infrastructure, Aotearoa needs:

  • more cheap, sturdy bikes with frames that women feel comfortable on,
  • cycling-friendly school uniforms,
  • and cycle-friendly schools and workplaces with plenty of storage, showers and changing areas.

All these changes represent a culture shift, to one where cycling is a natural factor in a range of daily decisions.

A classic from Bikeyface. A simple dream that should be reality by now.

Finally, research reported on at bicyclenetwork.com.au has shown how switching to a bike for even just one trip a day can make a big dent in an individual’s CO2 emissions. The study, by researchers from Oxford University and Imperial College London, demonstrates the possibly already-obvious fact that mode shift, from motorised to active transport such as walking and cycling, is a key tool in cities’ efforts to reduce their emissions. The authors finished with this –

To improve active travel take-up, cities across the world will need to increase investment in high-quality infrastructure for pedestrians and cyclists and incorporate policy and planning concepts that require a fairly radical rethink of our cities.

In the quote at the top of this post, Russell et al note that the fact that more women than men get around by bike in high cycling countries ‘suggests that these issues are context-specific and modifiable.’ Cycling uniquely suits women – if they feel safe doing it. If the needs of women are made central in development of cycling policy and infrastructure, we might find that one of the essential climate change levers, mode shift, is that much more easy to pull.

Signs of change: mother and child at School Strike 4 Climate, Aotea Square, 15 March 2019. (Photo: Jolisa Gracewood)
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69 comments

  1. Thank you, Marita. That’s really informative.

    Our lack of infrastructure is impacting women’s health in a big way. And also children’s.

  2. Years ago , I heard that Canterbury Engineering Graduates were taken around the campus by Blind low Foundation volunteers to help them experience what their members experience with the built Environment.
    Recently i heard from a 2 year Graduate that this doesn’t happen any more, Can any Recent Civil Engineering Graduate answer if their education exposes them to a more broad user experience in regards to the built environment, Roads etc?

    1. That was actually part of the Sustainable Transport paper in the Transport Engineering Masters programme at Canterbury (I used to run it and arrange those visits); it’s never been a part of the undergrad curriculum. I don’t work there any more but my understanding is that this component is still part of that paper

  3. Disbanding the cycling team was a backwards step.

    Failing to put the situation right when it became clear what the effect would be, is misogyny, amongst other things.

  4. …and children to get to primary school and retirees to get to the shops.

    Stop putting middle aged men in charge so they can put SUV landing strips everywhere

    1. I’m not 100% convinced its a gender thing, I know plenty of middle aged women who hate anything considered “anti car” too (wasn’t one of them smashing up cycle lanes with a sledge hammer). It’s like any progressive* changes, there are always going to be those that want to keep the status quo, especially those that have built their careers around it and have been trained to always think of traffic flow.
      (*kind of funny funny calling walking and cycling progressive isn’t it!)

      1. I agree that there are a lot of women who are deeply suspicious of cycling, and rely heavily on their cars. But I suspect that the ‘culture shift’ I mention in the article would change the attitudes of some (if not many). They’re concerned with safety, ease and accessibility, and comfort. Our cycling infrastructure doesn’t meet their needs yet, so we can’t expect them to be keen on cycling. Those of us who do, do so in spite of the conditions we have to cycle in.

      2. I feel these gender issues, while clearly really important, also reinforce views that all in a group think the same. For instance through well targeted marketing by car/truck companies it is no longer just ‘macho men’ that drive ‘trucks’. A big growth in largish SUV drivers has been among women, young and not so young. Older women (and men) with sore hips find it easier to get in and out of the large cars, young mothers get convinced they are safer for their families and younger women are ‘sold’ a sense of freedom. The Country Calendar Hyundai ad has a concerned grandmother recommending the ‘safest, most powerful’ SUV for her granddaughter. These are the cars that i worry about most when cycling – try being passed by two coming either way on a narrow road with one parked beside you as well – they are often much wider than normal cars (and thinking about emissions).

        1. We had three children using an infant car seat or still using a booster. International best practice recommends the use of an appropriate child restraint (or booster seat) until your child reaches 148 cm tall or is 11 years old. There are not many cars that actually fit three child with their approved safety seats next to each other. With the increase in cars having passenger air bags you can’t having them sitting up front which then leaves getting a bigger car. Which is what we did. So for us nothing to do with having more ‘freedom’.

  5. My sisters all girls high school has actually banned kids from either riding to school, or because it’s a boarding school, having bikes there at all. Bit of a missed opportunity I would have thought. These kids already have less ability to go out because they don’t have parents to take them anywhere. Essentially stuck. Although that is how they like it so maybe that’s the goal.

    1. A demographic who’d be well served by local bike share. But then the school would just make a rule against using that.

      Honestly, someone needs to take a human rights case against these schools.

      1. +1, someone needs to take a school that bans cycling to court and establish a precedent. We don’t allow schools to police any other activity outside of the school grounds. Why are they allowed to police transport? It is probably legal (even if incredibly damaging and needlessly confrontational) for schools to ban bikes on grounds, it almost certainly isn’t legal for them to ban cycling to the school and leaving the bike locked outside.

        1. I think we should also take schools to court for providing free parking for students while not supporting local cycling infrastructure. But schools – like all parts of the public service – have now been told to become carbon neutral by 2025 so they may well have to suddenly support cycling for both staff and students.

        2. “We don’t allow schools to police any other activity outside of the school grounds“
          Sure we do, same school has a policy of expelling students if there is any evidence of them going to any kind of party. Even if they’re under the care of parents at the time. Which is fully legal. I seem to remember some school student leadership students getting demoted in a Christchurch school after they did something unscrupulous after hours off school grounds. And they also give out punishments for not wearing the school uniform on their way too and from school.

        3. Not going against the point of the post and comments, but schools absolutely do control things outside of school properly.
          One is things like parties/after-balls where they often find ways to punish students for either attending or organising them (which I think shouldn’t really be up to the school). On the other hand things like controlling how students wear their uniforms and/or the things they do while in uniform is certainly something for the school to consider seeing as how that reflects on the school.

        4. This comes back to how much control the organisation’s we work at / study at should have to expel / fire people.

          If I was seen to be making publicly frowned upon comments etc an employer can have the option to fire you. It’s even encouraged by the government. https://www.employment.govt.nz/resolving-problems/types-of-problems/misconduct-and-serious-misconduct/employee-actions-outside-of-work/

          I would argue this should be illegal, and work and livelihood should be totally seperate. But you will then be seen to be supporting this kind of behaviour.

        5. Examples include …… “ activity on social media sites that is inconsistent with the values of the company”

        6. “Sure we do, same school has a policy of expelling students if there is any evidence of them going to any kind of party. Even if they’re under the care of parents at the time. ”

          That also probably isn’t legal. I’ll say it again, someone needs to actually take these schools to court.

        7. @Jack
          Absolutely, it’s getting to be a pretty serious invasion of privacy these days by many companies some who have teams dedicated to hunting down employees posts on social media. If it isn’t something related to the company (eg leaking confidential information) then it shouldn’t be subject to their inquisitions.
          One example I know of is an employee is not allowed to even be in a bar (even if they aren’t drinking) in any bit of uniform whatsoever even in their own time. This is for a non-hazardous/safety critical role too. This is for a nameless council.

          Another will have you face disciplinary action if a photo of you in uniform turns up with someone drinking in it (maybe a flat mate as you get home from work or something). That’s just nuts. This is for a nameless airline.

          Plenty of other overreaching by organisations going on. They need a big slap on the wrist by the privacy commissioner and really should be removing a lot if wording out of contracts.

      2. Oh yeah they did. Any student caught or seen in public on a ride share scooter would be liable to get booted too.

        Same school allows boarding students to have cars once they get their licence.

        1. Haha, not a chance. Sorry. Don’t want to reveal too much info online, and this was last year, not sure if this is still their policy. Fairly likely I would think

        2. So we have schools effectively teaching children that cycling is not done. You can get expelled for it.

          And here we are pulling our hair out wondering why bicycling project attract such backlash.

    2. Rules are very often created to deal with a specific problem. Usually to be enforced on the 1% of people causing the problem, to the detriment of the 99%. This is how we end up with massive bureaucracies.

      I know one school in my area too many bikes were getting stolen and parents complained too much. So the bike racks went and biking was discouraged.

      The school board probably doesnt want the H&S problems of bike injuries that might be blamed on the school. So, ban it.

      Thanks, ACC*.

      *I totally support ACC, but it does create a culture of risk aversion by management to avoid any liability for anything.

      1. Not compared to the alternative, Ari, surely? ACC severely limits the liability compared to, say, what organisations are up for in the litigious culture of the US.

      2. Yes, I totally support ACC over the alternative. Brilliant scheme, if not a bit lacking some times. The way they treat pregnancy injuries are horrendous.

    3. That doesn’t actually surprise me. It means the school doesn’t have to provide facilities to keep bikes safe/secure from theft.

      It actually didn’t take long to potentially find which school it was. It may be the only one with an actual ban in place but that doesn’t mean that other school haven’t effectively done the same just by not providing bike stands for students/visitors use.

    4. I’ve had a bit more of a look at this. There is a guideline published here: https://communitylaw.org.nz/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/Problems-at-School-text-19-Dec-for-web.pdf

      A school cannot blanket ban cycling to school. If a child is being dropped off by their parents then they are not under the schools control (p53). While students are under the control of the school while travelling to or from school, the school must consider:
      – Are the rules reasonable?
      – Is the rule appropriate for the particular age group?
      – Are the rules relevant to the school’s educational role?

      For all three of those considerations, preventing high school students from cycling to school is obviously a no.

      In relation to the parties, that rule has been in for about 7 years at that particular school and I can’t believe the principal hasn’t been sacked. it’s clearly illegal.
      “Your school usually doesn’t have any authority over you when it’s outside school hours, you’re not on school grounds, and you’re not representing the school in any way. For example, a school couldn’t suspend you for smoking cannabis at a private party at the weekend.”

  6. Great post. The point about needing better facilities at schools is a good one.

    The same is needed to improve walking, too, and actually the same applies throughout the public realm, at community facilities, plus at retail areas and workplaces.

    I met with 4 friends on Saturday. None of them drive to work; they use public transport or walk. But because of the rain on Saturday, each one of them drove. It’s stupid for people to wear two tonne rain jackets just because gutters flood at the pedestrian crossings, there are insufficient bus stop shelters, and there aren’t enough places at your destination to put your raincoat and umbrella.

  7. Great article, fully agree with it.

    As a dedicated cargo bike dad, I love dropping my kid off on the bike. It’s the best part of the day. But my wife doesn’t feel safe enough on the roads to do it.

    So yeah, guess that supports your points.

  8. In Auckland, getting cyclelanes designed is one thing – regardless of who they’re for. Getting them built is the problem.

    The RLTP now puts the Pt Chev to Westmere project out to 2023 / 24. They first consulted on that in April 2017. What a joke of a process. And offensive; setting up a community liaison group and chewing up the time of locals, all for nothing. Wasting everyone’s money on designs and redesigns, none of which get the best outcomes anyway because they refuse to allow “impacts on the network”.

    And meanwhile the WSC students can’t get a crossing on Meola Rd because that’s waiting on the streetscape project.

    Unconscionably bad strategy and decision-making.

  9. Good article. Informative. Good links for reading. Also good to have some other perspectives shared on the blog other than the usual suspects. I know the comments section may be intimidating with all the anonymous, opinionated, white(probably) men around on here arguing with each other.
    One such opinion follows:

    I’m not a fan of the “design for women” approach in terms of framing the safety argument. I feel it’s just divisive click-bait. I don’t think there is any difference in designing safe infra for a man or woman. It’s just that walking/cycle infra is so terrible in NZ and it isn’t designed well. The issue is safety, not gender, so bringing that into it just complicates the matter. The conclusions drawn would still make sense if the focus were on safer cycling infra for all.

    However, I can appreciate that the building/construction/engineering fields are so male-dominated that when it comes to designing safer infra as part of private developments, other perspectives are needed. And the elimination of the AT Cycle team hasn’t helped much in the public space either.

    Otherwise, I totally agree with the article. Safer cycling infra is always better, regardless of who uses it. If we build safer infra for people (some who happen to be women), nothing is lost. If anything we should aim to design for unaccompanied children in mind. Anything less is probably not good enough.

    1. As a white (probable) man, the least I can do is actively seek out the perspectives of people who think differently and incorporate them in my attitudes and behaviour. The international evidence is that “designing for women” is likely to produce the best outcomes for a very wide range of active-mode users, so I’m not going to quibble with that. Maori perspective is also known to produce wider benefits. And really good footpaths and crossings require less expensive ‘child restraint’ equipment than an SUV with four kiddy seats. But I do accept that design for women does include awareness of the trips that may need to be made by car and the size of parking spaces at end of trip. Question is, where do we get most benefits for modest cost? Low Traffic Neighbourhoods are likely to come out well in answer to that. Extra lanes for motorways? Only if they are for RTN or e-bikes.

      1. I would prefer they design for everyone: any gender can feel unsafe / intimidated / fragile / have kids / etc. Associating certain properties to genders seems like a very outdated concept to me. Gender is anything but binary these days anyway.

        1. I guess one point of the article is that at the moment we are not designing for everyone.
          What is that path like at night?
          ” It’s dark but I’ve got lights on my bike”
          ” It’s dark I wont go there”

        2. We don’t associate certain properties to genders. We understand that certain characteristics are more common within certain groups. Our design should reflect that because, if we know that women are more likely to be responsible for the supervision of children, and we knowingly build infrastructure that is difficult to use while supervising children, then we are knowingly reducing the ability of women to access educational, economic, health, and social, opportunities, which is discrimination.

        3. Sailor Boy I think its outdated and unnecessary. For example when I (male) dropped my daughter at kindy today there seemed to be a lot of other males doing the same, and I suspect the proportion will continue growing until it reaches ~50% (if it isn’t already).
          And if you flip it the other way around: “more males commute, so we need to design the network for commuters otherwise it is discrimination”, doesn’t that seem wrong on multiple accounts?

        4. @JimboJones “more males commute, so we need to design the network for commuters otherwise it is discrimination”, doesn’t that seem wrong on multiple accounts?”

          You seem to miss the whole point of this guest post. The network is designed for commuters. We are calling that out as discrimination. If there wasn’t such a large difference in the number of cyclists that are male compared to female we wouldn’t be having this discussion.

          The other part of the equation is that women as a group seem to need a higher level of cycle infrastructure to feel safe enough on our roads to cycle. So it becomes double edged sword. The cycle lanes we have are more aligned with trips that commuters are likely to make, there are more males that are likely to be commuting.

          I personally believe that we need to do more to create safe connections with places that traditionally you would find more women than men. Such as schools, parks, supermarkets. The younger a person starts cycling and feeling safe doing it the more likely they will continue to cycle as an adult. While mothers still out number fathers dropping children off at school at is women that we need to design for so they will take their child/children to school by bike. Helping to set that life long habit of cycling.

          Schools today have a much smaller percentage of students cycling to school than before the compulsory helmet law was introduced and the tariffs on imported cars was lifted and we decided that 50km/hr was perfectly safe speed for cars around young people on the road. Our roads are not like they once were and it’s about time we acknowledged it and made them safer for all road users.

        5. Jimbo, trying to jump forward to decision-making in which the gender lens isn’t required is like trying to jump over the issues raised by the Treaty straight to an equitable society or to achieve an accessible city without proper regard for what people with disabilities say.

          There are advantages to continuing to use the gender lens. Crash test dummes were all a standard size not because the men who dominated the automotive industry were all a standard size but because of deeper cultural problems in the industry; problems rooted in values around uniformity and control. It was the gender lens that highlighted the need to include many different shapes and sizes, including children and larger people. The system needed change, and the gender lens provides the necessary challenge.

          The transport system isn’t designed to meet everyone’s needs and people have been forced to adopt driving in order to participate in the economy and the city. Of course it’s more than just women who are missing out – it’s everyone, in fact. But the gender lens assists in highlighting details about what’s missing. So does focus on children, and focus on disability needs. Applying these lenses help everyone to achieve a better system. It’s something that assists progress.

        6. “And if you flip it the other way around: “more males commute, so we need to design the network for commuters otherwise it is discrimination”, doesn’t that seem wrong on multiple accounts?”

          This seems wrong on one account only: we already design our transport network primarily for commuting.

  10. “If anything we should aim to design for unaccompanied children in mind. Anything less is probably not good enough.”

    Absolutely. What’s that saying? if its not safe for an 8y.o cycling alone, its not proper cycling infrastructure.

  11. We need to get rid of “on-road bike lanes” and only provide only fully protected facilities.

    To do this we need a nation wide NZ roading standard for new roads and retrofits that provides enough safe space for all modes.

    The Dutch have it right:
    Mono-functional roads in the Netherlands

  12. “Cycle infrastructure should connect residential areas to local amenity and recreation space”

    Agreed.
    Our current cycleway project is designed for long distance commute to work.

    What I have been found lacking is high quality cycle way to connects neighborhood to schools and local town centers.

    1. ‘why not both meme’.
      Easy to have a network that does both. Longer trips and shorter trips can use the same facility as long as it connects to places. ie; most of Aucklands arterials have town centres, many have schools, many have recreational parks etc all these ‘features/attractions’ scattered along them. A cycle lane on the start to end of say Manukau Road for example would be great for both local trips and longer trips.

      1. Yes, that’s correct. But local cycling connections can be provided more cheaply using Low Traffic Neighbourhoods. While Council and Government work out what political intervention will be required to get AT up to speed on getting cycleways onto the arterials, this is something Council can get on with without pushing AT’s control button too hard.

        And it gives transport freedom to a whole lot of people who are then more likely to publicly comment on the need for arterial cycleways.

  13. Talking to a friend about this last night and they likened our current situation to swimming. We want to get people swimming so we build a pool- but only with a deep end, then when more people are swimming we might add the shallower end and the steps for easy access – but not enough people are jumping in!

  14. Lots of writing about…”what we need,…or would like” but virtually nothing about “cost” or ” who would pay”. We are surely facing, along with reducing our emissions , a major reset of how we pay for the brave new world. Given that a sizable chunk of the costs of roads, cycle lanes, and footpaths are paid through petrol & diesel taxes, it is surely important to start discussing what revenue source will replace the current system. Once the costs of cyclists and electric vehicles infrastructure needs are known, then, the discussions of what constitutes a realistic ideal can commence.
    I rather suspect that many contributors to this column, once faced with cost realities, might better align their thoughts to that old adage….” perfection is the enemy of good”. (ie, something short of of perfection might be acceptable)

    1. Paying for the maintenance and construction of cycleways out of general tax and council revenue is totally viable. The maintenance and build costs of cycling infrastructure is significantly lower than for cars. You don’t need to replace pavements regularly, you don’t need to design everything to hold 50 ton trucks and because bikes are more space efficient the roadways can be a lot smaller. A lot of our current cycling infrastructure is extremely expensive only because all the easy and realistic places to build are already built out by car infrastructure. If reallocation was more generally accepted then the cost is not an issue.

    2. Basically just wants to say cyclists should pay tax and pay for their own cycle lanes.
      Imagine if a billion of the billions allocated to roads (which seems to always have space in the budgets) was put into a vast, and fast roll out of cycle lanes. Not just tiny projects like finally finishing the Market st extension but proper coordinated 100s of kms roll out.

    3. Exactly the same could be said of those who want SH1 four lanes from Christchurch to Ashburton, want a second bridge in Ashburton and want a car parking building, but don’t you dare ask for a cent to spent on cycling infrastructure.

      Car lanes cost more to lay and to maintain. The extra weight of even a small car compared to an e-bike means they do more damage and the surface needs repairing more often.

      Cycling contributes positively to lower numbers of depression and other mental health illnesses that have associated costs of time off work.

      Cycling contributes to lower obesity numbers meaning reduced health costs of patients with heart diseases and diabetes.

      As for having to prove there is a need before supplying it there have been plenty of surveys done that ask ‘if you felt safe would you cycle more’ and people answering yes. Also forecasts regularly (if not always) underestimate how many people would actually take up cycling or using public transport.

      Britomart opened in 2003 and was originally projected to have a daily rail patronage of 18,000 by 2011 and 21,800 by 2021. The actual numbers in 2011 (25,112) already exceeded the projected numbers for 2021 and have only gone up since then. Dig deep enough and the same can be said for the Northern Bus way. The Northwestern Cycle way is being widened because of the number of users exceeds how many it can cope with.
      https://www.greaterauckland.org.nz/2013/07/07/happy-10th-birthday-britomart/

      Here are some more cycling facts and figures that show that yes it is worth spending the money on something other than more car lanes.
      https://www.bikeauckland.org.nz/resources/cycling-facts-figures/

    4. $1 spent on a cycle way pays back more in long term value to the community than $1 spend on a road which tends to be a losing proposition.
      And the long term maintenance costs are a magnitude more for roads.

      If there is anyone that should be paying more it is the truck industry. They do enormous damage to the roads. They should probably be paying 100x more than they do currently to cover the damage they do. They are bludging off of everyone else paying fuel taxes. And no one says anything. Because Natbour gets lots of lobby money from the trucking companies.

    5. What revenue source will eventually replace fuel tax is completely irrelevant to a discussion on how to make road users safe from the existing fleet of ICE vehicles.

  15. What I’m struggling to understand is why women feel unable to cycle on road like men? I understand about small children but I think the author referred to the ‘timidity’ of women which I disagree with. Some women perhaps but like wth gendered cycle lanes, really?!

  16. Do men not need safer bike lanes or is it just women?would safer bike lanes not encourage more men as well as women to bike places? i’m confused as to why we are separating people based on sex in 2021. the way the author is taking about women is a bit degrading and as if we are stupid, and need special help and resources.

    1. What is actually required to create a low traffic neighbourhood? There are so many cars parked on either side of many of the non-arterial roads in my area that traffic is effectively one-lane and therefore slow.

      Given that many residents would currently perceive a need for their cars and lack parking on their properties for them, is it possible to sign post lower speeds as people leave the arterial roads (you can’t go fast anyway), then paint symbols on the road to indicate that it is a shared pedestrian (old person with cane, child running symbols), cycle and car space?

      Some concrete pots with plants at the entrance to these zones could help mark them off.

      And if it doesn’t work, or changes are needed, paint and pots are not hard to alter.

      Such streets could start around neighbourhood amenities like schools and parks and extend to shops.

  17. A number of Cycle Accident Claims team members cycle in one form or another…and absolutely love it. The possibility of an accident should not deter riders from getting out on the saddle, especially when one considers all the fantastic benefits you’d be missing out on.
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    Still, one should always exercise precaution and be aware of the most common risks to cyclists on the road. Based on our own experience and knowledge, we have listed what we believe to be the top 5 threats.

  18. I think we should also take schools to court for providing free laptops. But schools – like all parts of the public service – have now been told to become carbon neutral by 2025 so they may well have to suddenly support cycling for both staff and students. we also provide the entertainment

  19. A good indicator of bicycle safety in a city is if you see a mother riding a bicycle with her kids. In fact, women riding bicycles in general point to the overall bicycle safety in a city. “It is understood women are catalysts for safe pedestrian and bicycle friendly design

  20. When I moved back to the US two years ago, buying a bike was at the top of my to-do list. I’d spent the previous six months living in the Netherlands, where pedaling alongside Dutch trams and taxis made me feel independent and strong enough to go anywhere.

  21. Women ride bicycles primarily for utility, ease of use and efficiency and sometimes for empowerment, but not as often for the sporty thrill of it. So women riding bicycles promotes the idea of bicycling other than for recreation.

  22. Women are more likely than men to say they want safer cycling. … Dutch cities had designed tens of thousands of kilometers of bike lanes and The UK’s cycling infrastructure is hostile to women – and smart new … has increased with recent investment in protected bike lanes.

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