Sport

It's not only cyclists who travel to sporting events by bike here. Also, you'll find that football players (soccer to those of you on the other side of the Atlantic), and hockey players, and enthusiasts of all other sports will turn up at their events by bicycle.

Why not ? It's the most practical way of getting about. What's more, all your friends do the same, and you'll see the world go by as you make your journey.


Young and old, rich and poor, male and female, black and white.

You don't need to be "a cyclist" to cycle. Everyone cycles.

The Hop

In many countries it is illegal to carry a passenger on a bike. Not here.

Carrying a passenger on a bike is legal in this country, and very common. Those who've been doing this since childhood have a very relaxed way of hopping onto a friend's bike as the lights change, which is what you'll see in the video.

A great way of transporting a friend who for some reason doesn't have their bike with them.

It's worth pointing out that at this junction, as is always the case at well designed junctions in the Netherlands, when cyclists have a green light to go straight on, car drivers wishing to turn right have a red light. As such, there's no chance at all of a driver to your left running you over as you do this.

There are many products available to help you safely carry all kinds of objects on bicycles, including younger and older children.

Pedestrians sharing with cyclists

"Look out! Pedestrians on the cycle-path. A situation so
uncommon that it has a warning sign

"Let op! Voetgangers op fietspad" - "Look out! Pedestrians on the cycle-path". This situation is so unusual that this cycle-path has a unique sign to warn cyclists that pedestrians sometimes use this cycle-path in considerable numbers.

This is the only one of these signs that I've ever seen in the Netherlands. I found it about 35 km east of my home.

There have never been pedestrians on this cycle-path when I've ridden in this direction, but they are apparently quite numerous when there is a football match in progress. The local football stadium is to the right of the water; that's why pedestrians sometimes use this path.

The Dutch don't build "shared use paths" where pedestrians and cyclists are expected to use the same space. It was made quite clear to us on the 2006 Study Tour just how much of a problem this caused in the one place in Den Haag where it was tried. The experiment has not been repeated.

Remote cycle-paths in the countryside with very light use by pedestrians don't have separate walking paths, on these the few people who walk along them use the space in the same way as pedestrians walk on countryside roads without pedestrian paths in other countries. However, anywhere that there will be significant numbers of pedestrians, they're provided with a separate path so that there is no conflict with cyclists.

Why does the UK persist in forcing pedestrians and cyclists to share, even though it continues to cause many problems ?

One might have though that shared use paths being universally unpopular and the regular conflict caused by them might have made planners twig that this doesn't work, but shared use continues to be proposed and built. Pedestrians and cyclists are not the same. They do not have the same requirements. This simply causes conflict and unpleasantness. Occasionally it's even dangerous. So why does it continue ? Is it just cheapness ? It's obviously cheaper to build one path than two. When cycling is so undervalued as it is in the UK, perhaps the planners are oblivious to the deleterious effects of making cycling less appealing. It's quite obvious that they've not realised that if all effects are added together, providing for cycling costs less than not providing for cycling.

Planning "Shared Use Paths" is a continuation of planning for very low cycle usage, rather than planning for cycling to grow. If you want cycling to grow, you need to provide space for cyclists. Low aspirations do not lead to growth because they do not provide for growth. To get growth you need properly segregated and good quality cycle paths which are not shared with pedestrians as well as properly designed segregation of modes without cycle-paths, which allow direct and convenient journeys to be made. That is what is found all across the Netherlands, with the exception of the spot where the photo was taken.

Later blog posts expand more on the subject of Shared Use Paths.

I'm always on the lookout for unusual signs, such as the equivalent of Cyclists Dismount, which I've still not found.

Sexbomb

I'm not generally a big fan of graffiti, but I thought this bit interesting. It's on a bridge support on the way into town, on a route which many cyclists pass daily.

No doubt it was written by one of the many teenagers who go this way, on their bikes, to school.

"Hi, sexbomb on the bike" - one of several messages written by someone trying to catch attention from someone else, while they cycle by.

Everything happens on a bike. Perhaps it occasionally leads to scenes like the previous post.

Cycling together

It's quite common in the Netherlands to see couples cycling along hand in hand. It's also quite common to see people who are retired cycling, and they hold hands too.

This couple are cycling into the city centre, along one of the main routes - a bicycle road along a canal on which cycles have priority over cars.

Matching bikes, matching jackets, still in love.

How many hours have they spent together on their bikes ?

How many kilometres travelled ?

How many wonderful experiences shared by bike ?

In the Netherlands, the over 65s make 24% of all their journeys by bicycle.

And... what road conditions are required to make this possible ? Just how much subjective safety does it take for people to keep people cycling for their entire lives, and to allow people to continue to cycle hand in hand in later stages of their lives ? This bicycle road is no longer a through route for cars, but it does allow through travel for bikes. The result is segregation of modes without a cycle path.

Roundabouts

Many cyclists dread roundabouts due to the need to ride fast around them (hoping not to find the road slippery due to spilt diesel), be in the right lane etc. For some people, the need to use a roundabout on the road is good enough reason to cycle along a different route or to avoid cycling altogether.

However, Dutch roundabouts don't cause these problems for cyclists due to being designed a little differently from those in the UK and most of the rest of the world. This design maximises subjective safety of cyclists.

The photo shows a typical Dutch roundabout viewed from the air.

Cyclists are not expected to use the road, but have a segregated cycle path which avoids the roundabout. Note that the central reservation on the road where the cycle path crosses is wide so that a cyclist only has to cross one stream of traffic at a time and can stop part way across the road. This choice of stopping is made by the cyclist, and is not forced when unnecessary by use of barriers.

Also note that the crossing for cyclists is one car length removed from the roundabout itself, meaning that a driver can be stopped waiting to get onto the roundabout without blocking cyclists who are crossing.

On some roundabouts, motorists must give way to cyclists crossing the arms of the roundabout, though that is not shown on this photo nor the accompanying video which shows a similar roundabout in use here in Assen. Despite this lack of priority, from personal experience I find it is rare that one has to do more than slow a little at these locations.

Note how the children ahead of me negotiate the roundabout efficiently, just regulating their speed a little to synchronize with a car coming from the right. I have to slow a little to synchronize with a passing car from the left. It is rare that you have to stop completely.

In addition to the features of the roundabout which are concerned with cyclists, there are also other differences from the British style of roundabout. Note that there is only a single lane of traffic going around the roundabout rather than multiple lanes, and also that the cars entering and leaving the roundabout have to turn quite sharply to do so. This reduces speeds on the roundabout and increases safety.

It is also quite common for cyclists to avoid roundabouts in other ways, such as by using underpasses, so that they're barely aware that the roundabout exists at all. Read more about the safest designs for roundabouts in the Netherlands.

There are now many posts on this blog about roundabouts. Please click to read them all. The photo comes from a presentation given by Wybe Nauta on the May 2008 Study Tour.

Distraction technologies

Most people recognise that there are good reasons to try to reduce the proportion of journeys made by driving.

There are many things out there which may may look initially like a good idea to help to achieve this, but most are simply distractions.

One high-tech device that occasionally gets a bit of publicity is the Segway. It travels at the speed of a slow cyclist over a distance that anyone can cover on a bike, and it's expensive. However, it's championed by some as a "breakthrough".

So, what's not to like ?

• There's no-where to put any luggage or shopping except in a rucksack or other bag on the person.
  
• There's no way to carry a passenger (either child or adult)
  
• It's slow compared with a bicycle. Just 20 km/h (12.5 mph) maximum speed.
  
• It's very heavy to lift (around 50 kg) if you should need to move it. So forget carrying it onto a train, for instance.
  
• It uses batteries which will at some stage have to be disposed of or recycled.
• It is utterly dead in the water if the battery runs out as you're riding it.
• It does not promote physical fitness
• It costs... HOW MUCH ?

And that cost is of course a complete killer. $5,350 to $6,400 in the US plus another $1600 or so every 2 to 3 years when the battery needs replacing. Are you going to buy one for each of your children to ride to school ?

I've tried the Segway. It's a very neat device, technically clever and as easy to control as its promoters say. I didn't fall of it like George Bush did. I also think the developers did very well to produce it at all. However, that doesn't get over the basic pointlessness of the device. A bicycle is more useful in every way.

Mind you, there's no end to the silly ideas which get a bit of publicity every so often. Some people simply can't get used to the idea that bicycles actually are a really good way of getting about and they'll suggest virtually anything else. The Independent has even recently suggested that cycle lanes should be shared with horses. There are many impracticalities (e.g. are there enough stables should everyone decide to ride a horse ? Who will look after them ? How many injuries will be caused due to people thrown from horses ?) and I can also think of a brown, slippery and very smelly reason why this is a bad idea...

The Guardian writes about Fiat supporting a competition which picked a modified snowboard with handlebars as a good transportation alternative. They suggest that a skateboard would be a better alternative. It sometimes seems anything is to be considered in place of the already existing and proven bicycle.

I've nothing against horses, segways, snowboards, nor the people who ride any of these things. However, they are all examples of distraction technologies. Things that are promoted as ideal forms of transport when they are not, and when the truly practical alternative - the bicycle - is ignored by the British press, even though they're susceptible to reproducing the most preposterous green wash.

Even over emphasis on cycle training is missing the point. The reason that people don't cycle is that cycling feels unsafe. It is also viewed as inconvenient. If you really want to increase the rate of cycling, you need to tackle these problems directly by increasing subjective safety and directness so that people find cycling an attractive means of transport.

8th April 2009 update. Here's another example. I also recently wrote about over-reliance on the price of fuel.

Update 2014: This stuff just keeps on coming. There's now a proposal for London to have "Skycycle", a network of cycle-paths built in the sky. This is a proposal for a very sparse network (220 km in total, about the same as the length of cycle-paths in Assen, but London's population is more than 100x as large) which won't go near most homes or most destinations. It's another distraction from what is really needed.

Luckily, it's crazy enough that it'll probably never be built. However, it will waste time, and London really does not have time to waste.

The picture at the top is of another, older, distraction technology: The "Bicycle Railroad". This was a late 19th century idea of a pedal powered monorail, which come back time and time again. This example is in the Velorama bicycle museum.