When cities take bicycle seriously.

• Author: Gardner, Gary
• Position: Cover Story

By making room for bikes - and putting their own employees on them - city officials are finding a simple, cheap, and effective remedy for the urban car disease.

In late November 1997, President Jiang Zemin of China ducked into an art gallery in Vancouver, where he had come for a meeting of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum. The gallery visit was unannounced, but Jiang was soon recognized and a crowd quickly gathered. Worried about the president's safety - Jiang had been the target of various protests at previous stops - Vancouver police called in their Quick Response Team to ensure his protection. Forty-five members of the elite unit arrived swiftly, in spite of congested traffic, and instantly established a metal and rubber barrier between the crowd and the gallery. The president finished his tour, climbed into his limousine, and left without incident.

The police outside the gallery made up the department's bicycle squad, which had been designated the first line of defense to protect the 18 heads of state that attended the conference. Recognizing the bicycle as a superior form of urban transport and an effective policing tool, city officials gave it a central role in police protection for the international meeting.

Vancouver's policy exemplifies the growing recognition that bicycles have a natural place in cities - indeed, in many instances they outperform other forms of urban transport. Bicycles arc inexpensive, clean, fast by urban standards, require cheaper infrastructure than cars do, and contribute to the health of the rider. Moreover, they can help calm a city and add a sense of community to it - less tangible but no less valuable improvements in the quality of urban life.

While bicycles are just one species in the "ecology" of urban transportation, their multiple advantages make them especially attractive for short commutes, deliveries, and even some hauling chores. Where cities have understood this, especially in northern Europe, the bicycle has assumed an important presence in the urban transportation network. Indeed, due to years of support from citizens and local officials, bicycles now account for 20 to 30 percent of all trips in major cities in the Netherlands, Denmark, and Germany. In many Asian cities the bicycle's share of trips is even higher, accounting for more than half of all trips in some Chinese cities, for example.

On the other hand, city hall sometimes wields its clout against bicycles. Guangzhou, Shanghai, Ho Chi Minh City, Jakarta, and Dhaka have all restricted bicycle use this decade in response to the gridlock created by a surge in motorbikes and autos. In Jakarta, for example, some 20,000 bicycle rickshaws were tossed into Jakarta Bay in the 1980s, and another 30,000 were confiscated, in an official effort to rid the city of this "backward" technology. In Viet Nam, the combined effect of municipal policies and increased prosperity has proven lethal for bikes: their share of trips dropped by a third between the mid-1970s and the mid-1990s. The trend mimics the practice of cities in some industrialized countries, where urban development long ago relegated the two-wheeler to a distant third as a mode of transportation, behind cars and mass transit. Indeed, bicycles are used for less than 1 percent of all trips in Canada and the United States today.

Because local authorities have jurisdiction over areas where most "bikeable" trips are made, they wield considerable influence over the fate of cycling in their cities. But a number of factors may influence the decisions of city hall. Often bicycles have not gained a cultural acceptance, or they are perceived as a poor person's means of transit. In other instances, pro-bicycle policies are paved over by interests such as the construction and auto industries. On the other hand, citizen activism is often an important grassroots impetus for pro-bike city action. And national and provincial governments also have their say: the 1998 U.S. transportation bill, for example, commits at least $1.5 billion for bicycle and pedestrian funding, a shot in the arm to budget-strapped state and local governments.

Even so, local support is a key "limiting factor" in a city's transportation system, akin to levels of sunlight or precipitation in a natural ecosystem - elements that determine which species prosper and which fail. Whether a city succumbs to the pressures of auto-centric growth, or whether it becomes "bike friendly" - the choice is often made by local government. And municipal workers, such as bike police, can showcase - or not - the bicycle's versatility and destigmatize its use. Following such efforts, cities in Germany, for example, have seen a 50 percent average increase in cycling since 1972 (see table, page 19). But without the active backing of city hall, bicycles are typically marginalized by more powerful transportation interests. City hall, it seems, is the key to unlocking the bicycle's potential.

An Urban Invasive Species

Many of the ills that plague cities today are linked to transportation systems that give undue privilege to automobiles. Like an invasive species, cars now dominate many urban "ecosystems," reducing transportation diversity and creating a host of problems throughout the larger urban environment. In the United States, auto dominance is extreme: the car's share of trips rose from 67 percent in 1960 to 87 percent in 1990, while all other modes of transportation saw their shares decline. Other countries, especially in Asia, are also witnessing a rise in the car's influence. But an increase in cars means an increase in car trouble.

Air pollution, much of it from auto exhaust, is a chronic health hazard in scores of cities in developing countries. Even in the United States, despite several decades of improved air quality, one-third of Americans in 1995 lived in counties that failed to meet federal clean air standards. Traffic is responsible for 15 to 20 percent of emissions of carbon dioxide, the gas that is the main cause of climate change.

In many areas, the car also underlies a vicious circle of urban sprawl: popular acceptance of the car as the means of commuting encourages suburban development at substantial distances from the urban core. The development increases traffic congestion, thereby creating demand for more roads. And the roads, in turn, allow for even...