Wednesday, February 29, 2012

Toronto - Complete Streets Forum 2012

The 2012 Complete Streets Forum is TCAT's fifth annual active transportation conference taking place on April 23, 2012 at Evergreen Brick Works. The Complete Streets Forum represents a holistic approach to active transportation policy and planning with a focus on cycling and walking while maintaining the interests of other road users.

Registration is now open. Reserve your spot today to take advantage of early-bird pricing!

E-Bikes Provide Boost for German Market

Albert Herresthal, GM of the VSF emphasized the importance of electric bikes for the German economy at the Vivavelo Congress. “As the bicycle industry sold 300,000 e-bikes in 2011 alone; only 1,800 electric cars were registered. While the car industry is working on electric mobility; e-bikes have become a mainstream product already,” said Herresthal.

EU Parliament To Study Benefits of EuroVelo and Cycling Tourism

When originally published, it caught the interest of the cycling community and the wider world, as it estimated that there were 2,795 billion cycle tourism trips in Europe with a value in excess of €54 billion per annum. It went on to estimate that, if completed, the EuroVelo network itself could account for 45.2 million cycle tourism trips, generating a total of almost €5 billion of direct revenue.

Tuesday, February 28, 2012

Canada facing a troubling childhood obesity epidemic

"Canada is facing an obesity epidemic. Never in our nation's history have the overweight and obesity rates in children been this high," Dr. David Butler-Jones, Canada's chief public health officer, said at a national summit in Ottawa Monday on the childhood obesity crisis.

Needs of older drivers not yet met by our roadways and vehicles

As Baby Boomers age, older Americans will be more mobile and active than any previous generation, and our nation's transportation system—including roads, traffic signs and vehicle safety—is inadequate when it comes to the safety of these drivers, says a new report by the transportation research group TRIP. [And also older persons as pedestrians. -MH]

Monday, February 27, 2012

Promoting Cycling for Everyone

This document is the final report of the European PRESTO cycling project, summarising its main achievements and recommendations from 33 months of experience and practical knowledge in building cycling cultures in five European cities: Bremen, Grenoble, Tczew, Venice and Zagreb; cities with different cycling conditions, modal splits, starting situations and local challenges.

Wednesday, February 22, 2012

Video - How to get America to walk

The BBC's Franz Strasser went to Raleigh, North Carolina, where an unsanctioned street sign campaign called Walk Raleigh caught the attention of city officials and pedestrians alike. [3m46s]

Owen Sound - Improving walking, cycling conditions challenging

There’s a growing movement afoot to get local municipalities more pedestrian and cyclist friendly, but barriers are slow to be broken down. Some of the things municipalities can do are design traffic lights to give enough time to pedestrians to cross streets. Another is to lower speed limits, because people are afraid to walk or cycle alongside cars going 80 kilometres an hour. In other cases where road lanes are wider than they need to be for cars, a walking-cycling lane could be installed, he said.

Monday, February 20, 2012

Pedestrian Cities / Quality of Life

Pedestrian cities are growing in popularity in many top regions around the world. The incredible beauty, enjoyment, and convenience a network of connected pedestrian streets and squares provides to the residents on a daily basis is unsurpassed. Being able to walk to a mix of shops, restaurants, newsstands, coffeehouses and open-air markets within car-free neighborhoods and work centers delivers the highest quality of life, and adds great variety and vitality to an area.

Most bike-friendly cities in the U.S.

“It is by riding a bicycle that you learn the contours of a country best, since you have to sweat up the hills and coast down them,” Hemingway wrote. “Thus you remember them as they actually are.” - Ernest Hemingway

We [the article's authors] asked nationally recognized bike advocates across the United States, and reviewed information from the League of American Bicyclists, Alliance for Biking & Walking and the U.S. Department of Commerce to determine the best U.S. cities to discover by bike.

Canadian-made bicycle electrifies your ride

The first electric bicycle made in Canada will make its debut on city streets this spring. Designed and produced by Quebec-based Procycle, the eVox electric bike "boasts the latest in both design and technology" and is "the only product of its kind in North America," the company said in a press release Sunday.

Friday, February 17, 2012

Skateboarders ride into battle over by-laws

Jim Sher, a 33-year-old Claremont man who skateboards to and from work every day, contacted the Cape Times after reading about the longboarding schoolboys who call themselves The Noordhoek Group and who have lodged a formal application with the City of Cape Town to revise by-laws that make it illegal to skateboard on public roads.

Are bicycle lanes really green? Some [LA] residents see red

When [Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa's] accident made headlines in July 2010, the incident energized the city’s cyclists and bike commuters around Los Angeles’ ambitious plans to make 1,600 miles of bike lanes in this auto-centric metropolis. Yet little progress has been made in the year and a half since the mayor’s fall because of an unlikely hurdle: California’s environmental laws.

New cycling coordinator to make Calgary bike-friendly

The city is hiring a new manager in its transportation department and you should know how to ride a bike if you want the job. The cycling coordinator will oversee the implementation of Calgary's new cycling strategy. “Must be able to ride a bicycle or be willing to learn,” the job posting says.

Tuesday, February 14, 2012

Video - Car Trouble: And How to Fix It

A humourous look at the mess cars of made of our world, this ends with some simple but radical ideas on how to fix things.

Winnipeg - Active transport to connect east and west

On Feb. 9 the University of Manitoba hosted a public session about an active transportation river crossing that will provide a direct connection between Fort Garry and St Vital. The pedestrian and cycle crossing will go over the Red River and enter Fort Garry near the U of M.

Video: Bike vigilantes pedal way towards success

A band of bicycle vigilantes, minus the spandex and capes, are fighting back in the battle against bike theft in a new Vancouver-based web series that uses bait bikes to lure and catch thieves.

Friday, February 10, 2012

Peel adopts active transportation plan

“This plan demonstrates a shift in understanding on transportation from a focus on moving people in cars, and moving goods in trucks, to one that considers that, but balances it more with different modes of transportation — in particular, with active transportation and public transit,” said Dr. Eileen de Villa, Peel's associate medical officer of health. “It is good for health, it is good for the environment and, frankly, it is more economical.”

Wednesday, February 8, 2012

Paris to allow cyclists to run red lights in bid to cut accidents

Paris is to become one of the first major capital cities in the world to officially allow cyclists to ride through red lights. The measure is also being tested in the cities of Bordeaux, Strasbourg and Nantes, where Paris city hall has noted there have been ‘no rise in the number of accidents.

Calgary - Bike-sharing debate overshadows growing number of cyclists

Bike Calgary posted some leaked numbers from the city’s latest commuter count, and the number of cyclists is on the rise. The day-long count of cyclists in 2011 topped 10,000 for the first time, representing more than two per cent of commuters. This came before the new 10th Street N.W. bike lane was implemented, before changes to the 10th Avenue S.W. bike lane, and before our absurdly warm winter.

Tuesday, February 7, 2012

Calgary - Bike share study to push forward, council decides

Even though bike sharing is just a kernel of an idea for now, council showed how reluctant it is to introduce the program to Calgary’s downtown, voting by the thinnest of margins Monday against stalling work on the program until 2014.

Langley BC - Mapping out cycling future

The plan isn't called the cycling plan, or the car plan, or even the pedestrian plan, noted Gary Vlieg, the City's director of engineering and parks. The idea is to integrate all the modes of transportation together into a viable network for a community that is getting denser and busier.

Saturday, February 4, 2012

Borneo - 25.3km pedestrian walkway, cycleway

The pedestrian walkway and cycleway project will include among other facilities bicycle shared path, bridges, decks, covered bicycle parks, children playground, lighting, benches, public toilets, showers and lockers.

[So, is it just me or does it seems as if Canada is falling behind, well, just about everybody? -MH]

Thursday, February 2, 2012

"Let's Double the Number of Women & Girls Riding Bikes" Campaign

Currently, women are dramatically underrepresented among bicyclists in the United States. According to a new report from the Alliance for Biking & Walking released in January - Bicycling and Walking in the United States: 2012 Benchmarking Report -women represent just 24 percent of bicycle trips in the U.S.

Dublin Bikes: Bike Sharing That Works

Since 2009, Dublin has seen overwhelming success with its bicycle sharing program. Dublinbikes.ie, modeled after the Paris Bike Program, (Paris Bikes) has had a high adoption rate as Dubliners are using the bikes much more than anyone had expected. The program has been so popular that this past November the City Council voted to expand the program from the current 500 bikes to 5,000.

Capital Bikeshare program looks to spread into the Washington suburbs

The Bikeshare program has proved more popular than expected in the year since the cherry red machines debuted on the streets of Washington and Arlington. It has 15,982 annual members, its bikes make an average of 4,000 trips each day and the total number of trips taken hit 1 million Tuesday [Jan. 31, 2012].

Wednesday, February 1, 2012

Montreal - On Time on Two Wheels

Over the last 15 years, bike trends have changed dramatically in Montreal and in Quebec. According to Transport Canada, one in six adults were using bicycles as their means of transportation in 2005, and those numbers have continued to rise.

Beyond Urban Centers: Active Transportation in Rural America

"Active Transportation Beyond Urban Centers: Walking and Bicycling in Small Towns and Rural America," released today [Feb. 1] and produced by Rails-to-Trails Conservancy, reveals the surprising prevalence of walking and bicycling in rural communities across the country.

The full report is available online at: www.railstotrails.org/beyondurbancenters