Staying in a small town 10 kms from Groningen, I borrowed my host's bike and rode in to town to see how it managed to become the place with the greatest modal share of cycling in Holland. I had been there five years ago and discovered that it was not just happenstance,but a deliberate result of keeping cars out of the city.
Riding in, it was noticeable how car traffic thinned out as I got closer to the rather badly reconstructed main square, which had been badly damaged by heavy fighting in the war as the Canadians chased out the Germans in 1945. The inner ring road has virtually no cars and, of course, lots of space for cyclists. Inside that ring, there are virtually no cars. Indeed, the crucial decision to encourage cycling rather than cars had been made in the 1970s when that ring had become chock full of traffic.
The reason for the town's success in achieving a modal share of over 50 per cent for cycling is nothing very complicated. The crucial point is not only being pro-bike but to some extent being anti car. That is the stumbling block for policymakers in this country. You need both the carrot and the stick.
John Whitelegg made that point in a critique of the Lancaster Cycling Demonstration Town about which I have written previously on this blog. There's no getting round it - policymakers have to start putting the squeeze, ever so gently at first, on car users in order to encourage a modal shift. Sadly, I don't think they will ever do it here.
While Groningen is famous in transport circles, Utrecht is a town best known for its once powerful bishops and for having the largest tower in the Netherlands but there too the number of cyclists was really striking, even more so than in Groningen. People say, rather dismissively, that its because Utrecht and Groningen are student towns, but that is to underestimate the sheer ubiquity of cycling.
In Amsterdam, too, jogging round the Vondelspark at 8am, the streams of cyclists in all directions, sizes, ages and speeds using it as a short cut on their way to school, college, business or leisure.It was the sheer variety that was so wonderful - kids with their dads pushing them on gently, mums with two toddlers in a front trailer, besuited gents on their way to their accountancy firm and old age pensioners off to look after their grandchildren. Oh God it made me feel wistful and wonder where we went wrong...
Dutch thoughts part three
Sunday, 23 March 2008
posted by Christian Wolmar at 01:10
6 Comments:
Isn't part of the problem that Dutch cycle facilties/lanes/bike parks are designed BY cyclists FOR cyclists, whereas what we see in the UK are just box-ticking exercises by local councils?
I think the only way you'd get British politicians to understand is to take them over to continental Europe and show them...I don't think you can really describe the difference to them.
Matthew Tempest
I think there is much more fundamental problem at stake here – which of course is not to disregard your blog statements and the comments here. This is the obsession with the car – so many people (inc of course the very decision makers) are personally obsessed with them in a way that really influences all they do. It seems to tap into a very US / UK obsession with ‘individuality’ and ‘freedom’ that is of course both clap trap, and played on by advertisers very heavily, plus a tendency to be lazy too of course.
People talk about it being flat in Holland (but when car ownership was low in the 50s in the UK many people cycled to work despite the topography, or being a student town – but I live in a student city – they all have cars now and drive like everyone else (funded by affluent parents presumably)!
I can’t see any way round this – the decision makers need to put the squeeze on, but in reality they facilitate car use. I’m a local govt public servant and my masters locally are looking at moving offices – they want to move to a new business park in the city from the traditional core area (where public transport links are better) – the business park will never have good links – BUT there will be more parking. Only bosses get car parking spaces now (with no regard to whether they need them – it’s a perk). They want to move to a location where they can offer more parking to middle managers – despite this being in flagrant disregard to stated polices on sustainability they themselves spout. That is why they are ‘box tickers’ as another person states in a different context.
But the real question is WHY do they want to do that? – presumably it is because they want to drive even if it is not even time efficient – because they are obsessed with the comfort, convenience and status driving gives them. Also presumably they don’t care about the impact on lower paid staff that may not be able to afford to drive to a new less convenient location and the impact on their lives of such a move. It’s crazy!
D
I was in Holland for just over a week on an orchestral tour last month. We stayed in Utrecht several days, with coach journeys from there. The cycle rush hour is a wonderful sight, as are the thighs of those young lady cyclists!...From my hotel room overlooking Utrecht station the number of cyclists, trains, trams and buses far outnumbered cars at any one time...Hurrah!...But strangely the coach company booked our journeys to take far longer than they actually did, saying that often the motorway traffic is very bad - inspite of the train service. (Regretfully orchestra managements seem to have a horror of a load of musos making their own way by train!) New lanes seemed to be sprouting on these m-ways. Referring to anonymous above, who I do so agree with, I wonder whether there is a strange law at work, where the apparent freedom of the Dutch on their bikes in a possibly rather more regimented society - Xian mentions rules about gardening on the Sabbath, door and roof colours etc - contrasts with our and U.S. emphasis on freedom, yet we imprison ourselves in our cars and have much less freedom to roam by bike and public transport - in terms of ease at least.
Julian - I too noticed that the motorways were full in Holland and that there were many of the same problems as here.
D - what a depressing story. It is, I suggest, because the managers are eager to drive to work and want to be able to park outside the door. But surely as a public body, it should be looking at its carbon footprint and making its decisions on that basis? Has the local paper not noticed the problem of relocating to an industrial park?
Christian - thanks for your comments. I agree - it is because the top dogs like to drive (even though they would happily sign off policies, procedures and other strategies to endorse the 'sustainability' of their organisation if it would help them get points with govt inspectors) - but again - it is about box ticking, not a genuine commitment. In this actual case site is not strictly 'out of town', but would be on a fringe brownfield area, with little access by public transport - like those supermarkets that pretend to be in the town for planning purposes, but are in fact totally car orientated. Regional / local press are not esp good at the level of srutiny required to expose these sorts of vaguely hypocritical plans!
D
Matthew said above that "the only way you'd get British politicians to understand is to take them over to continental Europe and show them".
We are trying to do precisely that with our Study Tours, but convincing politicians to come is not easy.
If there are any politicians, or any other interested parties who would like to see Dutch cycling provision for themselves and also be involved in a meeting with local experts discussing the rationale for it, please click on my name just above and you'll be taken to the website.
David Hembrow.