Walking and Cycling
Improving the Quality of Walking and Cycling in Cities
Roundtable Report, Policy Insights,
14 February 2024
- Overcome car-centric thinking. Decades of car-centric development have made its assumptions the unquestioned norm. As a result of this “moto-normativity”, risks and harms from motor vehicles may be accepted when they are unacceptable in other contexts. Many cities have begun to question this approach.
- Think beyond infrastructure. Focusing on infrastructure is not enough to ensure pedestrians and cyclists will feel safe and secure and enjoy walking and cycling. Policies must also target street violence, social disadvantage and other factors.
- Redesign planning processes. Processes for transport investments have traditionally prioritised car-centric options. A vision-led approach can provide the basis for redesigning these processes, and help ensure active travel contributes to more inclusive, sustainable cities. Work in progress across a number of cities worldwide suggests such a shift is possible.
The Freight Space Race: Curbing the Impact of Freight Deliveries in Cities
Corporate Partnership Board Report, Policy Insights,
5 December 2022
- Manage curb space with a focus on the needs of both passengers and goods transport.
- Apply access restrictions for delivery vehicles in urban areas while considering business practices.
- Use more logistics data to better monitor and manage freight flows.
Streets That Fit: Re-allocating Space for Better Cities
Corporate Partnership Board Report, Policy Insights,
16 February 2022
- Adopt meaningful indicators for how urban street space is used.
- Re-allocate street space to account for diverse uses and users.
- Prioritise people over vehicles when allocating street space.
- Explore the benefits of dynamically re-allocating certain street spaces.
- Adopt Safe System principles to guide the re-allocation of street space.
Road Safety in Cities: Street Design and Traffic Management Solutions
Case-Specific Policy Analysis,
15 February 2022
Cycling, Health and Safety
Research Report, Policy Insights,
19 December 2013
- Insufficient evidence supports causality for the “safety in numbers” phenomenon – policies increasing the number of cyclists should be accompanied by risk-reduction actions.
- Efforts must be made to harmonise definitions of bicycle accident terminology so as to be able to make reliable international comparisons on cyclist safety.
- National authorities should set standards for, collect or otherwise facilitate the collection of data on non-fatal cycling crashes based on police reports and, in either a systematic or periodic way, on hospital records.
- Authorities seeking to improve cyclists’ safety should adopt the Safe System approach - policy should focus on improving the inherent safety of the traffic system, not simply on securing marginal improvements for cyclists in an inherently unsafe system.
- Authorities should establish top-level plans for cycling and cycling safety and should ensure high-level coordination among relevant government agencies to ensure that cycling grows without aggravating safety performance.
- Speed management acts as “hidden infrastructure” protecting cyclists and should be included as an integral part of cycle safety strategies.
- Cyclists should not be the only target of cycling safety policies – motorists are at least as important to target.
- Where appropriate, traffic speeds should be limited to less than 30km/hr where bicycles and motorised traffic mix but care should be taken so that speed control devices do not create hazards for cyclists.