Aleksander Buczynski’s Post

Last week I attended the first study visit in the frame of the Interreg Europe #CycleRight project. Thank to Tibor Polgár and Zsombor Aradszki for organising such a packed and diverse programme, spanning good practices from three countries, from urban mobility and street space reallocation to participation of people with special needs in ecotourism in protected areas. My personal highlights were: - Visiting the construction site of the tram line across the Petržalka district in Bratislava. The new line is to a large degree independent from the road network, and the project includes a significant amount of cycling infrastructure alongside the tram tracks. - Cycling (despite persistent rain) a developed section of the EuroVelo 13 - Iron Curtain Trail on the Hungarian - Austrian border. The route combines cycle tracks, cycle lanes and mixed traffic into a continuous cycling experience, with businesses and activities developing around it.

This week the Interreg Europe Policy Learning Platform organised a Peer Review on cooperation between public authorities and OpenStreetMap to improve cycling network data. Some inspiring examples, general recognition of the need for better, more standardised data about cycling infrastructure, and willingness to work together across different levels of governance. I presented the ECF experiences: - why are we using OSM as a source of data about cycling infrastructure - what kind of data can you mine from (and store in) OSM - what kind od data is missing, but would be very useful for cycling - how we cross-check data from OSM with data from official sources. Thanks to Katharina Krell and Magda Michaliková for facilitating the exchange, and to Reiner Dölger for hosting us in Mainz!

On my way to the Economic Forum in Karpacz, and quite curious about the event, also known as "Polish Davos". I'll be speaking in a panel on Thursday 5 September, but I should be in Karpacz already today evening, so if you'd like to catch-up or meet in person for the first time, send a message!

Is cycling “urban mobility”? EU-level documents, or even the structure of the DG MOVE website, usually mention cycling somewhere under “urban mobility/transport”. But is it universally applicable across all the EU member states? The countries in the map are coloured according to the difference between share of trips done by cycle inside the functional urban areas and share of trips done by cycle outside of FUAs, according to the recent EU Wide passenger mobility survey (Study on New Mobility Patterns in European Cities, 2022). In red and orange countries cycling is more popular in cities; in dark and light green ones – outside of them. Things change: the growing popularity of e-bikes supports the uptake of rural cycling in the West, and the East is discovering the benefits of cycling in the city, but there is still a significant difference in where the bicycle is used in Western and Eastern Europe. Rural cycling is very dispersed and therefore stays somewhat under the radar. Hundreds of bikes queuing on traffic lights in Copenhagen are very visible and photogenic, but overall the Hungarians cycle more than the Danish.

Congratulations to Yves Roelandt for putting together and moderating this morning session on data. Despite the time slot being widely knows as the most difficult one of the Velo-city conference, almost straight after the Thursday party, we had a full room, demonstrating a big interest and demand for cycling data. Special thanks to Holger Haubold for taking this photo of me clearly entering into dialogue with Pierke ;-)

Next week is the Velo-city conference week! On Thursday (session 9.4), together with Silke Brocks and Jelle Vercauteren, we will offer a practical workshop on integrating active modes in large infrastructure projects. The revised TEN-T regulation for the first time ever includes walking and cycling in its objectives and priorities, but how to implement it in practice? On Friday (session 11.6), I will talk about using (OpenStreetMap) data to build the case for cycling infrastructure. I also highly recommend session 10.4, discussing international cooperation on cycle route networks, prepared by Agathe Daudibon and Lukasz Wyrowski. A good opportunity to get introduced to the amazing work done with regards to cycle infrastructure on the UNECE level. And of course, if you'd like to catch up on some other day, send me a message - I'll be around the whole week. See you in Ghent!