Beyond the Bicycle

Foreword

This article is based on my CIHT London talk "Beyond the Bicycle - An Introduction to Inclusive Cycling" which I gave on 5th February.

Introduction - What's wrong with the word bicycle?

There has been a traditional focus on designing for different types of ”cyclist” in the UK (we're actually designing for people who happen to use cycles from time to time rather than some amorphous group). This approach has often led to a ”dual network” solution to providing infrastructure. The ”fit and the brave” are placed on the carriageway to mix with motor traffic with everyone else often being left to use a share paths with people on foot.

This simply doesn’t work for everyone (including people walking and people driving) and with the use of barriers, tight geometry and poor detailing, we exclude many people from being able to participate in using their cycles for transport.

Cycling infrastructure giving up at a junction where protection from general traffic is needed the most requires people to immediately become the fit and the brave. Cambridge.

Perhaps part of the problem is the language we use and the preconceptions that we bring with it. The word "bicycle" potentially limits one's views on the types of machine available - even bicycles are very diverse in their configurations. Beyond the bicycle, there is an astonishing array of machines available which serve an equally astonishing array of people and uses. The word "cycle" is more inclusive and getting under the skin of the word can help us see that we need to change our approach to planning and design.

A recumbent tricycle can be more comfortable to ride for some people and is clearly more stable than a bicycle. However, riders cannot look behind themselves and people are lower to the ground.

The crucial starting point for planners and engineers is disability; and while I can talk about issues in their generality, it is the lived experience of people which is important as every story adjusts one's thinking on how we enable people to cycle.

The Equality Act 2010 reminds us that making "reasonable adjustments" should be a matter of routine whether we're making sure kerbs are flush and tactile paving is correct at pedestrian crossings, or that a multi-million point highway scheme should fully explore and deal with access issues for disabled people; including how cycling will be properly incorporated and not left as a nice to have which suffers the dual network approach which haunts us.

Onderwater family tandem - configurations like this can replace a car for local trips if the environment is appealing and enabling.

Local authorities in particular have a "public sector equality duty" which essentially means that they should be proactive in the removal of discrimination and to work to remove barriers for people with protected characteristics so they can participate in public life, which includes being able to travel.

Another crucial thing for planners and engineers to understand is the "social model of disability" which is described by the charity Scope as follows;

The social model of disability is a way of viewing the world, developed by disabled people. The model says that people are disabled by barriers in society, not by their impairment or difference. Barriers can be physical, like buildings not having accessible toilets, or they can be caused by people's attitudes to difference, like assuming disabled people can't do certain things. The social model helps us recognise barriers that make life harder for disabled people. Removing these barriers creates equality and offers disabled people more independence, choice and control.

It's a profound piece of thinking which challenges us to consider how we approach not only planning and designing for cycling, but in how our own attitudes put up barriers.

Christiania short-box tricycle. A common sight in Copenhagen where it's often used by parents for ferrying small children around and businesses to shift goods. It handles completely differently to a standard bicycle.

Overarching Design Considerations

There is a great deal of design advice, but we can distill much of it into a few short bullet points to guide how we plan and design for cycling;

• Some people use cycles as mobility aids because they find cycling easier than walking,
• Some people cannot dismount or they find wheeling their cycle difficult,
• Adapted and non-standard cycles cannot be easily lifted,
• People need space within which to move, manoeuvre and change their speed,
• Layouts should be intuitive and legible to avoid people being anxious about negotiating them,
• People need smooth surfaces on which to travel,
• Steep gradients and cross falls are difficult to negotiate,
• Separation of walking and cycling space should the norm,
• Designs also need to be accessible to others such as visually impaired people, people with learning difficulties, hidden disabilities etc.

Taking this a step further, we can talk about the "design cycle", a concept which seeks to encompass the variety of cycles and people into a single design vehicle that can be used to design test layouts as we would for motor vehicles. This recognises that cycles are in fact vehicles which operate within a dynamic envelope which varies with rider and configuration.

The Design Manual for Roads & Bridges (DMRB) provides commentary on the design cycle which is a vehicle of 2.8m in length and 1.2m in width - in essence, if you provide for the design cycle then you provide for pretty much any configuration you can think of;

Types of cycle from CD195 Designing for Cycle Traffic of the DMRB (image adapted)

CD195 also talks about five design criteria, a concept taken from the Dutch approach. The criteria are very useful for measuring the quality of cycling infrastructure and in listing them below, I consider the underlined text as being especially helpful in explaining how we think "beyond the bicycle".

• Coherence: Cycle networks link trip origins and destinations, including public transport access points and are continuous and easy to navigate.
• Directness: Cycle networks shall serve all the main destinations and seek to offer an advantage in terms of distance and journey time.
• Comfort: Infrastructure meets design standards for alignment and surface quality, and caters for all types of user, including children and disabled people.
• Attractiveness: Aesthetics, noise reduction and integration with surrounding areas are important.
• Safety: Cycle networks shall not only improve cyclists’ and other road users’ safety, but also their feeling of how safe the environment is.

The image above shows a series of cycles being turned through 180° at a speed of 5km/h using AutoCAD models developed by Sweco's Leeds office. While it is possible for some people to perform the turn in a tighter space, it shows that a design approach which recognises that space is required and that people cannot turn on the spot as some layouts expect them to. Of course, this is only an approximation and so it's important for designers to understand how different types of cycle handle in the real world.

Inclusive Design Details

So much for the theory, what about the practice? As we get into the nuts and bolts of how we incorporate cycling infrastructure into our streets, there are a number of details which can help ensure that designs are inclusive and satisfy the five requirements set out in the previous section;

• Gentle cross falls – steep cross falls and cambers are a problem for users of cycles with 3 or more wheels,
• Asphalt to asphalt connections without kerbs for smooth transitions between cycle track and carriageway,
• Machine-laid asphalt for cycling surfaces to maximise comfort,
• No staggered barriers, use bollards with a 1.5m minimum clear air gap to stop car access - many installations physically prevent people cycling through,
• Forgiving kerbs on cycle tracks to allow people who cannot dismount to access adjacent premises, cycle parking etc

A forgiving (sloped) kerb between a footway and a cycle track allows easy access between the cycle track and adjacent premises and for people to use the full width. London.

• If dropped kerbs are to be used by people cycling they should be flush and perpendicular to the line of travel as kerbs can be slippery and throw people if crossed at an angle
• Signage at a human scale and position,
• Separate space for people walking and people cycling,
• Avoid road humps where possible, if not, use sinusoidal humps,
• Do not use rumble strips as many people find traversing them uncomfortable or painful,

Bollards placed with an air gap of 1.5m allows all types of cycle to pass while physically preventing access by motor traffic. A lockable centre bollard allows access for fire and maintenance vehicles. London.

• Automatic detection of cycle traffic at traffic signals rather than push buttons as people cannot always reach a push button,
• Generous turning radii,
• Space around cycle parking for easy access, low level stands for cargo cycles to stop users of standard cycles from using them, ground fixings might be useful for some configurations, charging points for e-cycles,
• Cycle parking reserved for non-standard cycles and disabled people,
• Cycle parking at building entrances to improve accessibility for people who cannot walk very far and to make cycling the easy choice

This parking for non-standard cycles in Malm? allows people to cycle forwards into and out of the space and low level hoops discourages standard cycle users.

• Detectable kerbs between footways and cycle tracks to assist visually impaired people in navigation,
• Not requiring people to look behind themselves,
• Pedestrian crossing points – flush kerbs, tactile paving and perhaps mini-zebra crossings on cycle tracks,
• Many people cannot dismount and they certainly cannot lift their cycles,
• Avoiding the need for people to stop as getting moving again expends energy - Dutch guidance suggests that each stop equates to 100m of extra cycling effort,

Clearly defined walking and cycling space with a "floating" bus stop accessed via a mini-zebra crossing. London.

• Avoiding tight turns,
• Single stage crossings for ease of crossing and minimsing delay,
• Non-staggered two-stage crossings because some configurations of cycle are simply too difficult to turn within staggered crossing islands,
• Signal timings which take into account that some people need more time to get moving, either because of their power or the type of cycle they are using.

Single stage cycle crossing. In this case push button demand is used, but it is set well back to allow people cycling to draw level with it and not have the front of their cycle in the carriageway. London.

All For One & One For All

I have spent a large section of this article talking about designing for disabled people who cycle or wish to cycle, but with some of the commentary and the photographs I hope it is clear that in fact if we make our cycling infrastructure accessible for disabled people, then we have suddenly made cycling easier for lots of other people who we may not have considered before.

Families can cycle together in comfort and safety. Smaller children can be carried by cargo cycle. Copenhagen.

A wide variety of cycles can be used for a wide variety of jobs. Here we have a large cycle being used with boxes and a trailer for local postal deliveries in Malm?.

Here, the cycling infrastructure is being used in a rural context by somebody using a mobility scooter which has similar space and comfort needs. South Zeeland.

A cargocycle being used for local food deliveries reducing the need for vans on local streets. London.

Safe and comfortable cycling infrastructure enables children to travel independently. London.

Untapped Potential

In planning for cycling, it is often the case that commuter trips become the focus of attention because that is what is measured. This has the impact of missing many utility trips including those involving trip chaining. While commuting is an important planning consideration, there is untapped potential to grow cycling for utility trips. In catering for those not currently measured or planned for, our infrastructure could become far more inclusive and accessible for everybody.

Wheels for Wellbeing, the inclusive cycling charity, undertook a survey in 2018 which provides insight into the views of disabled cyclists (the 2019 survey is due out soon - opens PDF). Perhaps unsurprisingly, those surveyed felt that inaccessible cycling infrastructure was the greatest barrier to cycling, but other issues came up as well around a lack of accessible cycle parking and fear that benefits would be withdrawn or reduced.

Infographic from Wheels for Wellbeing's 2018 survey.

According to Copenhagenize it is estimated that there are 40,000 cargo cycles in use in Copenhagen. If the cycling networks were similarly developed in the UK, this could equate to;

• Over 500k in London
• 75k in Birmingham
• 35k in Manchester
• 33k in Edinburgh
• 23k in Cardiff

In London alone, there are over 30 cycle logistics companies using cargo cycles according to a study commissioned by the Cross River Partnership (opens a PDF).

Cargo cycle logistics company, Pedalme, generally operating within 5 miles of Central London.

The Walking and Cycling Statistics, England (2017) give an insight in the differences between men and women and how low cycling for transport to school is (opens a PDF);

• 2% of primary school and 4% of secondary school children cycle to school,
• Men cycle almost 3 times as many trips and almost 4 times further than women,
• Women are more likely to agree that it is too dangerous to cycle on the roads than men (69% to 56%),
• About 10% of all cycling trips are related to education (including escort).

Children being transported by cargo cycle in Copenhagen.

Conclusion - Key Issues

I've come to this subject as an engineer, a middle aged white male and as somebody who doesn't have a disability; so hearing the stories of other people and their experience is a vital component to the planning and design process.

I do have a story however, which is one of somebody who stopped cycling as a teenager and returned to it in my late thirties for local transport and soon realised how utterly hostile our roads and streets were for cycling. Four years ago, I also became a cargo cycle cyclist (the Christiania box tricycle pictured above is mine) with an interest in cycling with my children.

The key issues for me are as follows (although other people will have others);

• The word “cycle” is an inclusive term and applies to all sorts of cycles and configurations,
• The social model of disability tells us that people are disabled by barriers in society. This has fundamental implications for the planning and designing for cycling.
• Many people use cycles as mobility aids and cycling is often easier than walking,
• Use of the Design Cycle in our design work helps us see how much space people really need within which to move,
• What improves access for one group of people improves access for everyone else,
• There is untapped potential for cycling which is unrealised because of the traditional way we have planned and designed for cycling.

I hope that this article has been able to get you thinking a little differently about cycling as a powerful and enabling mode of transport. Of course, this is just my take on things and other people will have other tales to tell.

Me, testing out a continuous cycle track. On a Dutch utility cycle.

Resources

Wheels for Wellbeing is an inclusive cycling charity which has produced “A Guide to Inclusive Cycling” which is now in its second edition and has lots of detail,

• What is inclusive cycling,
• Recognition and awareness,
• Inclusive and integrated networks,
• Inclusive infrastructure
• Inclusive facilities.

Beyond the Bicycle Coalition is a group representing users of non-standard cycles (e.g. handcycles, e-cycles, cargo bikes) with the aim of facilitating discussion and developing ideas that will lead to improved infrastructure, facilities and recognition, along with reduced user costs, for users of non-standard cycles in London – including, but not limited to, disabled, cargo, freight and family cyclists.

• Infrastructure – inclusive design, consultation
• Subsidies and incentives,
• Facilities – cycle parking and cycle hire
• Recognition – non-standard imagery

About Sweco

Sweco plans and designs the cities and communities of the future. Whatever challenges our customers have, they can count on us to solve them.

We are Europe’s leading architectural and engineering consultancy with 17,000 staff including 1,350 in the UK.

We have extensive walking and cycling design experience across the UK and Europe delivering projects for a diverse portfolio of public and private sector clients.