In Copenhagens Nordhavn with Lasse Schelde of Cycling Embassy.

Last November I made a trip to Denmark's Capitol with Dr. D. Lau from the Hamburg ADFC to take a look at the solutions improving urban bicycling and mobility there. Our Interview with Lasse Schelde from the Danish Cycling Embassy (an NGO that communicates the danish bicycle way of thinking to the world) took place in the Nordhavn district.

We were interested in what Copenhagen does, and what Hamburg can learn and apply to what needs to happen in there with the growth of the city and also in other cities in Germany and the EU.

Nordhavn is a new area where still a lot of planning and development is going on at the moment. We asked Lasse if the Cycling Embassy is involved in making sure what happens there is environmentally forward thinking and in a bike positive way:

Hmmm (laughs), Yes and No, some of the members are on board, but Cycling Embassy does not have a specific role in Nordhavn, although some of the members of Cycling Embassy are directly involved. Of course we also have an opinion about how we think a good city should look like.

So what exactly do you do as Cycling Embassy? Are you in politics?

Well.. no, its an NGO, consisting of everybody working with cycling in Denmark. We have started 10 years ago, when we had so many people coming to Copenhagen who simply wanted to see how it was made. That was the starting point, to have a unified place to give answers. It is an NGO with all the people working with Bicycling.

We have Municipalities, we have consultants, we have NGOs, the Cycling Federation is part of Cycling Embassy. So its pretty much everybody working with cycling in one way or another.

We are at conferences around the world, because there is so much cycling knowledge in Denmark. Many People around the world are very interested in who knows anything about cycling, whom can we ask?  Then you come to Denmark or the Netherlands.. that is basically the starting point.

Are there Politicians supporting you?

The are not opposing us!! (laughs). .. in a danish context we don’t think of it as a political question. Its a question of common sense. When you look at the political perspective on cycling, basically you have all parties in Denmark in favour of cycling, some more than others, but nobody is opposed, everybody understands the importance of cycling. So in that sense its different than in other places, where only the left is in favour of cycling.

As an example, we just had funding for cycling infrastructure for 100 m € that was made without the government but the Danish Peoples Party and all the parties on the left side. They had the ability to work across political differences because they feel cycling is important.

This is fundraising for infrastructure? Without involving politics?

Without involving the government. That has to do with the government coming out with a climate plan, the day before, and the day after the opposition threw in this bolt into the machinery: Oh we can do climate stuff without you! So in that sense it was political. But it goes to show that parties from both side working together on cycling. In this case to make a point, but in other times it is a lot broader. We had a cycling fund for a couple of years, a five year period, where we spent 1 billion on cycling.

In terms of the cycling embassy, we are self funding organisation. We do not get subsidies.

How do you envision the future? IPCC climate predictions coming out two weeks ago, that turns out to be a very serious topic..

Every day that passes our vision is strengthened..

There is a discrepancy between people understanding and people actually doing something. And there is always an excuse for not doing enough! At all times in history there is a lot of pressure on politicians to do what seems right at the moment. So it seems difficult to make long term decisions where you have an impact that might come out negative when you are reelected. I think this is a general problem all over the world that makes it extremely difficult in today’s world with social media etc. to make long term decisions. You will always be hurting people when you make big changes. And that is the difficult part. At the moment there is a discussion asking politicians to make big decisions, make the big step, but its all just talk. How are they supposed to do it? Where are the politicians with the guts to do it? That is why we work with logic instead of politics!

Dirk Lau: Are you familiar with the situation in Hamburg? I would like to ask your for tips especially for the situation in Hamburg, in Germany..

Lasse Schelde: What I can say is that Hamburg is one of the better cycling cities in Germany, and you can say there is a lot of money in Hamburg, you have the economic possibility to make something happen. On the other hand you have a lot of cars coinciding with a lot of money. On a general level the big problem is that you are such a big car producing country. We have to talk about the elephant in the room as well. You can say that is one side of the problem, electric bikes and Pedelecs are very popular in Germany. For the longer commutes that is a good thing.

Personally I believe you become what you eat, when you create suburbs that are specifically tailored for cars that is the problem. The problem is not so big inside cities, where you have a larger percentage of cycling. How do we break the commuting in the cars. That should be the focal point for all cities, because that is the REAL Problem. In that sense I can definitely recommend bicycle highways, support of that, and how you can make a real impact on the companies that build the arteries, where you would build these bicycle highways. You should be very specific an supporting bicycle solutions all around these places. Anything else won't be realistic.

So it is a combination of political will and incentives, and Money at the end of the day. I would say in Denmark and in all cities its a struggle. I would also say, in Denmark and in all cities its a struggle. Its not easy and we just point and we have bicycle ways all over the place. Not at all.. In Denmark its also a fight. For every meter of bicycle infrastructure somebody has to put in the effort and explain people why this is important. So its a continuous work and unfortunately there is no golden solution to make it work.

You can say in way its own solution is that since in most cities (less so in Europe), you have a lot of people moving to the cities and with that you have a lot of cars, problems with cars and increasing congestion and that can not be solved with (more) cars.

In Denmark it is more differentiated between politics and doing stuff.. In that sense we talk, but its not that we are dependent on a specific movement. Because it has a lot more traction in Denmark, all municipalities understand the importance of having infrastructure, they have more or they have less money, but everybody GET'S IT.

Daniel: How do you integrate new kinds of mobility that is changing into your planning, the scooter craze etc….?

Lasse: .. we just threw them out last week!

Daniel:... the bike share, that is increasingly all over the place, electric cars, car sharing..?

Lasse: Yes and no, right now there is a trial going on from the transport ministry, working with self driving vehicles, in the test phase. What they want to test out now, is small delivery vehicles on the street for pedestrians.. Which I personally find problematic. 5 km/h rolling boxes, parcel delivery mixing in with pedestrians.

We have the local bike sharing company, called donkey republic, orange bikes, and they are very different from many of the much larger bike sharing companies, in that sense that they grow slowly in terms of working with cities of europe, and kind of solving their needs and challenges from a commercial point of view, opposed to flooding an area with 5000 bikes. So that is a very sensible way to have dockless bike sharing. So that is an example..

Kopenhagen has its own bike sharing system, a docking system.

Daniel: Cycling Embassy obviously sounds like it is a lot about cycling, but do you also have an opinion on the changing landscapes in mobility?

Lasse: Definitely, we have just launched 10 recommendations on what we see as good policies in terms of cycling. Separate infrastructure is one, what we feel as cycling embassy as a very important step in terms of creating infrastructure. Curb separated.

Daniel: Do you think it would be useful to register bicycles similar to cars?

Lasse: Absolutely not!!

Daniel: How do you make sure that the rules and regulations are respected?

Lasse: By using common sense..!

This is a discussion between people not understanding the reality between bicycles and cars, who pays the tax for what, and who is insured for what. Insurances can be different from country to country, so there might be something that is different, but apart from that in terms of taxing, in terms of who is dangerous in traffic: It is not bicycles. If you apply logic to your norms, and how you go about your society, every person analysing the situation would in five minutes find that bicycles are not the problem.

Dirk Lau: Can you give us a bit of historical background on the Cycling Embassy, where did it came from?

Lasse: The municipality of Copenhagen and other municipalities, they had so many people calling and asking about, how are you working? That was basically the starting point for the embassy. This has only increased in the last 10 years, the number of people calling and writing.

Daniel: In terms of politics, what kind of campaigning do you make use of to get some points across? To put pressure on politicians?

Lasse: That would more be the Danish Cycling Federation that you should ask that. They are the real Lobby institution in that sense, whereas we are not really lobbying..

Daniel: How do you bring the Cycling Embassy advanced knowledge into the planning of the new district Nordhavn?

Lasse: We are very lucky that the municipality of Copenhagen is lead by a bunch of people that are super skilled and have a super understanding of what is important in terms of urban planning, in terms of cycling and so on.

The masterplan for Nordhavn, the starting point is the 5 minute city, meaning that you be able to bike or walk or take the metro and get everywhere in 5 minutes. Hop to hop, the difference is if you are a car user, you have to go all the way around Also we have parking houses like the one behind us here, called Lyddos (?) Parking house. This is also a new way for the city of Copenhagen to work with public space, because they said we need to open it, we want to make the roof public accessible, so on top is now a public sports play ground. And that sets a very good example, and that is a very good example of how you can work with that area. And at the same time many of the places don’t have underground car parking. In that sense it is also a very different approach in car parking, where normally you just take the lift to the basement and get in your car and drive. And the only thing you get from that is more driving. In the situation here you go out of your apartment and decide wether you want to bike, or walk or take the car. If you want to take the car, you have to walk to the parking house to take your car for a spin. So in that sense the choices become more clear, and you do not have one that is favored over the others. Another big difference is also that this one of the first areas where we have in construction bicycle parking facilities which is also a demand for the buildings..

Daniel: Close to the car parking?

Lasse. Many buildings here now have to have bicycle parking in place, in good condition, that lowers crime, bicycle theft etc.

Daniel: Do you have (car)parking requirements, or is that a thing of the past?

Lasse: Unfortunately we do, from my perspective the car parking is quite high.. Still.

Daniel: You confront people with a choice they have to make, in terms of mobility..

Parking in the garage is based on apartment ownership?

Lasse: When you have an apartment, you are allowed to use the Garage. You have to live here to have one, if you do not, you have to pay.

Daniel: Is it the same for the bicycles?

Lasse: No bicycle parking is free!

Daniel: Is it protected?

Lasse: You can say in private Houses it is by the key. There is a not so impressive bike parking facility on the corner of the Parking Structure.

The interview was followed by a trip to the Playground on top of the Parking Garage where we could experience the view (and the wind) of the harbour city Copenhagen.

Thanks to Lasse Schelde and Dr. Dirk Lau.

Here is a link to the recommendations from CED Cycling Embassy of Denmark:

https://www.cycling-embassy.dk/recommendations-by-the-cycling-embassy-of-denmark/