Cycling on the rise during COVID-19 pandemic

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research 1:28 Cycling on the rise during COVID-19 pandemic

By:

Erin Williams

24 Nov 2020 319

Ralph Buehler, professor and chair of the Urban Affairs and Planning department in the School of Public and International Affairs, discusses how cycling has increased globally in relation to the COVID-19 pandemic.

COVID has had a big impact on how people get around. We've seen increases in bicycling. A couple of indicators for that. One is an increase in sales of bicycles. We also see that in increased bicycling volumes measured by bike counters. So these are machines that count bicycles that go by a certain spot in the city. And we see increases in the number of people going, going by those. And of course we see in many cities an increase in bikeway infrastructure. I think it's, it's beneficial for the transport system in the long run because we get people to ride more bikes, be more physically active and if we think about the space use of a bike compared to say, driving alone in your car to work, it's much more space efficient so it can help fight traffic congestion, it can help fight local air pollution. There's very little pollution coming out of bikes. Entire blocks have been closed off to cars and the old parking spaces are now used for outdoor seating, for restaurants. And in the middle you have pedestrians walking around and we'll see how these "pandemic experiments" will, will stay and will translate in the post-pandemic world. And some of them may stick because people like them. So they may demand them and some of them can really help solve other problems we have.

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