Bike
jams and unwritten rules: a day with Amsterdam's new 'bicycle mayor'
Rush-hour
bike jams, speeding scooters, ignorant tourists … Amsterdam may be
the world’s busiest cycling capital but it is no two-wheeled
paradise. ‘Bicycle mayor’ Anna Luten is working to smooth
conflict and export the lessons learned
Nick Van Mead in
Amsterdam
Thursday 11 August
2016 11.41 BST
Amsterdam’s new
cycling mayor, Anna Luten, barely slows as she nears a junction by
one of the city’s central canals. Cyclists are approaching fast
from six directions – bells tinging, hair flowing stylishly in the
light breeze (no one here wears a helmet). As I catch up the
crisscross of bikes almost looks synchronised, as if local riders
navigating the narrow, winding streets of the historic centre have an
innate understanding of their complex flows and patterns.
Cycling is something
the capital has become world famous for over the past 40 years and a
whole generation of Amsterdammers have grown up so used to cycling
that they have learned the skills necessary to effortlessly go with
the flow – to be hyper-aware of their surroundings yet appear
natural, says Anna. Like most Dutch children she cycled to school
every day, helmet-free, and hasn’t looked back since her
stabilisers came off.
But while Amsterdam
is synonymous with bikes and the ubiquitous Omafiets step-through
roadster, it is less of a cycling nirvana than smaller Dutch cities
like Utrecht and Groningen. We are touring the city in the middle of
the day when the traffic is light. Come back in rush hour – or at a
location popular with tourists unfamiliar with the city’s unwritten
cycling rules – and it doesn’t work so well, she says.
There are so many
bikes – an estimated 1 million for a population of 1.1 million –
that rush-hour bike jams frequently force cyclists to stop at every
junction on major routes into the centre. “For Amsterdammers it’s
frustrating,” says Anna. “Some parts of the city are just too
busy – there are too many bikes, too many scooters, too many cars,
too many pedestrians. There’s no space. It is a big source of
conflict.”
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The complex flows
of cycling and pedestrians near the IJ waterfront behind Central
Station
Indeed, while bikes
account for an estimated 68% of journeys made in the city centre,
they are allocated just 11% of infrastructure space, with cars
getting 44%. There are further flashpoints around the relative lack
of cycle parking (“Tourists love taking photos of bikes chained to
canal bridges but the council hates it,” says Anna) and the use of
bike lanes by scooters, which are heavier, wider and faster than
bicycles. Moves to ban scooters from cycle paths nationally are
currently going through parliament in the Hague – but just as that
issue nears a possible conclusion, the introduction of electric bikes
which can reach speeds of 30mph is threatening to create new
problems.
Many parents think
cycling is dangerous, and when those kids hit 16 they get scooters,
not bicycles
Maud de Vries
Smoothing out these
conflicts by improving communication between cycling groups, the
council, city planners and other residents is where the new bicycle
mayor comes in. The idea grew out of a Cycle Hack proposal by
advocacy group CycleSpace to build on the success of the city’s
night mayor Mirik Milan, who has won plaudits for navigating the
tricky path between the city’s ever-expanding night economy and the
residents and officials who would sometimes rather it didn’t exist.
After 17 video applications and a public vote to narrow the field, a
jury of city officials and bike advocates last month chose Anna as
his cycling counterpart. Unlike other cities which may have bicycle
commissioners, chief bicycle officers or cycle tsars, Amsterdam’s
‘bicycle mayor’ – although unelected – is independent.
But how difficult
can it really be to sell cycling in the world’s busiest biking
capital? “It is harder than it sounds,” laughs Anna, who juggles
her voluntary mayoral responsibilities with those of her day job as a
brand manager for Giant’s LIV range for female cyclists. “Cycling
is so normal for us that it becomes boring and we forget about it, we
neglect it. It’s not an identity like it is in other countries and
cities – it’s just the way people get around – so, while we are
ahead of a lot of other cities we still have to work at cycling to
maintain our position, and to improve for future generations. At the
moment, many people in Amsterdam think ‘because we ride a bike we
own the roads’. We like to think we go with the flow, but sometimes
we are actually quite rude. There are almost too many cyclists and
bikes. If it goes on like this people will stop cycling because it
won’t be safe.”
Anna takes me to
Kinkerstraat, a shopping street to the west of the centre where local
retailers are up in arms over work to ban cars and introduce a wider
cycle lane. “Even in Amsterdam, shopkeepers think their customers
come by car but that’s not true,” says Anna. “It’s stuck in
their minds and we need to change that.”
Then it’s on to
Mahlerplein, a state-of-the-art cycle parking facility in the
southern financial district complete with a travelator and space for
3,000 bikes. Cycle parking is such an issue that the city is building
facilities for in excess of 30,000 bikes near the central station by
2030, including underwater parking beneath the IJ waterfront and more
on floating manmade islands.
Much of Amsterdam’s
road and parking space remains allocated to cars.
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Much of Amsterdam’s
road and parking space remains allocated to cars. Photograph: Timothy
Clary/AFP/Getty Images
The issue of how to
get cyclists from central Amsterdam – across the IJ – to the
fast-developing suburbs to the north is another potential source of
conflict. Unless they want to detour a few miles east via the
Schellingwouderbrug crossings, the only way across the water for
cyclists is by ferry – free and picturesque maybe, but time
consuming for commuters. A new tunnel looks too expensive given the
city’s marshy soil, while talk of a new bridge has angered harbour
operators who fear the lucrative cruise industry could lose out.
And not everyone in
Amsterdam shares Anna’s lifelong connection with the bicycle.
Increasing numbers of people living out in the city’s suburbs or in
areas like Nieuw West with high immigrant populations do not have a
history of cycling and often drive their children to school. “Many
of these parents think cycling is dangerous, and when those kids hit
16 they get scooters, not bicycles,” says Maud de Vries, co-founder
of the CycleSpace group which runs the Cycle Mayor programme.
“Cycling gives children such a sense of freedom – and of course
it’s great for health and happiness and stress – but it is not
seen as cool in some areas and we need to work on that.”
How Amsterdam became
the bicycle capital of the world
Read more
“These are big
problems,” says Anna. “At other times it’s minor – like the
new trend for fat wheels means they don’t fit in old bike racks.
Normally, if you want to get something changed it is hard to be heard
as an individual, but now people are coming to me with problems and I
have the ears of those in power. I don’t have an opinion or a
solution for everything, but it is about communication and city hall
have been very receptive. We need to keep innovating or we’ll fall
behind.” That innovation may take the form of covered bike lanes
allowing business people to cycle to work in the rain without ruining
their suits, or new signs to show tourists where to find safe cycling
streets. “The willingness to experiment is key,” she adds.
Next CycleSpace
plans to export the concept of an independent bicycle mayor to 25
cities around the world – with interest so far from Johannesburg,
Cape Town, Beijing, Chicago and Warsaw – and a congress planned in
the Netherlands for 2017 to share ideas and knowledge.
“I don’t know if
we’re still number one, or if Copenhagen is ahead, but to me that
rivalry isn’t important so long as each city is a good place to
cycle,” adds Anna. “Cycling has the power to transform. I dream
and hope that in 20 or 50 years from now there could be more cities
like Amsterdam, where cycling is so normal and accepted that we’re
not really aware of it.”
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