Design Perth streets for bikes and increase our kids' independence

It's time for Perth to embrace the three-mode transport approach that makes for a more socially connected, happier and healthier city.

While cities around the world are lowering speed limits and tearing down freeways, Perth continues to build a road network that facilitates the movement of only two modes - car and foot.

Most parents would love for their children to ride home from school on a safe path.

People on bikes are currently expected to share with motor traffic or share with pedestrians, and the conflict problems are obvious.

Designing for a third mode, the bicycle, not only improves mobility options, it can deliver a number of positive social benefits too. This is seen most notably in the Netherlands, which since the 1970s has adopted the gold standard of this three-mode approach.

It's about changing our thinking from two modes to three.

The Dutch have done it and their streets function in a way that is fairer for all people. 

Better for children, seniors and those with disabilities

Thanks to the network of separate bike paths and low-speed neighbourhood streets, Dutch children are able to have independent mobility by the time they are eight or nine.

Meanwhile in Australia, the majority of our children have restricted mobility and must wait to be taken places by car. Being a parent in Australia also means being a taxi driver.

The three-mode system also allows Dutch seniors to have independent mobility without the stress of driving. They can do their own errands and are able to have a more active social life than older Australians.

People with disabilities also benefit from bike-friendly street design. Smooth, continuous paths designed for bicycles are also ideal for wheel chairs and other motorised mobility aids.

Enlightened cities around the world are cottoning on and are progressively installing separated bike infrastructure. New York, London, Chicago and even Auckland increasing understand the importance of providing an option of bicycle riding for all people.

Failed system

Our Western Australian state and local governments want more people on bicycles but the current strategies are not working.

A new approach is needed that targets the 56 per cent of the population who have bikes in the shed but will not use their bikes for transport unless there is a dramatic change to the urban environment.

The majority of people will simple not ride a bike next to motor vehicles travelling at 50 or 60 km/h.

Lemnos Street near Shenton College.

For example, the on-road bicycle lane next to Shenton College does not get used. The students riding bikes prefer the safer option of being on the footpath (legal but not ideal).

Change in thinking

The issue is not about Australia having enough space or money. It's about changing our thinking from two modes to three.

The Dutch have done it and their streets function in a way that is fairer for all people.

Once we stop thinking about the bicycle as just a piece of sporting equipment and remember our history of using it for transport, we can stop having the pointless debates about a minority group called 'cyclists' and get on with providing transport options for the majority of people.

In Western Australia, only 1.3 per cent of people ride a bike to work or school, yet there is at least one working bike in 61 per cent of households.

Obviously most people, even when they own a bike, do not want to travel to work, school or the shops wearing Lycra and a helmet, in single-file next to fast moving motor vehicles. That's the main option available right now.

Most parents would love for their children to be able to ride home from school, relaxed, chatting with a friend, on a safe path that's separated from motor vehicles. The kids want it too.

Perth, it's time to stop taking baby steps with infrastructure and treat the bicycle as an efficient transport option for all people.

Tim Burns writes the Bicycle Perth blog.

This article was recently published by WA Today using alternative photographs (see below). I have re-published it here using my original photographs which are more relevant to the content. My images were supplied to WA Today but they decided not to use them.

The article is based my earlier "Australia, start counting to-three" blog post.

We paint streets and ignore parking

Reading Mark Wagenbuur’s recent blog post about creating a contra-flow cycle facility in the Dutch city of ‘s-Hertogenbosch reminded me of a stupid Australian version in Adelaide.

During the Velo-city conference in 2014 we visited a couple of primary schools to learn about the Way2Go education program in South Australia. At Sturt Street Community School we were shown   how the school’s main outdoor sports area was located a few blocks away. The local government (City of Adelaide) was in the process of improving access to the sports ground and proudly showed their proposal to allow contra-flow cycling on Little Sturt Street.

Travel south from the school to reach the play area.

Little Sturt Street had one-way motor vehicle traffic in a northerly direction. There were parking bays on both sides of the street and a central travel lane. I was astonished to learn City of Adelaide's “improvement” for the children was to encourage contra-flow cycling in the existing travel lane, but planned to keep both rows of car parking. The law was changed to allow cycling in both directions, yet no additional space was allocated.

Little Sturt Street, Adelaide

The City's strategy involved painting a short entry lane to feed cycle traffic into the path of oncoming cars at the northern end; and to provide another short section of painted lane at the southern end for anyone who survived. These treatments have now been completed and can be seen on the current Google Street View images below.

Painted lane at northern end 

Southern end

Another element attempting to encourage cycling was the addition of a painted design on the street surface at the intersection with Maxwell Street. This place-making exercise involved the neighbourhood children with intention to slow traffic and give the children a feeling of ownership.

Maxwell Street intersection 2014

City of Adelaide has taken a lot of care to consider the minor and decorative details of the street. But, they have not solved the obvious problem: there are too many parked vehicles occupying valuable space that should be used to provide a safe cycle track.

The s'Hertogenbosch street described on the Bicycle Dutch website had one row of car parking and one travel lane. All of the car parking was removed to ensure enough room for safe cycling. The Adelaide street is wider, only half of the car parking would need to be removed to achieve a similar result. Is that possible?

The City of Adelaide currently has 44,700 publicly available car parking spaces. This is the most parking of any Australian city, more than Sydney and Perth combined. Adelaide's total includes 18,400 on-street parking spaces in an area of just 15.5 square kilometres. 

It is interesting to compare the two Dutch and Australian streets. Both are inner city streets with a mix of residential and commercial use. They are a similar length: 150 - 250 metres. Both had a need for contra-flow cycling. The potential cycling traffic in the Dutch street would be a mixture of people of all ages. In the Australian street there could be people of all ages, but it was specifically targeted at the needs of primary school children.

In both cities car parking is considered a valuable commodity, however car parking is probably more valuable in the Dutch city. As Mark Wagenbuur describes, the s'Hertogenbosch municipality have a waiting list for people wanting car parking spaces, with 200 listed as of late 2015. When the residents finally manage to get a permit they pay €208 per year for the privilege. 

So how did the Dutch city manage to remove eight highly prized on-street parking bays from their city street, yet Adelaide could not? 

Surely Australians care for their children as much Dutch people care for theirs? Have we become so obsessed with our car parking spaces we've become disconnected from logical reasoning?

It has become standard practise in Australia to fiddle around with paint on streets. We upgrade paving, plant trees and create websites to encourage behaviour change yet do very little to remove cars. We are dancing around and ignoring the elephant in the room.

How many local and state government bike plans or cycling strategies include parking management?
Queensland recently released a cycling strategy: the state's vision for the next ten years. The action plan called for leadership from six different state government departments yet I could not find anything about reducing car parking.

On-street car parking is a major restriction for building safe cycling infrastructure. While there continues to be an abundance of car parking in Australia, we will continue to drive. Any long term cycling plan should include a strategy to reduce this problem.

Back in 2014, we watched the children from Sturt Street Community School being taught cycling skills in the small playground at the side of the school.

When leaving I noticed this sign on the street-side gate. I took a quick photograph because I thought it was slightly strange.

The puzzle has been solved with the help of Google Street View. On a normal school day, when Bike Ed is not happening, it seems the staff squeeze their cars onto the school grounds and take over what could be a playground for children. This is an inner-city school with limited space for outdoor play.

Elephants in the room

Australia, start counting to three

The bicycle can be used for sport, or transport. During the past 40 years Australia’s concept of the bicycle has shifted so much the majority of people now just consider it a piece of sporting equipment. We like to think of ourselves as a sporting nation, and we know you don’t have to be an Olympic athlete to participate in sport. Therefore, millions of us own bikes.

Photo: Elfa storage system www.wardrobeman.com.au

The amount of time we actually use them can vary dramatically. Some enthusiastic people will get out on their bikes a few times a week and clock-up hundreds of kilometres riding around the streets in the early morning. At the other end of the scale, it is typical for families with young children to own bikes and ride them around their local park occasionally. Perhaps for an hour or two, every couple of weeks, but only when the weather is suitable. It’s good exercise and good ‘family time’. Sometimes they won’t bother with the bikes and just kick a ball around instead.

It can be a hassle dealing with bikes, especially if you don’t have a good park nearby. Loading bikes into the car and driving to a park can feel like a mission.

We carry bikes in cars because most of us don’t feel safe riding on busy roads. This is also the reason the majority of us stop riding bikes as we get older, and once the kids have grown up.

Australians who are older than forty will probably remember riding a bike to school - it’s what we did back then. But now, a lot of us drive our kids to school. Things have changed.

What happened?

Lot’s of things are different. We don’t accept death on the roads as much as we did in the 1970s. The road toll back then was huge. It’s much better now. We have all become very safety conscious. And there are more cars now. Lots more. And traffic is bad.

That’s interesting: it’s safer to drive now, but the roads are busier.  Since the 1970s in Australia, it has become safer in a car but not on a bike.

There are multiple issues involved, but one of the key factors during the past forty years of safety and transport efficiency advancements, has been that Australia has continued to build a road network that facilitates movement of people in motor vehicles and on foot, but not on a bicycle.

Basically, the Australian road space has two parts: a carriageway for motor traffic, and a path on the side for pedestrians. People on bicycles are expected to either share with motor traffic or share with pedestrians. The conflict problems are obvious.

City of Adelaide, South Australia

Floreat, Western Australia

Osborne Park, Western Australia

Mixing people on foot and on bicycles is not ideal but can function OK if the area is not crowded and speeds are slow. However, it is bizarre that during a period of significant safety advancement in Australia, people sitting on a skeletal combination of steel and rubber are expected to share the part where there are moving motor vehicles. A bicycle is not a protective shield, it‘s just somewhere to sit.

While Australia (and the UK and North America) continued with this problematic two-mode network, the Netherlands adopted a three-mode network. It’s simple really. Instead of leaving bikes behind, they took them on the same safety journey.

Groningen, The Netherlands 

Assen, The Netherlands

Amsterdam, The Netherlands

This has enabled the Netherlands to maintain bicycles as a common transport device. The social consequences of adopting this three-mode principal has been dramatic.

BETTER FOR CHILDREN

Dutch children are able to have independent mobility. In the early years they are accompanied by their parents to school as they develop their riding skills, then by the time they are eight or nine, they are able to travel by themselves.

School traffic - Assen, The Netherlands

School traffic - Assen, The Netherlands

School traffic - Assen, The Netherlands

Teenage girl travelling to sport after school, Groningen, The Netherlands

Meanwhile in Australia, the majority of our children have restricted mobility. They must wait to be taken places by car. Being a parent in Australia also means being a taxi driver.

Most people living in Perth are aware how much easier it is to drive during school holidays. In 1970, 16% of Australian children were taken to school by car, now it's about 63%. The figures vary between each state but the trend is clear (Heart Foundation report 5.6 MB PDF).

Stirling Highway, Claremont Western Australia - 8:10 am during school term

BETTER FOR OLDER PEOPLE

The three-mode system also allows older people to have independent mobility without the stress of driving. Wide bicycle paths that form a connected network, separated from motor vehicles, allow the Dutch seniors to get out and about. They are not sitting at home waiting for a weekly visit from their adult children. They can do their own shopping and are able to have a more active social life than Australians.

Electric assist bicycle, The Netherlands 

Supermarket parking area, Assen, The Netherlands

BETTER FOR DISABLED PEOPLE

The other group of people who are able to use this third network are those with disabilities. Smooth, continuous paths designed for bicycles are also ideal for wheel chairs and other motorised mobility aids.

Assen, The Netherlands

Amsterdam-Noord, The Netherlands

Couple holding hands, Groningen, The Netherlands

At the Velo-City Global 2014 conference in Adelaide, it was heartening to hear Manfred Neun, the President of the European Cyclist Federation, declare the organisation will be pursuing access to bicycle riding and infrastructure on an international level and this would include the United Nations. He stressed: "Active mobility is a basic human need, and must be a human right".

BETTER FOR EVERYONE

The photographs above feature the Netherlands because I took them during a recent study tour. Of course, other European countries also adopted the three-mode principle. Denmark is a prominent example, in particular the city of Copenhagan. Now other enlightened cities around the world are progressively installing separated infrastructure because they acknowledge the importance of providing an option of bicycle riding for all people. As Steven Fleming wrote after the conference:

"Velo-City has shown there is no further need to argue the case for separated bike infrastructure. There is a global consensus, held now as well by all major players on the Australian bike scene. Separation is key to making cycling mainstream. It has been proven in car crazy cities from New York to Saville."

This report from the USA Protected Bike Lanes Means Business provides some useful facts and figures for any sceptics you might encounter (2.5 MB PDF).

The current policies in Australia are not working. The National Cycling Strategy 2011-2016 had the objective to double the participation of people bicycling riding during those five years. The interim statistics for 2013 actually show a drop in participation after two years!

This change needs to start at the top. The Austroads standards need to be rewritten, again. Reading Cycling Aspects of Austroads Guides (2014) is depressing. The majority of the specifications, which deal mostly with on-road bike lanes, only suit the 5% of people who are already riding. The other 56% of the population who have bikes in the shed will not use their bikes for transport unless there is a dramatic change to the urban environment. At best, they will ride a few times a year, on a sunny Sunday in a park somewhere. 

The majority of people will simply not ride a bike next to motor vehicles travelling at 50 or 60 km/h. I frequently see examples of Australian 'best practise' bicycle facilities go unused. It is a waste of money and resources.

ON-ROAD LANES

This on-road bicycle lane next to Shenton College does not get used. The students riding bikes prefer the safer option of being on the footpath even though they're at risk of being 'doored' by the other children arriving by car.  Shenton College has 1200 students and only around 5% travel by bike.

School traffic, Shenton College, Western Australia

This on-road bicycle lane on the new section of Great Eastern Highway was made with a width of 1.8m, has top quality green paint at intersections and detailed road markings but it is rare to see anyone using it.

Great Eastern Highway, Redcliffe, Western Australia

It is more common to see people using the footpath. The speed limit on this section of the highway is 60 km/h. These types of lanes are not used by all of the existing 5% of riders, so there is little hope the other 95% of people will use them.

Great Eastern Highway, Redcliffe, Western Australia

This road in Midland was completely redone a few years ago as part of the railway Workshops redevelopment. It has generous proportions, expensive landscaping and an on-road bike lane that most parents would not allow their children to use.

Centennial Place, Midland, Western Australia

THERE'S NO LACK OF MONEY

What is worse than the basic Austroads standards is when those standards are not even applied. There are multiple examples of roads being realigned and neighbourhood streets being upgraded without any provision for riding bicycles.

This issue is not about Australia having enough space or money. It's about changing our thinking from two modes to three. Adelaide's North Terrace is an example of a street with plenty of space, a beautiful expensive footpath, yet no safe or legal provision for people on bicycles. 

North Terrace, Adelaide, South Australia

Newcastle Street in Western Australia had a full makeover a few years ago. Fancy paving, new kerbs and landscaping that included trees planted down the centre of the road. This central island in the road provides a refuge for pedestrians but has narrowed the carriageway so there is no room to pass a person on a bicycle. The speed limit here is 50 km/h.

Newcastle Street, Northbridge, Western Australia

 A CHANGE IN THINKING IS REQUIRED

The towns that I visited in the Netherlands were not all beautiful. The amount of money spent on materials and landscaping in the streets did not appear to be any more than what we spend in Australia. Perhaps even less, some of the streets are quite shabby by Perth standards but they function in a way that is fairer for all people.

Bicycle path traffic light crossing, Assen, The Netherlands

The money for roads in Australia is already available, the issue is how we spend it. 

Once we stop thinking about the bicycle as just a piece sporting equipment and remember our history of using it for transport, we can stop having the pointless debates about a minority group called "cyclists" and get on with providing transport options for the majority of people.

In Western Australia, only 1.3% of people ride a bike to work or school, yet there is at least one working bike in 61% of households. Obviously most people, even when they own a bike, do not want to travel to work, school or the shops wearing Lycra and a helmet, in single-file next to fast moving motor vehicles. That's the main option available right now.

Australia, it's time to stop taking baby steps with infrastructure and treat the bicycle with the respect it deserves, as an efficient transport option for all people. Our aim should be to provide protected or separated bicycle lanes where ever possible.

I want our children to be able to ride home from school, relaxed, chatting with a friend, on a path that is wide, safe and separated from motor vehicles.

Groningen, The Netherlands

Snorfiets

Snorfiets is the Dutch name for a light moped or scooter. Whenever I see that name I think "snorting bike". After my two-week stay in the Netherlands, my conclusion is that snorfiets are at the top of the transport hierarchy. If you ride a scooter, it seems you can do whatever you want, and go wherever you like. They are fast, can travel on the bicycle paths or the road and rules don't apply.

To an outsider it is very strange that the benefits of the excellent bicycle infrastructure are allowed to be eroded by permitting scooters, travelling at up to 60 km/h, to mix with slow moving bicycles.

The rules allowing scooters on the bicycle paths go back to the 1970s when the under-50cc mopeds or scooters lacked power compared to today's machines. They were not really suitable to ride on the road with fast moving traffic and it was seen as a reasonable concession to allow them on the bicycle paths to assist people who were unable to ride a bicycle. 

This is how they looked in the 1970s. A small motorbike with bicycle style pedals, hence the name mo-ped.

This is how they look now. The pedals are gone and they often share the same chassis and components as the 125cc versions.

Unfortunately, the laws have not kept pace with the technical developments and design evolution. It appears that a lot of rev-heads are taking advantage of the current situation.

Officially there are supposed to be two types of scooters with different speed restrictions: 'light' scooters with blue licence plates restricted to a maximum speed of 25 km/h, and 'heavy' scooters with yellow licence plates restricted to a maximum speed of 45 km/h. The scooters are meant to have speed limiters fitted but it is obvious many people disable these.

The cream coloured scooter below has a yellow license plate and the other has blue. They both look the same to me.

The two types are also meant to be restricted to different grades of bicycle path, but in my few days of riding I could not find any difference. I was 'buzzed' at high speed by both yellow and blue-plated scooters in a wide range of locations, sometimes close enough to brush my sleeve.

You can read a more detailed explanation of the rules in this post on the Bicycle Dutch blog.

During the Hembrow Study Tour I stopped to take a photograph of this group using the bicycle path beside a quiet country road near a small village. The road can be seen in the foreground and it had almost no traffic. 

Within a few seconds this person on a yellow-plated scooter buzzed past them using the bicycle path and not the road. I am not sure if this is legal but to me it is wrong.

This next example, below, shows my daughter on a hire bike in Amsterdam. She's facing a scooter coming towards her at about 40 km/h, and she's looking for an escape route. Although it was not close to hitting her, as an inexperienced rider, this situation is intimidating and unpleasant. This can't be good for tourism.

Not all scooter riders are aggressive, some ride in a reasonable manner but almost all of them are noisy. Most of the scooters have two-stroke motors and are louder than modern cars. In Amsterdam the scooters were often the dominate sound in an otherwise quiet city. 

And then there is the smell to consider. These anti-scooter stickers at some the traffic lights provide a solution.

With the current range and availability of electric bicycles I find it surprising the Dutch government allow the situation to continue. 

Don't take this the wrong way, the Netherlands bicycle infrastructure, even with the scooter problem is much better than our current situation in Australia.