Szentendre City Hall takes a stand for cyclists

Incredibly, this awkward underpass is part of the Eurovelo 6 bike touristic route. The public road authority forbids cyclists from crossing the road on the surface. Photo stolen from here.

The Szentendre local government is taking a stand against Hungary's public road authority in order to allow bicycling on the main road through town.

If you want to lend  personal support to this cause, you can sign a petition posted by a Szentendre subgroup of the Hungarian Cyclists Club.

This has a bit of history. Szentendre hasn't been terribly bike friendly over the years, and as someone who works and bikes there on a daily basis, I have ongoing issues with local cycling policy.

However, the local authorities in this case are trying to do something good for cyclists. For many years, the public road manager -- Közútkezelő Kft -- has banned bicycling on Route 11, despite it being the only option for many people to cross the town north to south. On the southern part, there's a shared bike/pedestrian path that cyclists are required to use. It's old and broken up, and not pleasant to ride on. And in order to get from this path to the dedicated bike path leading to Budakalász and Békésmegyer, you have to cross Route 11 through a horrible little underpass. Crossing on the surface is illegal.

From Szentendre's public transport junction (HÉV and Volan bus stop) to the north, there's no designated bikeway at all -- yet you're still banned from riding Route 11. One  local cyclist I've met has been cited by police for riding here -- and he successfully fought the ticket in court. Hungary's traffic code expressly permits cycling on public roads unless there's an adjacent bikeway provided. So Közútkezelő Kft.'s ban on cycling on the northern stretch of  Route 11 doesn't even accord with the law.

For years, Route 11 has not served as a local road at all, only as a high-volume, high-speed highway between Budapest and Visegrad (despite a posted speed limit of 50 km/hr in town). The local authorities are now wondering if maybe they can claim the Szentendre section for their own citizens, so that people can use it and cross it, by car, foot or bike, without cowering in fear of torrential through traffic. Allowing cycling here would be a good first step.

According to my local cycling contacts, the Route 11 initiative is part of a larger plan to prioritise cycling around the town. A couple years ago, a university student from Szentendre who had researched cycling in Denmark drafted a few relevant proposals for Szentendre. Apparently some of his ideas have caught on at City Hall. I think this is great. I have nothing against the use of cars for longer distance journeys between cities. But for local travel, cycling has an important role to play, and in Szentendre, there's huge untapped potential.

Cited for biking on the bike path

Some other poor sap. Photo stolen from: http://444.hu/2013/07/17/timar-utcai-tortura-trukkozz-tolj-vagy-tejelj/

I got a HUF 10,000 citation (EUR 33) this morning for riding my bike on the bike path.

If you've ever ridden on the Buda-side Eurovelo route north from Margit hid, you can probably guess where it happened. It's on the pedestrian / bike overpass near the Tímár utca HÉV stop. Despite this being part of the official bike path, it's forbidden to ride your bike here. Signs on both ends of the bridge indicate that you're supposed to dismount and push your bike over the bridge.

Because it's on my work commute, I go over this bridge twice a day everyday. I know the rule and understand the rationale. There are lots of people on foot on this bridge because it connects a huge housing estate to the HEV stop. Even so, I figure if I slow down and refrain from mowing down children and senior citizens, I can stay on the bike and still be within the "spirit" of the law.

I mean, why should I have to get off my bike on a bike path? It's bad enough that they forbid cycling on public streets, as on any major street where there's an adjacent, separate bike path available. Bike paths are no longer an option in Hungary, they're compulsory. But to forbid cycling on the bike path itself?? That's really the final insult.

The officers who ticketed me this morning explained how it's only for a small section, that it's for the protection of pedestrians, and how making a separate crossing for cyclists would be a huge investment. Mind you, the Hungarian government spends HUF 63 billion for car infrastructure like the Megyeri hid. But somehow, it can't shell out an infinitesimal fraction of that to solve a problem for cyclists.

I was pleased this morning that one passing cyclist (who was canny enough to have gotten off her bike) stopped to make some of these arguments to the officers who has ticketed me. She didn't get anywhere with them but at least made an effort.

But what can you do? I've crossed this bridge a thousand times without getting ticketed. My number was long overdue. If you read this, though, let it be a warning. Approach this bridge with caution -- it's cycling season, and the Obuda public space patrols have baited their hooks.

According to the kerekagy blog, a more bike-friendly solution to the problem is planned for 2015. We'll see.

Like mother, like daughter

This week, our friend Rachel brought over some toys that her daughter had outgrown, including a carrying rack for a kid's bike. Sequoia loves it. Part of being like her Mom is packing your little ones around when you're going to work and running errands.

Cycling cities -- they're possible!

In Kaunas, Lithuania, the Mobile 2020 bike parade.

For the past three years, I worked on a project called Mobile 2020 promoting everyday cycling in small communities in the region. We concentrated on 11 countries in Eastern Europe stretching from the Baltics to the Balkans.

Final publication of the Mobile 2020 project, available here.

The work has come to a close and our results are satisfying. The main activity was cycling-promotion seminars for municipal transport officers and planners. We educated them on best practices in infrastructure design, integrated transport planning, communications and cycling services (e.g. bike sharing, internet route finding).

Our curriculum reached at least 359 375 cities (more will be reported in the coming days). Our target at the start of the project was 350 cities, and I remember thinking we'd be lucky to reach half that many. But step by step, we met the target, and then exceeded it. By focussing on small cities, conducting the training in local languages and adapting the curriculum with in-country case studies, we were able to reach hundreds of tranport professionals who had little to no previous acquaintance with state-of-the-art cycling promotion.

In the end, a couple transport officers from each of the 11 project countries were invited to model cycling cities in Germany and the Netherlands. That gave them a first-hand experience of what's possible in city cycling. A Czech transport planner who joined the tour was so bowled over by what he saw that he was texting us throughout his visit expressing gratitude and telling us what an eye-opener it was. It was the first time he'd been to the Netherlands and seen streets with more bicycles than cars. He said he couldn't wait to get back home and set things right in his own town.

I had a similar reaction 10 or so years ago when I visited the Kreuzberg district of Berlin. It was the first time in my life I'd been in a city neighborhood where cyclists ruled the roads. I have to admit it brought tears to my eyes. So I understand exactly how that Czech transport planner felt. And I have to say it was cool being involved in a project that gave the same inspiration to hundreds of people in Central and Eastern Europe -- especially people in a position to influence the transport situation in their communities.

As project evaluator, I wrote a booklet of lessons and recommendations. Of course, I had the help of the project implementers in all the countries, and the technical experts and other partners from Germany and the Netherlands.

The publication is available here.