In the City of London a new report has found that cyclists are the “single largest vehicular mode counted during peak times on City streets”. This doesn’t mean that the number of people on bicycles outnumber motorized vehicles but rather that they outnumber personal cars - taxis, delivery vans and trucks are in separate categories. Lest you think that this information was collected on a sunny summer day the report notes that this was in autumn.
Data were recorded over three autumns (2019, 2021 and 2022) and “cyclist numbers are at 102% of pre-pandemic levels. The number of motorists has fallen by 64% since 1999, while the number of cyclists has increased by 386%”.
At peak hours of the day cyclists represent 40% of road traffic and throughout the whole day they represent 27%. This increase in cycling and decrease in personal motor vehicle traffic has been facilitated by many initiatives like congestion charging and modifying streets to make cycling safer.
If you are interested in diving into what the City of London has done you can check out the report. What would your downtown look like with fewer cars? How could you begin to make that happen?