The Metropolis

We can only look on enviously at Berlin's cycling paradise

Mike Pollitt | Friday 28 October, 2011 12:56

The recent deaths of cyclists in Kings Cross and Bow have shown once again that London’s roads are simply not designed to be shared. We should be looking how to make this better, so we must look to Berlin, where 13% of commuters bike. The figure in London is around 2%.

So, how do the Germans do it? The Guardian ran a piece last year raving about cycling in the city. The main reason it’s so good:

Thanks to a combination of Allied bombing and the Communists’ insatiable appetite for tearing down lovely old buildings and replacing them with brutal new ones, many of Berlin’s streets are incredibly wide.

So, communism or getting bombed would appear to be one solution. Ah. Neither of those sound particularly enticing. Other features including the unlimited right to cycle through parks (looking at you, Primrose Hill), and better residential bike parking facilities are also invoked, but would have only limited benefits.

As any cyclist will tell you, London’s problems are two: firstly the roads are too narrow to comfortably support cars, buses lorries and bikes. Unfortunately, this is something we just have to live with.

Secondly, the prevailing culture privileges the car. Case in point: Boris’s response to John Biggs’ prescient questions about the Bow flyover:

“TfL have been unable so far to find an immediate solution for providing controlled at-grade pedestrian crossings at Bow Roundabout that does not push the junction over capacity and introduce significant delays to traffic.”

No amount of blue paint slopped on the side of the road is going to improve things while this attitude persists.

Chart source: EPOMM

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