Following my recent trip out to Barcelona I thought I would share my thoughts on what seems to have changed from a car-centric city to a more bike centric city. They are not totally there yet, but it is less car oriented than when I last visited 6 years ago. (Photos to follow when I have had chance to download them from the camera)
For a start the municipality has set up bike hire scheme. They have partnered with ClearChannel to provide somewhere in the region of 8000 "Bicing" bikes. These bikes can be spotted a mile off, the wheels are odd sizes, the back being bigger than the front and they are finished in a "fetching" red and white colour scheme. The scheme, unlike Velib in Paris, is only open to residents of Catalonia (the cards will only be issued to addresses in the area). A card costs 24Euro per annum and allows the user to use a bike for 30 minutes for free, then it costs 30cents per half hour upto 3 hours, at which point the cost rises sharply. This is to encourage the short hop use, and to discourage people taking a bike and keeping it all day. The system is subsidised by the fees collected from car parks around the city. Another trick to stop people keeping a bike all day is a 10 minute "lock out" whereby a user cannot take another bike for 10 minutes after they have returned a bike. Tourists have not been ignored when it comes to bike hire though as numerous shops around the city offer bike hire and tours, mainly on beach cruiser type bikes.
Obviously a bike hire scheme is no good if there is nowhere to ride, and this is one of the biggest changes I saw in Barcelona. A large percentage of the streets now have fully segregated bike paths, where it is not possible to have a bike path seperate to the road the bike path is actually lowered section of road with a kerb between, thus marking a defined area that bikes are welcome, but cars are not.
A walk along the seafront on Sunday showed us just how much the residents are taking to cycling, with large groups of cyclists making use of the wide, flat paths provided for them. We saw all manner of bikes and riders, from fully race snake types, to families on hybrids. We also saw one rather confused guy who was dressed in fully racing lycra riding a hybrid with a child seat....
I look forward to returning to see how the system progresses
