International Journal of Transportation Science and Technology xxx (2017) xxx–xxx Contents lists available at ScienceDirect International Journal of Transportation Science and Technology journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/ijtst Towards an index of city readiness for cycling Mohamed Anwer Zayed Department of Architecture Engineering, Cairo University, Cairo, Egypt article info abstract Article history: After decades of overdependence on motorized means of transport, and in acknowledge- Received 7 October 2016 ment of major environmental challenges, most of the world’s cities are recognizing the Received in revised form 12 January 2017 importance of adopting non-motorized means of transport to enhance their quality of life. Accepted 15 January 2017 Local authorities are interested in providing facilities that enable city residents to effi- Available online xxxx ciently traverse the urban fabric. Cycling, as an important non-motorized mode of trans- port, is considered to be an efficient alternative to motor vehicles. Establishing safe and Keywords: convenient cycle routes has become one of the main development tasks in contemporary Non-motorized transport cities. Indeed, converting today’s traditional cities into bicycle-friendly ones is considered Cycling Bicycle-friendly city to be one of the principal goals of development plans. This paper addresses the urban readi- Urban attributes ness of cities to be bicycle-friendly. It focuses on the socioeconomic and urban character- Cycle routes istics that have to be present in a city for cycling to be adopted as a primary mode of transport. Through statistical analysis of 20 bicycle-friendly cities, the paper identifies the main requirements for urban cycling. Finally, it evaluates the readiness of Egyptian cities to become bicycle-friendly. Ó 2017 Tongji University and Tongji University Press. Publishing Services by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/ licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/). Introduction After decades of motorized mobility dominance in urban areas, the world is witnessing a revival of the notion of using bicycles as the main transport mode in cities. In fact, non-motorized transport as a whole is starting to receive special atten- tion. This is due to the great environmental, health and social challenges that are threatening the liveability of contemporary cities. Developing cities to be more suitable for bicycle use and more encouraging of cycling is considered to be one of the most important urban trends, not only at the level of academic research but also in professional practice. The notion of the bicycle-friendly city (BFC) is emerging internationally as one of the main targets of urban development plans in the twenty- first century, especially in European countries. This is mainly as a result of recognizing the benefits of this efficient means of transport. The development of contemporary cities into BFCs firstly requires identification of the basic urban attributes that generally facilitate cycling. This will help to determine the priorities of development. The cities with cycling physical poten- tials will be nominated to be developed before those without. After determining these cities, the second step will start. This step will focus on the socio-economic and cultural characteristics of local communities in the chosen cities in order to orient the developing to BFC to fit it. The current research had two main goals. The first was to identify the principal urban attributes of the city that affect utilitarian cycling. The second goal was to evaluate the readiness of Egyptian cities to be developed into BFCs so that cycling Peer review under responsibility of Tongji University and Tongji University Press. E-mail address: [email protected] http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijtst.2017.01.002 2046-0430/Ó 2017 Tongji University and Tongji University Press. Publishing Services by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/). Please cite this article in press as: Zayed, M.A. Towards an index of city readiness for cycling. International Journal of Transportation Science and Technology (2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijtst.2017.01.002 2 M.A. Zayed / International Journal of Transportation Science and Technology xxx (2017) xxx–xxx will be one of the main modes of transport. To achieve these two goals, a quantitative deduction methodology was adopted. A statistical tool, principal component analysis, was used to quantitatively investigate the attributes of the built environment of pioneer BFCs. It was then used again to evaluate the readiness of Egyptian cities to be developed into BFCs and rank them according to the urban attributes identified for utilitarian cycling. The research consists of three main parts. A literature review forms the first part, where the background to bicycle use as a principal mode of transport in cities is introduced. In this part, a cycling overview, the benefits of cycling, the characteristics of bicycle-friendly environments and the pioneer BFCs all over the world are considered. Then, in part two, a selected set of urban, environmental and social attributes in these pioneer BFCs are statistically investigated to identify urban attributes for utilitarian cycling, from which an index of city readiness for cycling is proposed. Based on these results, the research then highlights the status of cities in Egypt in terms of their readiness to adopt cycling. The availability of the required urban attributes is assessed for a selected set of Egyptian cities. Literature review Since the second half of the twentieth century, urban mobility has witnessed increasing motorization rates, which have resulted in negative impacts (Castillo-Manzano et al., 2015). Environmental pollution, increased fuel consumption, contin- uous traffic congestion and health deterioration are some of the main consequences that are threatening human life in cities (Stanley et al., 2011; Rybarczyk and Wu, 2010). In such circumstances, the world pursues sustainable transport as a principal goal of urban development plans (Blickstein, 2010; Kassens, 2009). Sustainable transport is defined as ’satisfying current transport and mobility needs without compromising the ability of future generations to meet these needs’ (Biack, 1996). It offers to the local community the opportunity to feel free to reach a destination with minimum environmental, social and health impacts (Passafaro et al., 2014). It encompasses restructuring of current transport systems that are mainly depen- dent on private motorized transport means (Gössling, 2013). One of the main elements of sustainable transport systems is the facilitation of non-motorized modes such as walking and cycling (Rietveld and Daniel, 2004; European Commission, 2011). In particular, there is an international recommendation to adopt bicycles as a primary means of urban transport (European Commission, 2012; Eryig˘it and Ter, 2014; Lanzendorf and Busch-Geertsema, 2014; Heinen et al., 2011). This is due to the exceptional potential of cycling (Blair, 2002). Compared to private cars, the bicycle is an inexpensive door-to- door means of transport. Compared to walking, cycling is faster and requires less energy to transport someone the same dis- tance. In fact, urban cycling is 3.6 times faster than walking (David and Sullivan, 2005; Bernardi and Rupi, 2015). For the same distance, cycling requires only 35% of the calories that are required for walking (Suzuki and Hanington, 2012; Lowe, 1989). Furthermore, there are various types of bicycles (Roman, 2014) to accommodate different characteristics of users (Stallard, 2004) (male vs. female and children vs. adults) and also different activities. Tandem, pedi-cab, cargo-bike and police-bike are all well-known types of utilitarian cycling means in many cities across the world. Fig. 1 presents some of the best-known types of bicycles. In the twentieth century, many theories of urban planning and development addressed the importance of restructuring the urban fabric of cities to support better non-motorized urban mobility, especially cycling (Bickis, 2003). Ebenezer Howard in the theory of garden cities, Jane Jacobs in The Death and Life of Great American Cities, Christopher Alexander et al. in A Pat- tern Language: Towns, Buildings, Construction and Kevin Lynch in Good City Form were all directly or indirectly addressing how to make cities suitable for cycling. Today, many cities, especially in Europe, America and Australia, are adopting urban devel- opment policies to revive cycling as a primary transport mode (Buehler and Pucher, 2012). Bicycle master plans are an important element in urban restructuring strategies (Lowry et al., 2016). These plans are mainly aimed at creating a bike- friendly environment that will facilitate cycling in the city (Joo and Oh, 2013). Two main approaches are adopted to this end (Rietveld and Daniel, 2004). The first is to enhance the attractiveness of cycling as a mode of sustainable transport, to be achieved by both infrastructural development and strengthening of cycle culture (Lanzendorf and Busch-Geertsema, 2014). The second approach is to deter the competing modes (such as private car) through either financial (Sterner, 2007) or engineering constraints. Research highlights the benefits of adopting bicycles as a primary transport means in urban areas. Utilitarian cycling is considered to be a sustainable and efficient mode of transport