Vision 2030

ENVIRONMENT IN 2030:

By 2030 the demand for mobility products (cars, bicycles, public transport, etc.) will be much higher than in 2018. by the introduction of low-entry try self-driving transport modes and shared modes.

Major cities will introduce zero/low-emission zones, forcing the most polluting vehicles out of the urban areas: electric cars will widely replace combustion ones. The most visionary cities will also ban electric cars from the city centres in order to save space, since bikes need 4x less space for the same throughput as cars, and require 10x less space to park.

In order to improve air quality, all mobility modes producing emissions or any negative effect on healthcare will be prohibited in major cities.

Speedelecs and e-bikes will be the main transport mode in cycling streets and cycle highways.

DREAM FOR 2030

• Cycle highways are the backbone of a broader cycling network
• There are Mobility Hubs (or Park&Bike Hubs) at 2 to 15 Kms from City Center for easily changing mode from car to bike or vice versa, and saving parking space and time in cities.
• There will be zero-emission zones in all cities to avoid air pollution and save parking space.
• The major cities will contain healthy Cycling streets, where the streets are (almost) exclusively used by bike (since research in Denmark showed that  bike troughput is 4 times higher than car throughput for the same street width).
• 60% of all people live within 3 kilometers of cycle highways. A relatively dense spider cycle highway backbone network is needed in every city in order to cover all the needs of the growing cycling population.
• 80% of all Cycle Highways reach at least level 3 for the CH Assessment Criteria: speed, road safety and uninterrupted character.
• Taxation system for mobility solutions is SPACE and WEIGHT related.
• Bike Leasing is from a financial point of view 10x as attractive as car leasing
• There will be  a completed or nearly completed cycle highway network by 2030 in all major European Cities
• Self-driving bikes will first appear in 2030, and by 2040 they will circulate from Park&Bike HUBs to city centers in order to remain competitive with very comfortable self-driving cars.

Illustration showing the future vision with high coverage of multiple cycle highways (within corridors of 2-3kms) leading to a total coverage of more than 60% of the population.

Illustration showing future mobility HUBs to change from bike to car and taking the (semi-sheltered) cycle highway backbone to the city center.

The bicycle is SPACE-GIVING: throughput for the same street width: Cycle Highway = 4x Car Highway and Parking Space =...

SUCCESS FORMULA: 

Cycle Highways are in 2030 the number one backbone of urban mobility since they have the least spatial impact and create healthier and more livable cities serving everyone (last miles).

USP’s of Cycle Highways:

1. LEAST SPACE: The BIKE is SPACE-GIVING: throughput for the same street width: Cycle Highway = 4x Car Highway and Parking Space = 10x less)
2. EXTENDING the RANGE of CYCLING where journey-time is shorter than cars
3. RELIABLE and NOT COMPLICATED RESILIENT INFRASTRUCTURE leading to reliable journey-times
4. High-speed lanes are foreseen (>25 <45km/h) in order to avoid accidents due to speeds differences (among bicycles) and to guarantee high future troughput.

USP’s of CYCLING:

1. AFFORDABLE and DEMOCRATIC; most democratic mobility product; speedelec (e-bikes up to 45 km/h) price will decrease to less than 2000€, which will make speedelecs more accessible and affordable to a broader audience. For commuters living in a range between 15 KMs and 30-40 KMs, speedelecs can easily compete with cars, once cycle highways are foreseen as backbone as the cycling network.
2. LOWEST ENERGY and COST/km: no energy needed or f.e. 250W speedelec engine compared to  50kW (electric) car engine: so 200 times more efficient transport versus cars. Also compared to trains bicycles are much more efficient since electric train engines are around 4000-6000kW engines, which means the energetic equivalent of one train is the energy equivalent of around 10.000 electrical bikes.
3. HEALTHIER: Cycling will be the number one enabler for healthier and less air pollution within cities. As shown in studies most of the air pollution in cities occurs within smaller canyons (where streets are narrow and tall buildings arise). Cities take into account that so called “canyons” (streets) need to be the first to be converted to cycling streets in order to guarantee a liveable and high quality (unpolluted) air.
4. FLEXIBILITY; unlike public traffic, cycling provides door-to-door mobility, freedom and closer contact to other inhabitants (real freedom vs cocooning in SelfDrivingCar-SDC)
5. RELIABLE JOURNEY-TIME: car journey times but also self-driving car journey times will be more and more unpredictable. Cycling will be one of the most predictable mobility products for door-to-door mobility.