Cyclists now outnumber motorists in City of London

Somewhat unrelated to the article, but I live in a mid-size EU city and dumped my car for an e-bike a few months ago.<p>Surprisingly, it hasn&#x27;t been that hard (my GF kept her car, and I have a car-sharing subscription):<p>Pros:<p>- Immediately stopped having insomnia. Better feel overall;<p>- about €300&#x2F;month in additional disposable income. That&#x27;s basically a free lunch everyday!<p>- significantly faster if parking is taken into account for most trips. The bike is faster for any &lt; 10 km &#x2F; 7 mi trip;<p>- do not have to worry about car maintenance, parking tickets or theft;<p>- you will not kill someone if you ride after a night drinking;<p>- amazing when the weather is great;<p>- (almost) no emission.<p>Cons:<p>- might be impossible depending on work or children;<p>- weather might make the ride unpleasant;<p>- somewhat dangerous when the infrastructure is lacking.<p>I&#x27;m pretty sure I&#x27;ll never own a car, unless absolutely required by work. Improving the infra and the car-sharing network would be awesome.

Note that the &quot;City of London&quot; is not the whole of the London built-up area, but just the financial services district, slightly more than one square mile in area. Still, it&#x27;s a remarkable statistic even then.

This news literally makes me so happy. I can&#x27;t wait to see it propagating around the world ! Riding a bike it better for your health, for the environment, makes cities much safer places, better for your mood as well &amp; even better for your wallet. For people who have the chance to work reasonably close to their work, it&#x27;s THE perfect solution.<p>I bike to work every day since 4&#x2F;5 years, in Switzerland. Since roughly 18 months, I have seen a huge change in the behavior of car drivers: they are much much nicer to interact with. Before COVID, I had dangerous interaction with drivers several time a week, and had to be in constant vigilance for them not considering me as part of the traffic. Now, it has been reduced to maybe once a month. Sometimes I don&#x27;t even believe how well people respect us now, considering how it was just 3 years ago. And most of the time when I confront people that did something dangerous, they are sorry and feel bad about it (it really wasn&#x27;t like this a few years ago...)

Amazing news! More cyclists (and fewer motorists) on the streets creates a safer, less polluted city environment for everyone.

&gt; The 24-hour traffic count was conducted on a wet and windy November day last year.<p>Presumably that means on a nice summers day the numbers are even higher.<p>This is of course countered by the fact the City of London is becoming increasingly hard to navigate in a motor vehicle. There&#x27;s a proliferation of camera-enforced road closures and turning restrictions which, along with the congestion charge and very high parking charges make driving anywhere near the City only really possible for the very rich. It&#x27;s long been the case that the majority of vehicles in the City (or anywhere in central London really) are taxis and commercial vehicles. It&#x27;s great that cycling is increasing, but it&#x27;s probably at the expense of train travel rather than driving - I don&#x27;t think I&#x27;ve ever met anyone who works in central London who drives to work regularly.<p>One peculiarity of the way the City of London is managed is that it has its own local government. Maybe with this evidence that cycling is important they&#x27;ll finally invest some money into their cycle infrastructure - you can essentially see the dividing line between the City and Islington just by looking at the quality of the road surface.

November 2020 I ordered a Swytch e-bike kit and fitted it to my bike. It replaced the car for many things (weekly grocery shops, city centre trips).<p>I moved to London last year and this turned out to be a fortune timing.<p>My car, a Honda Civic 2007 diesel, is not ULEZ compliant and I will have to pay £12.50&#x2F;day to drive it from August 2023 due to the low emission zone expansion. I plan to sell it in July.<p>Guess what? I&#x27;ve been using my Swytch e-bike happily here in London to get around the suburbs. There are even some Amsterdam style bike lanes to get further into the city.<p>Pros when I get rid of the car:<p>* no insurance, tax, ULEZ charge, fuel, trip to fuel station, servicing charges, worries about people scratching it...<p>* Uber for when I really need a car (eg. I have a group with me)<p>* able to take short-cuts and bypass unpleasant town centers&#x2F;sometimes<p>* feeling of getting fresh air and exercise<p>* helping a cleaner environment for next generation<p>Cons:<p>* weather has a big factor when riding and planning trips, all you really need though is gloves, a waterproof jacket - maybe waterproof over-trousers for when there is heavy rain.<p>* cold weather waters my eyes and hits me in the face<p>* have to unlock &amp; lock the bike and carry a D-lock<p>I doubt I will ever own a car after August 2023.

I was finding it difficult to stick to cycling.<p>Hearing my plight, an avid cyclist friend of mine suggested me to try a trick:-<p><pre><code> Get a 3 way folding cycle such as the Brompton. Now, play around with hybrid modes of transport. </code></pre> My programmer&#x27;s brain loves building abstractions neatly on top of each other. Folding my cycle and carrying it onto another form of transport brings a smile to my face every time.<p>The biggest tower of babel I have achieved so far is this:-<p>A barge carried my car accross a river. I was sitting in the car with my Brompton next to me.

I&#x27;ve a 24 km commute in Dublin in Ireland. It&#x27;s most consistent by ebike. Driving can take anywhere from 35 minutes to over an hour depending on traffic. Public transport takes 90 minutes and there is only a direct bus a couple of times a day, otherwise it will take closer to two hours.<p>On my bike it consistently takes an hour. I can take various green ways through parks and try to minimise my exposure to aggressive drivers and get some good exercise even on an ebike. The only issue is picking up a puncture which has been an issue with my new tyres lately. It&#x27;s important to invest in good equipment if you can.

I&#x27;m worried about riding my bike in the city. A friend of mine died on her bike when hit by a truck in Seattle a few years ago and since then I just don&#x27;t feel okay biking alongside cars any more, especially with kids.<p>I know this is fundamentally born of emotion rather than rationalism, but still, it does seem like riding a bike is much more dangerous than driving. Bicycles are somewhere from 3x to 11x more dangerous than cars.<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;bicycleuniverse.com&#x2F;bicycle-safety-almanac&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;bicycleuniverse.com&#x2F;bicycle-safety-almanac&#x2F;</a><p>When I visited Amsterdam I liked how they often had separated bike lanes, not like in the US where cars can and do just drive through the bike lanes, like an actual physical barrier preventing cars from driving through bike lanes. Maybe that would be a lot safer, but, I won&#x27;t hold my breath on that coming to the US.

I think the sensible model is to eventually get rid of most car traffic in city centres, and concentrate the parking spots in suburbs, with adequate public transport to denser areas.<p>Personally I couldn&#x27;t live without a car. Not because I need it much in the city right now, but because I need it to reach my relatives and meaningful places in the countryside, far away from any public transport. Cost of living is also something to consider, not everyone can afford a proper house within reach of public transport, and living in a flat sucks.

Its fascinating, that even such a entrenched industry such as the car industry, can be banned from urban centers. There is hope for change yet.

Somewhat important detail to note: The City of London&#x27;s (AKA &quot;The Square Mile&quot;) geographical area is 1.12 square miles: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;City_of_London" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;City_of_London</a><p>This is great news.

We are the cyclists, the intermediate stage between humans and pure energy.<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;youtu.be&#x2F;1s0XsulDXtk" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;youtu.be&#x2F;1s0XsulDXtk</a>

imagine how much of a shit show it would be if every single one of these people tried to commute in one day in their own individual vehicle instead of a bicycle.<p>It&#x27;s the space efficiency of the bicycle that allows London to function at this point.

My main transportation vehicle for anything under 15km is a bicycle. I go through rain, ice, snow — doesn&#x27;t make a difference to me, I&#x27;ll be cycling. Yes, I&#x27;ve cycled through storms, can&#x27;t see what the fuss is about really.<p>I would still never cycle in London. It doesn&#x27;t have proper cycle infrastructure, just some painted lines on roads designed for cars. You&#x27;re taking your life in your hands there.<p>The car drivers are absolutely entitled to be pissed off with the city. Where I live (Netherlands) they made cycling the obvious choice, because it&#x27;s cheaper, faster, and more fun than anything else. In London, it&#x27;s more like it&#x27;s being smashed down everyone&#x27;s throats by force. Cycling isn&#x27;t _better_ there, it&#x27;s just the only economically viable option after the greedy money grab that is the &quot;punish all drivers&quot; policy for the last 20 years.

It would be interesting to see how road space is also allocated between these 2 modes.<p>I don’t know much about the City of London (I do know that it’s not the same thing as the city of London), so I’m curious if others with more knowledge can share some information.

What are the per-mile statistics? What percentage of total miles traveled occur via bike? If every trip counts equally, pedestrians should outnumber everyone. (Most every cyclist or driver becomes a pedestrian at some point during the day.)

Great.<p>Hopefully this will make the introduction of stricter regulations on motorists easier, particularly safety and noise.

I have been a daily bike commuter for over a decade.<p>I recently got an e-bike, and I would not want a non-e-bike aftger this.<p>I have an Orbea Rise and I love it. It is heavy though, and the tires are too wide for some of the bus bike racks...<p>Also, WRT to lighting - I highly recommend getting these, instead of the expensive lights they sell in places like mikes bikes...<p>I have these on my bikes - they are awwesome because they are weather-proof, solar charged, motion sensing activation and give a wide throw of light. I have one on the front of my bike and on on the back. They automatically turn on at night and go bright when the bike starts moving.<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.amazon.com&#x2F;Otdair-310-Lighting-Waterproof-Security&#x2F;dp&#x2F;B09P1JG7GN?pd_rd_w=0WofT&amp;content-id=amzn1.sym.deffa092-2e99-4e9f-b814-0d71c40b24af&amp;pf_rd_p=deffa092-2e99-4e9f-b814-0d71c40b24af&amp;pf_rd_r=C6819PHP9CA8E4AAD1JX&amp;pd_rd_wg=LQ7ul&amp;pd_rd_r=6746df0a-28cc-46b8-b3e8-8c99164b5d3c&amp;pd_rd_i=B09P1JG7GN&amp;psc=1&amp;ref_=pd_bap_d_grid_rp_0_1_i" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.amazon.com&#x2F;Otdair-310-Lighting-Waterproof-Securi...</a>

I haven&#x27;t done my research but from what I&#x27;ve gathered from news over the years hasn&#x27;t London had very high car tax, tolls, super expensive gas, and just outright closing streets and eliminating parking?<p>So with a big enough stick and very little carrot anything is possible? Is that a win? Aren&#x27;t we hearing that actual residents really don&#x27;t like these &quot;15 minute&quot; cities?

How much of this is because London is a great place to bike and how much of this is because they tax you so darn much to drive in the City?

Curious how much of this was the £15 daily &quot;congestion charge&quot; you have to pay to get a vehicle into the area.

For people who don’t know, the City of London is a tiny part of London that is already an expensive and hellish place to drive in as it is due to congestion charging, exorbitant parking, one-way roads with numerous yellow box junctions, red route clearways, one-way systems, even police stops.

I wonder what fraction of that are E-bikes or others with a power source additional to the human.

If you are going to get into cycling i recommend finding a geometry that works good for you, like something general from a major brand, and then have a titainium frame builder in china make a frame with those dimentions. For 1250 you can have a frameset that lasts forever, doesn&#x27;t rust, cleans well. Rim brakes are the way to go as they are lighter and cheaper to maintain. Disc brakes weigh more and only offer performace improvements in the wet and other more intense situations. There is a push to move people to disc for product design uniformity so the industry as a whole can keep costs down... you know.. hedge funds n stuff.

I love only having a bike in the city. So convenient and helps keeping my energy up. Worst part of living in Stockholm is that it is completely inconvenient in most cases if you actually wanna go to the city.

This is a great success which I hope is replicated in the United States.

Let&#x27;s not forget that the &quot;City of London&quot; is a small enclave located in a small area of London proper with very very expensive parking and a lot of other restrictions for car traffic so the bankers can be leisurely driven by their chauffeurs in their Blenteys and Rolls without being importuned by the petit bourgeoise that works for them and their patetic Range Rovers, BMWs and <i>gasp</i> Fords.

Indeed. And they&#x27;re as (or even more) dangerous for pedestrians as cars since they think traffic rules do not apply to them. Source: I work there.

Looking at the chart, it appears that &quot;motorists&quot; is separate from &quot;taxis&quot;. I wonder which bucket Uber falls into.

The main issue with bikes in big cities is the blatant bike-theft problem and the near-impunity that thieves seem to enjoy.

What is a constructive way to respond to cyclist hate? I used to commute to work quite a bit and got a lot of flack both on the road and off (people giving their opinion).<p>I don&#x27;t really understand the hate first of all, but more importantly how do you respond to it appropriately and maturely? Is there another way than just ignoring it?

I didn&#x27;t see any mention of this in the article, but I wonder what percentage is commuting vs. delivery. I was in NYC before and after the pandemic and, just from a casual outside perspective, it seemed that the number of delivery cyclist has risen significantly while commuters has dropped or just stayed the same.

hopefully this will contribute to a tipping point on infrastructure investments around low traffic neighbourhoods.

I would personally bike more often to more places if only there was some way to securely park my bike at the destination (grocery stores, restaurants, etc.).<p>The only place I can reliably bike to at the moment is my office which has a secured bike parking.

Nice, I wonder if they are back using internal hubs (like old 3 speeds) or derailleurs ?<p>The internal hubs like they used 50+ years ago were a better design for rainy weather than derailleurs.<p>With that said, I can guess most are using single speed. Hopefully not fixed :)

And the total time it&#x27;s taken a load of goods to cross the city still hasn&#x27;t changed in 700 years :)<p>(I <i>believe</i> that this is Neil Gaiman&#x27;s joke, but it could also be Pratchett, or older)

This is mostly not for the right reasons of benefits and incentives but cost of public transport, unreliability of public transport (we&#x27;ve had strikes all year so far) and absolutely terrible traffic (urban planning is non existent).<p>They simply gentrify car ownership in the city due to different taxes and it ends up being something that is only for the wealthier segments.<p>Everything seems to be about profit in London, while trying to coat it with a nice messaging about environment or some other thing most of us agree on but the implementations usually are simply money making or money saving schemes that very gladly screw over those less socioeconomically able.

<i>Make sure you charge your ebike battery outside and&#x2F;or in a steel ammunition box to mitigate fire risk</i>.<p>What&#x27;s driving the battery fires with e-bikes and scooters?<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.npr.org&#x2F;2023&#x2F;03&#x2F;11&#x2F;1162732820&#x2F;e-bike-scooter-lithium-ion-battery-fires" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.npr.org&#x2F;2023&#x2F;03&#x2F;11&#x2F;1162732820&#x2F;e-bike-scooter-lit...</a><p>The problems seem to be more with low end Chinese ebikes.<p>Hopefully LEVA will produce some standards as Light Electric Vehicles are very unregulated right now.<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;levassociation.com&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;levassociation.com&#x2F;</a>

Love to see it, I cycle a lot for exercise.<p>Weather has been very rainy, hoping to bike more for short trips around town. Thought about a cheap e-bike for grocery shopping, etc.

If you count all the deliveroo electric bikes as bikes.

I don&#x27;t live in London, but I&#x27;m interested in acquiring a stationary bike to do cardio at home. Does anyone have recommendations?

Only a quibble, but &quot;Bicycles outnumber motor vehicles&quot; might be more accurate. It&#x27;s a vehicle count, not a person count.

both equally horrible, from the perspective of a pedestrian. the only two people i have ever punched with intent in my life were these witless nincompoops that drive around the city and into you - if you don&#x27;t work there, you have no idea how dangerous these assholes are.<p>easy solution: compulsory lisencing and insurance

Commuting to work on my bike through London was one of my highlights living there. So much fun and danger.

But, also tfl trying to build more and more cycle lanes ignoring the importance of the pedestrians. <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.telegraph.co.uk&#x2F;news&#x2F;2023&#x2F;03&#x2F;18&#x2F;sadiq-khan-cyclists-floating-bus-1-10-stop-pedestrians-analysis&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.telegraph.co.uk&#x2F;news&#x2F;2023&#x2F;03&#x2F;18&#x2F;sadiq-khan-cycli...</a>

Works well when you don&#x27;t have 3-4 months of snow and ice. This is probably my biggest gripe with the whole &quot;change roads to bicycle paths&quot; push that is happening in most big cities (emulating this and using it as a guiding example). That infrastructure is essentially useless for 1&#x2F;3 of the year.

Just for reference:<p>City of London is not greater London. It’s a small part of London.

Didn’t they ban cars in the city center recently?

NB. This is in the City of London, which is a 1 sq. mile area in the center of London. This is definitely not representative of London as a whole.

The City or London as a whole?

I remember New York mayor Michael Bloomberg taking a trip to London around a year after they implemented their congestion charge, since he wanted to do that too. Their mayor told him something like, “Everyone’s going to be protesting literally up to the morning it goes into effect, and then a week later everyone will be saying, ‘Why didn’t we do this ages ago?’”

Great!<p>Now fix London&#x27;s massive crime issues, thanks.

Didn&#x27;t they make it very, very expensive to drive in the City of London?

don&#x27;t drink and bike, it&#x27;s dangerous.

biking is great except for ball cancer due to sitting postion

There is a proven correlation between prostitution and poverty. Are we observing a similar effect?

I would celebrate if this happened naturally, but this seems more a case of if you punish driving enough you get less drivers.<p>When I was in London over a decade ago they already had restrictions on car traffic into certain parts of the city and additional fees to go there. Tax on a new car is 20% and lots of regulations on their characteristics. Large taxes on petrol which is already much more expensive than in the US.