Paris cycling numbers double in one year thanks to investment

As a daily biker in Paris (and for years), I think it is hard to grasp the changes Paris has seen in the last years.<p>You now even get to see some congestion on bike lanes (Bd Sebastopol for instance), because they are too many cyclist on an older (and thus too narrow) bike lane.<p>This change, the new subway lanes, and the reduction of car usage in the city make the city much more enjoyable on a day to day basis, especially for pedestrians as cyclists are less annoying than drivers.

People not living in Paris can&#x27;t even grasp how much the city has changed in just 6 years. Starting a bit before 2020 but massively accelerated by the covid situation (and public transport saturation). You could barely cycle safely before and now it&#x27;s hard to not find a bike lane.<p>Because of the fast pace, of course not everything is perfect but we have to celebrate this as much as we can.

While its true that compared to 10 years ago cycling is much better served by the infrastructure, there are still large challenges ahead, and I would mention only two of them:<p>- many intersection are very poorly signaled if you are riding a bike (not sure for cars is much better) and old bike lanes setups put you in weird situations (ex: bike lane changing from &quot;outside&quot; of the road to &quot;inside&quot; of the road, without clear way to change from one to another)<p>- there is quite few temporary parking space for personal bikes. Velib works great until there is a rush hour and you either can&#x27;t find bikes or a parking spot.

&quot;I really hope US cities head in this direction&quot;<p>The US is headed on the path of autonomous vehicles as the solution. It&#x27;s the perfect combination of things our society loves: 1) No new public investment. 2) Continuous, end-to-end air conditioning

The city started during the pandemic and has moved toward making these bike lanes more permanent. There is also a deep dissatisfaction with public transportation here. While comprehensive throughout the entirety of the Paris metropolitan, it is expensive, unreliable (especially the regional RER trains that connect the inner city to suburbs and vital for commuters), often filthy, and at times unsafe (depending on the line). The other issue is the traffic above ground. I&#x27;ve heard reports that there are fewer cars, but it doesn&#x27;t feel this way. If anything, there are more delivery trucks.<p>So while infrastructure investment has helped (not to mention some nice tax write-offs and discounts on e-bikes), there are some other issues here. I like bikeable Paris a lot, but the ecological goals of this city&#x27;s mayor demand much more investment in the city and regional authority&#x27;s mass transit. It is unreasonable to expect commuters to bike in from many kilometers away. Biking inside Paris upon arrival should be the desired end result. Ultimately to get the cars off the roads, people need to feel <i>good</i> on mass transit so that they want to use it more than a car, and the impression I have right now is that many people are biking because it&#x27;s better than sweating in filthy, delayed trains.<p>To that effect, riding a bike is and should be a delight -- not a mere alternative to defunct metro transit, but I know many who are terrorized or disgruntledby biking in Paris. To solve this intractable issue of getting more riders, cars have to be removed from the streets which need to be progressively closed to make room for more bike infrastructure. These kinds of plans well face strident criticism and backlash from the suburbanite commuters. In that vein, I am totally for the Grand Paris Express plan. Make Paris great for Parisians again!<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Grand_Paris_Express" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Grand_Paris_Express</a>

Title is misleading... the source Le Monde article states that use of certain bicycle <i>paths</i> has doubled (or tripled) in <i>certain places</i>, as investment has gone into improving these paths.<p>That&#x27;s great, but kind of obvious that if you build out dedicated bike lanes, cyclists are more likely to prefer them to alternate routes.

Given safe infrastructure cycling is one of the fastest most reliable forms of transportation in cities. No wonder more people ride if you improve the experience.

My wife and I visited Paris last summer and biked everywhere. It felt very safe, not as safe as Copenhagen but still safe. I hope that with more time, as more drivers get used to bikes on the road it will get safer and more people will bike, creating a positive feedback loop.

Having just moved from Houston to Manhattan , I have been really impressed by the number of bikes I see. One factor, which this article doesn’t seem to discuss, is the e-bike. In Paris, is it mostly classical bikes, or are the electronics becoming widespread there too?

Using &#x27;induced demand&#x27; for good - I love it.<p>People are under the impression that things &quot;are just the way they are&quot; in the US, but it is very much a political choice to not dedicate more funding to keeping people on bicycles safe from automobiles.

I don’t get how you can make bicycling your only form of transportation, even if the bike travel infrastructure and parking is adequate. When I bicycle, even for a short amount of time like 15 minutes, I sweat, and end up a stinky wet mess at my destination. Especially in the summer. My shoes and pants get dirty from the road and my hair gets wet and messed up especially if it’s raining. So if I’m going anywhere with even a moderate expectation of personal hygiene, I need to 1. Make sure there is a shower at my destination, 2. Haul a change of clothes with me (necessitating a backpack or bag), 3. Hang on to my dirty sweaty clothes in that bag the whole time. Fine if I’m commuting to work where they have a shower and storage. What about going to a restaurant or business meeting or a museum or an appointment with a professional? I honestly don’t know but there are so many cities where people bike everywhere so there must be a solution.<p>EDIT: ok, ok, I guess e-bikes it is. Still there are cities like Copenhagen and Amsterdam where everyone bikes everywhere and they don’t all have e-bikes. Do they just bring multiple changes of clothes everywhere?

Covid really accelerated this. Friends visiting in Paris are also surprised how fast the city changed in just 2-3 years.

That’s written by gpt (bustling, at the heart of, …)

Isn&#x27;t it rather thanks to the banning of electric scooters?

I switched to cycling for transportation. Benefits: 1. way more access to the city 2. eliminated need to go to gym; transport time doubles as cardio time 3. freed up time to see people; 15 minutes door to door is hard to beat<p>I really hope US cities head in this direction. It is a no brainer for cities: 1. higher density -&gt; lower taxes per person, higher tax rev per sqm 2. lower cost of living -&gt; lower inflation 3. quieter; cars on streets are noisy 4. people see each other more; better social cohesion 5. kids are free from the house to do things

but do note that car owners in Paris (where I live) are reaching never-seen-before levels of whining, complaining about the fact that their little selfish privilege is not as cushy as it used to be and that only 80% of the public road infrastructure is dedicated to their idiotic 2 miles journeys on board of their oversized SUVs now

The second order effect is that tax rates will increase to cater to increase in social security payment and medical care thanks to increased life expectancy. That might also divert money from other public spending that could mean living longer but with lower quality of life.

It must also has be taken into account that driving has become annoying to the point that many people from suburbs don&#x27;t come anymore to Paris for shopping, theatres, exhibitions, ... and many living inside or nearby are really annoyed by the public transports which are dirty, not on time, too crowded, beggars every few minutes, ... so biking is like a forced solution that helps with some things but isn&#x27;t always a choice of preference. It&#x27;s easier to see this in the winter, which is not cold&#x2F;wet enough in Paris to make cycling difficult, but there are clearly much less cyclists then.