Death by truck

An interesting article in SVD today says that out of the 7 latest accidents where bikers have been killed in Stockholm 6 were caused by trucks turning right at an intersection. A study by London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine shows that trucks were involved in 43% of all deadly bicycle accidents in London although trucks only represent 4% of traffic.

This is totally unacceptable. We can not have vehicles in crowded city's that kill people following simple traffic rules. You should be able to cross an intersection at green light with your bike without risking being killed by a truck!

The solution to limit access of heavy vehicles to city centers is discussed in the article. This has several other environmental benefits as it also lowers noise and air pollution. However there is also practical issues with this solution.

There has, for a long time, been special rear view-mirrors for trucks that gives the driver a better view of what is below him. Making these mirrors a standard requirement for trucks and educating drivers on the importance of using them might be a way to at least start reducing this type of accidents.

Kent Ek; is he the guy that can increase the level of biking in Sweden?

Kent Ek is assigned by the National Goverment to investigate how to increase biking in Sweden. However he will soon be transferred to a post in the EU parliament. He is not even sure if that will work out himself.

In this article in DN he talks a bit about how what he thinks is most important to get more people in the saddle. He especially points out increased safety as the most important improvement. In my mind there are three important areas to work on.

- Increased accessibility, it must be easy and fast to reach your destination.

- Safety, When it comes to getting more people to bike it is not the actual safety but the experienced safety that is important.

- Image of biking. It is cool to go by bike!

Anyway there was a national bicycle plan in the year 2000. It pointed out a ten year strategy on how to increase biking in Sweden by 2010. As almost nothing in the plan was implemented the result was that biking decreased instead. Investigations and planns are just not enough.

Meeting on new biking strategy for Lunds Kommun

Important Notice Below!


On 28 September there will be a meeting at Lunds Stadshall on a new bicycle plan to improve for bikers in Lund. This is a very welcome initiative from Lunds Kommun so please try to take some time of to join with some personal input. Don't forget to announce your intention to come to Katrin Andersson (katrin.andersson@lund.se) no later than the 22 of September.

Important Notice:

I just recived an E-mail from Katrin saying that this meeting is only open for officials in the Lunds Kommun administration. Later on there will be other outreaching activities.

Stockolm - Taking after Malmö and Lund

Stockholm are now planning to take after Malmö and Lund in their broad efforts to promote biking according to DN. The efforts will include upgrading of the bicycle infrastructure but also "Bike Boxes" that make room for bicycles by red lights in front of the cars. There is even lobbying going on to change national laws so that bikers will be allowed to turn right at red lights and go against traffic on one-way streets according to this article in Dn and this article in Aftonbladet. Just shows that things have to happen in Stockholm before national policy can change. Biking in Stockholm is up 200% (!) in the last five years. Although the levels are still low the potential is for sure high when infrastructure now is being put in place.

Malmö and Lund; Swedens best Cycle Citys

In a report from the Swedish bicycle association 17 Swedish kommuns are evaluated on how bicycle friendly they are. Standing out as better than all the other kommuns are Malmö and Lund. The evaluation was done with Kommuns that chose to participate which makes you guess that the report includes more of the Kommuns with high ambitions for biking rather than the ones with low or no ambitions. Last year Malmö Kommun came in second in the same survey after Varberg while Lunds Kommun did not participate. Here is the concluding graph of the results of this years report:

Well done! It is not stange that Malmö and Lund also tops the statistics for cities were most trips are done by bike in Sweden, 43% of all trips in Lund and 30% of all trips in Malmö. Download the full report from the Swedish Bicycle organization here.

Puerto Alegre Critical Mass Massacre

This absolutely crazy incident in Puerto Alegre Brazil is among the worse seen. However this is quite the way the car once became the hegemonic mode of transport in western countries. "stay of the road or get killed" was what happened in Europe and North America when rich people started driving cars back in the days. The same thing is happening still today in developing countries.

The risk of getting killed by a car is 10 times higher in Africa than in Europe. As there are at least 10 more cars per person in Europe than in Africa this would mean that the risk that an African car kills someone is 100 times higher than a car in Europe killing some one. (this is not Swedish road safety figures we are comparing with but average EU statistics)

Having that dangerous machines running free is only possible if the accessibility of the, rich and powerful, car driver is valued higher than the lives of the poor and powerless.

Fortunately the lives of the public is, now days, highly valued in the developed world. Still however, the accessibility of non car drivers are being sacrificed for the sake of the car drivers accessibility.

I apologize for the commercials in the start of the video. Aftonbladet is getting payed not Malmö Lund Cycle Chic.

€ 1.3 million to better biketracks in Stockholm

There has been complaints at the low rate of investment in the Stockholm bike infrastructure for some time now. Today Swedens largest morning paper DN announces that at least somethins will be done. The money will go to better bike lanes in Tegelbacken. The entire plan for bicycle infrastructure in Stockholm will be finnished in the fall and we hope that it will include much larger investments.

Swedens best bicycle politician back in Lund

Yesterday the Swedish bicycle association, Svensk Cykling, awarded the politician that best have emphasized the positive effects of biking during the last year. The winner was Karin Svensson Smith from the green party. During most of 20010 Karin have been active on a national level as a member of parliament. Now she is back as a local politician in Lund and have great plans for us two wheelers. She anounced at the price cermony that she is about to put in a suggestion for a "bicycle highway" between Malmö and Lund to make things easier for bicycle commuters. In Malmö, Swedens second best bicycle politician, Karolina Skog, also from the green party, share her ideas. Lets hope this "highway" becomes real real soon. There is a strong need to do something about the existing bicycle path between the city's and upgrading from a path to a highway is the way to go.

Cykling är politik / Biking is politics

Sydsvenskan hade en bra artikel om Till Koglin idag. Till Koglin forskar om Cykelns roll i sammhället. Hans slutsatser är självklara för alla som satt sig in i området. Att Cykling är sammhällsekonomiskt lönsant och att det är inte cykel mot bilism och kollektivtrafik utan att alla tjänar på att fler cyklar. Tyvärr verkar dessa slutsatser inte vara lika välkända bland politiker och stadsplanerare som de borde. Det gör goda exempel som Malmö, Lund, Köpenhmn och många fler desto viktigare liksom forskning som den som utförs av Till Koglin.

Sydsvenskan had a good article about Till Koglin today. Till Koglin is researching on the roll of biking in scociety. His conclusions are well known to all that have been studying this problem. That biking is saving society mney and that it is not biking against motoring or public transport instead everybody benefits from more bikes. Unfortunately these conclusions don't seem to bee as well known as they should among politicians and city planners. That makes good examples, such as Malmö, Lund, Copenhagen and many others even more important as well as research such as the one carried out by Till Koglin.

Partiernas cykelpolitik betygs satt / The partys biking policys graded

Snart är det val och Svensk Cykling och Cykelsmart har tittat närmare på riksdags partiernas cykelpolitik. Här på Malmö Lund Cycle Chic publicerar vi endast de sammanfattande betygen i skalan 1-5 där 1 är sämst och 5 bäst. Vi kan hålla med om Svensk Cyklings analys att det rödgröna blocket är betydligt mer cykelvänligt än aliansen. För att ta del av hela enkäten följ länkarna ovan.

Kandidater i valet / Kandidates for the elektion

Jag var ute och fotade lite runt valstugorna på stortorget i Lund under min lunchrast idag. Jag tog två foton på kandidater till valet.

I was out taking photos around the party huts on Stortorget in Lund. I took photos of two candidates for the upcoming election.

Mats Olsson, huvudkandidat för Vänsterpartiet i komunalvalet:
Mats Olsson, main candidate for the Reformed Communist Party in the local election:

Ulf Nilson från Folkpartiet kandiderar till riksdagen:
Ulf Nilsson from the Liberal party is a candidate for the national parliament: