Peddling policy change

(This piece has been published in The Australian Financial Review)

BY ANY measure, cycling in Australia is a big, growing business.

Yet with new bike sales tipping 1.47 million units in the past year, and overall annual revenues estimated to be about $1.5 billion, cycling as a transport mode is standing at a major policy crossroad – particularly in NSW.

This crossroad is starkly lit when you compare road transport policy in Sydney with that of Vancouver, Canada. It’s also clear that cycling has a long way to go in Australia’s most populous state before it plays a meaningful role in reducing our overall transport carbon footprint.

The Friends of the Earth and Australia’s Cycling Promotion Fund say cars alone contribute about 50 per cent of greenhouse gas emissions in Sydney and Melbourne.

As the president of Bicycle Industries Australia (BIA), Noel McFarlane sees it, there’s no end to our growing love affair with cycling, but only about 1 per cent of all commuting travel done in Sydney is by peddle power.

“Some states are doing better, but inconsistent NSW transport policies, coupled with fractured responsibility for our road system is holding back cycling,” he says. “As Sydney’s roads become more congested, there’s less room for cycling – and many of those doing it say they consider it dangerous.”

McFarlane says that after years of working on issues such as taxes, tariffs, and manufacturing and safety standards, his industry is turning to these policy deficiencies. “We don’t need to encourage people to buy bikes; they’re already doing that,” he says. “We need to encourage them to use them – and feel safe doing so.”

He says the first thing that strikes a cyclist in Vancouver – a city of about 2.6 million people – is the clear, consistent signposting, making clear to motorists, road transport operators and other road users that cyclists have their place in the system.

The second, less obvious reality is that all roads in the city are controlled by only three administrations – Vancouver city, West Vancouver and North Vancouver. In Sydney, McFarlane says it’s hard to determine whether roads are federal, state or municipal responsibilities, with all three often bickering over the smallest things – including signposting and cycleway marking.

Third, Vancouver’s cycling system – unlike Sydney’s – is integrated.

Like Sydney, central Vancouver is densely populated. After New York and San Francisco, it has the third-highest density in North America. Vancouver embarked on an urban development policy in the 1950s and ‘60s that saw the population of its West End neighbourhood soar, resulting in a compact pedestrian/transit/bicycle-friendly core. Similar growth has occurred within 15 kilometres of Sydney’s CBD – but without an adequate policy framework in place.

McFarlane says Vancouver’s authorities also have a clear set of road-transport policies. In order, they prioritise pedestrians, cyclists, public transport operators, freight transport operators and private car users in all developments. What’s more, a single body controls land use and development, eliminating bureaucratic stumbling blocks encountered in other cities, like Sydney.

“Before any road or pedestrian project starts, it’s weighed against this priority list to help determine all transport outcomes,” McFarlane says. “As a result, cyclists know they can ride comfortably and safely throughout Vancouver.”

Vancouver’s director of planning Brent Toderian says the city’s cycling network started about 16 years ago with the development of the Local Street Bikeways concept. “Since then, the network has grown to include more than 400 kilometres of [integrated] arterial bicycle facilities, including bike lanes and off-street paths,” he says. “Complementing this network is [Vancouver’s] Greenway’s Plan, a network of green corridors enhanced for walking and cycling, with amenities like landscaping, benches and water fountains.”

Since 1995, the city’s development by-laws have included requirements for end-of-trip facilities in all new developments, Toderian says. These include bike racks, secure indoor storage, and shower and changing facilities.

None of this is expensive in the overall transportation scheme; annual expenditure on all bicycle and greenways networks averages slightly more than $C4 million ($5 million) a year.

With some 57,000 commuters riding bikes every day, completing more than 4 per cent of all road trips (up from 1.3 per cent in 1994), it’s costing Vancouver less than C20c per bike rider per day.

“We haven’t even scratched the surface in Sydney when it comes to implementing or costing this kind of integrated policy,” McFarlane says.

Greens parliamentarian Lee Rhiannon says the NSW government only has eyes for cars. In a heated exchange with then minister for roads Michael Costa in 2005, Rhiannon questioned Costa over the Roads and Traffic Authority’s axing of cycling funding that year while the overall RTA budget was boosted 12 per cent.

Costa said: “In terms of motor vehicles, more than 90 per cent of journeys on any day are by road. Therefore we need to provide road infrastructure.”

“The NSW government doesn’t get it,” Rhiannon says. “It thinks roads are for cars. Full stop. There’s no real plan to make cycling more popular and accessible in the state.”

McFarlane agrees. He says that compared with Vancouver’s cycling costs, Australia’s unco-ordinated approach is financially crippling.

In its recent submission to the taxation system review panel, the Cycling Promotion Fund cited 2007 Bureau of Transport and Regional Economics figures pegged national traffic congestion costs at an estimated $9.4 billion a year – rising to more than $10 billion by 2010. It estimated the cost of road transport and noise pollution at more than $3 billion.

More shockingly, though, Access Economics has estimated the health cost of obesity alone at $21 billion – more than double the cost of Medicare. “For our health’s sake, and as Australia’s population ages, we simply have to do more exercise – including using all the bicycles we’re buying in increasing numbers,” McFarlane says.

BIA has decided to go national, and has appointed former Olympian cyclist and director of Cycling Australia Stephen Hodge as its federal government lobbyist. “A trickle-down effect may get us a co-ordinated national policy-development framework,” McFarlane says.

Even NSW Police has recognised cycling’s benefits. Its fleet of 638 mountain bikes cost about $3500 a year each to keep on the roads, compared with about $30,000 a year per car. And each litre of fuel it saves is saving 2.8 kilograms of greenhouse gas emissions.