Pedal Power ACT supporting Vote4Cycling election campaign

Vote4Cycling policies could be improved by:

1. Re-thinking the policy balance between lycra cyclists and ordinary cyclists – including the children who are the majority of Australian cyclists and also the majority of Australian cycle commuters. (Take the cycling percentages from the Australian Cycling Participation and the ABS ‘Census at school,’ convert them into thousands using ABS population-by-age data, and compare them with the Census data for adult cycling to work.)

2. including infrastructure in the ‘walking and riding to school’ policy, for the one in four cyclists who according KidSafe are too young to ride on the road unless accompanied by an adult. Even in the nation’s capital, 30% of streets have no footpaths. The network of cycle lanes, shared community paths and footpaths reaches only half of Canberra homes. Children can legally ride on nature strips, but that is extra work even when the nature strips are clear of obstructions like parked cars and extended landscaping (e.g. rock walls and shrubs).

3. Including a road rules education component for the 40% of drivers who don’t know the rules for giving way to child and adult pedestrians and cyclists at intersections, and for children who could then educate their parents about those road rules.

4. Addressing the road rules that discriminate against child and adult cyclists who use footpaths. If they walk along footpaths, or ride along the road, then cars at intersections may not turn across their paths. But if they ride on footpaths, they must give way to all other traffic at every intersection.

5. Addressing the road rule that discriminates against children (and all other cyclists) by making it illegal to ride across a zebra crossing (which Vote4Cycling paradoxically promotes). One way to address this would be to modify the Australian Road Rules to permit combined walking and cycling “tiger” crossings, as can be used in the UK.

6. Addressing the road rule that forces parents to risk damaging the spines of their under-12-month babies by putting them into helmets that are not designed for babies under 12 months old. A baby without a helmet can be safely carried lying down in a bicycle trailer, or in a baby capsule like the Maxi-Cosi that can be fitted to bikes such as the Gazelle Cabby cargo bike.