Connecting cities Building successes

‘Ich Radel Zur Arbeit’ , or ‘I am riding my bike to work’ in English was the keyword of a successful campaign led by the City of Weiz to increase the use of soft transportation means and at the same time the health of its population.

This experience is one of those exchanged in the course of the Active Travel Network, an URBACT project gathering 9 European Cities around the objective of tackling traffic and transportation problems in medium sized cities by promoting soft transportation.

In Weiz, 40 to 70% of employees live not further than 5km away from where they work

It was obvious in Weiz, Austria that people commuting to work were responsible for daily congestions of the city traffic system. The city authorities realised that depending on the companies about 40 to 70 percent of employees could use bikes to go to work, since most of them lived within a distance of 5 km from their company.

That means that bikes could become the main means of transport for commuters!

‘Bike-to-Work’ a simple principle : all the bikers are winners!

The “Bike-to-work”-principle is simple but effective. It’s a two month competition during which colleagues form a team ( of two colleagues) and use bicycles as often as possible on their way to work. They use a bike-card toi report all the trips they made by bike. So it’s based on team stimulation and competition spirit! After 2 months all teams that have used bike-to-work for more than half of their working days are rewarded, after taking part into a final competition. The prizes are sponsored by the companies who have been convinced in supporting the scheme.

Bike-to-work is a completely voluntary activity. It’s been initiated in Weiz in 2007!

Austria bikes to work : it’s like biking around the equator 32 times !

In 2012 the activity was enlarged under the slogan “Österreich radelt zur Arbeit!” (Austria bikes to work). More than 8.000 bikers from 2.000 companies and institutions have covered a distance of about 1.3 million km which means that they have biked around the equator 32 times! These bikers have saved about 209 tons of carbon dioxide and about 606.000 euros of gasoline price. Biking has also beneficial effects on the health of the bikers, the 8.000 bikers-to-work have saved their companies about 1 million euros annually of costs for staff away sick.

As this example shows, biking to work has a lot of beneficial side effects! Is it your turn now to take up your bike?

by Barbara Kulmer, Weiz

If you are interested in more tips, there are many of them on the web! We found a few just here:  Tops tips for cycling to work, 6 Tips for Commuting to Work by Bike, 5 Tips for Commuter Dude etc…