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ADFC: Commuting by bike - trend continues, infrastructure does not keep up

(dpa/lhe) Cycling season begins - Trend according to bicycle club unbroken: As soon as it gets milder outside, bike paths fill up. According to ADFC, many more investments are needed for greater safety. Bicycles with e-drives in various models remain popular.

Perfect combination: Not only does Hesse's Minister of Transport Kaweh Mansoori do well with a folding bike in commuter traffic, but more and more fellow citizens do too. | Photo: dpa/Andreas Arnold
Perfect combination: Not only does Hesse's Minister of Transport Kaweh Mansoori do well with a folding bike in commuter traffic, but more and more fellow citizens do too. | Photo: dpa/Andreas Arnold
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The temperatures are clearly in double digits, and the sun is increasingly making an appearance: nothing stands in the way of the start of the cycling season these days. The number of cycling commuters is increasing, and more and more recreational cyclists are venturing out into the fresh air. The trend towards cycling remains unbroken, says the chairman of the General German Bicycle Club (ADFC) in Hesse, Ansgar Hegerfeld. To sustain this, the new state government of CDU and SPD must invest in further expanding the infrastructure.

As an example, Hegerfeld cites bicycle paths along country roads. Here, the ADFC expects concrete figures that the state government aims to achieve. 89 percent of state roads in Hesse still do not have bicycle paths along them. Progress on rapid cycling lanes is also too slow; the state government needs to be more committed here. "The bicycle is becoming more popular, more people are choosing it," says Hegerfeld. To support this, more and better bike paths are needed to create more safety. 

Municipalities also need further assistance from the state. Some cities are making progress, including Frankfurt. But even here, there is still a need to catch up on bike paths, especially given the increasing prevalence of bikes with electric motors and cargo bikes. "Different speeds are being ridden here, so good and wide paths are needed to allow overtaking," says the ADFC chairman.

Minister does not cycle in the big city

That there are occasional safety problems is acknowledged by Hesse's Transport Minister Kaweh Mansoori (SPD) in an interview with dpa. He has respect for cycling in the city. "I learned to ride a bike in the village," he says. "I can ride a bike, but I don't trust myself to cycle in big city traffic. Not the way it is in Frankfurt." Therefore, he has a high sensitivity to road safety, the minister emphasized. This issue is important if more people in cities are to be encouraged to travel by bicycle.

Frequent Problems Due to Illegal Parkers

With this goal in mind, Mansoori followed an invitation from the ADFC on Monday for a traffic policy bicycle tour through Frankfurt's Nordend. Together with the state chairman Hegerfeld and state director Sofrony Riedmann, the SPD minister hopped on a red folding bike provided by the ADFC and gained an overview of the bicycle path infrastructure. He reported that various problems such as missing bike paths on main roads or bike and pedestrian paths that are unusable due to illegal parkers were highlighted to him.

"The fact that the safety of school routes is repeatedly compromised by illegally parked motor vehicles on bike and pedestrian paths is a grievance. As the state government, we will examine how we can further support the municipalities in this regard," the minister said afterward in front of journalists.

Investments in Bike Paths Promised

At the same time, Mansoori praised well-developed sections: "It shows: Better cycling infrastructure also attracts more people to ride a bike. We want to further advance this development throughout Hesse." The bike tour was fun, summed up the minister, who according to his own words is now considering getting his own folding bike.

"I believe the mobility transition will not succeed by waging a war against certain means of transport like the car, but by modernizing the infrastructure to ensure that all people in Hesse have a needs-based offer to move differently," Mansoori said in a dpa interview. In the construction of bike paths, the black-red state government wants to continue a point of the previous CDU and Green government and continue to allocate ten percent of the funds for road construction for the expansion of bike paths.

Supply Issues Are a Thing of the Past: Trendy on the Move with E-Motors 

The trend towards bicycles with e-motors continues this year as well. Particularly, pedelecs, whose motors assist up to 25 kilometers per hour, are available in an increasing number of designs. Those who want to be trendy in the city do not have to forgo motor assistance: Lightweight pedelecs with a frame in which the battery is permanently installed are in increasing demand, says Aaron Gröne from "Bike Boutique Frankfurt." Supply issues and long waiting times for workshop appointments, as experienced during and after the COVID-19 pandemic, are not an issue this year. The bike shop also specializes in cargo bikes. "The demand is still there, especially from young families," says the operations manager. 

Last year's bad weather resulted in a significant sales decline for the bicycle industry. The bicycle industry sold four million bicycles and e-bikes in 2023 nationwide, according to figures from the German Bicycle Industry Association (ZIV), around 600,000 less than the year before and the lowest in five years.  For the current year, the association is optimistic, it stated a few days ago. Particularly, e-bikes remain an important driver of the industry.

Translated automatically from German.
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