The future of cycling

Abstract

Paper presented at the 31st Annual Southern African Transport Conference 9-12 July 2012 "Getting Southern Africa to Work", CSIR International Convention Centre, Pretoria, South Africa.

The future is never certain but odd events or trends can be predicted with a reasonable amount of accuracy. One such trend is the use of the bicycle. It resembles the roller coaster graphs of shares on the stock exchanges, but like a good investment, increases with time. Being the most efficient vehicle invented by humans it has been embraced by some nations and integrated into their transport planning- The Netherlands, Denmark and Germany for example. These countries, and the more than 100 cities that have instigated bicycle hire facilities, are paving the way of using the bicycle to its maximum benefit. The global environment is under stress and the way various countries approach remedial measures in their life styles, especially with transport, will affect future quality of life. This paper will elaborate on some of the above statements with particular emphasis on South Africa and to where the future of cycling could head with improved legislation affecting non motorised transport.