Sustainability and Urban Mobility
Improving sustainable mobility is an urban policy objective shared by many European cities striving to reduce their transport-related carbon emissions as part of the EU’s green transition and global carbon neutrality targets. In addition to public actors and businesses, changes in civil society have been identified as key to achieving these goals. Urban citizens should adopt more sustainable modes of transport in their daily lives, including short and long distance journeys. One way to do this is by cycling.
Examples of how cyclists have helped scholars and practitioners to understand patterns in urban mobility and cycling policy exist form different parts of the world. Recent studies have taught us that everyday mobility choices are the result of numerous factors, conditions, perceptions, and constraints. While cyclists are co-producers of cycling practices based on their everyday experiences, the knowledge is typically shared only within tight cyclist communities, and among family and friends – if shared at all. In our research we set out to broaden this circulation of knowledge.
The bicycle is a vehicle that most people can use in cities, provided the infrastructure is conducive to cycling. Toddler bikes can teach children to cycle before they learn to walk, and the range of child carriers available allows families to cycle for longer distances. Similarly, different types of stable bicycles for the elderly and people with reduced mobility have been developed, enabling independent urban mobility for senior citizens and disabled person, for example, who may have been restricted in their ability to walk or drive. E-bikes add another layer to these possibilities, as they are light to ride –cycling to work and school, to do errands such as shopping, or to enjoy hobbies and cultural events does not have to mean getting tired from exercise and having to take a shower at the end. At the same time, cycling is a form of exercise and has health benefits. Bicycles are also rather affordable. Second-hand bikes are available in cities where cycling is commonplace, and many municipalities have a city bike program through which moving by bike is possible without purchasing one’s own.
But how can citizens be inspired and motivated to cycle more? This was the focus of the Cycling Citizen Science research project (2022–2023), where we turned to citizen science and digital technologies to promote cycling in European cities. The project brought together scholars from five European universities: Barcelona in Catalonia, Aveiro in Portugal, Dublin in Ireland, Twente in the Netherlands, and Tampere in Finland. Our main aim was to create a digital tool that cyclists could use to inform and learn from each other about issues related to local cycling. We wanted it to produce opensource data that anyone interested in the phenomenon could use.
The final tool, named BiciZen, is a collaborative platform for making cities and regions more bikeable. It is a mobile phone app (also accessible through the computer) that allows users to crowdsource information about their cycling experiences. BiciZen enables the sharing of experience-based knowledge among a broad variety of users – from children to the elderly, from residents to visitors, from cycling hobbyists to those who only ride the bike on a sunny summer’s day. You only need a smart phone or a computer and a little bit of effort to get acquainted with the facile platform. The app is open to anyone who wishes to document and study cycling phenomena. The open data can provide a historical record of cycling incidents, events and comments. Concurrently, it promotes co-creation of knowledge in the field of sustainable urban mobility.
We believe that the citizen science based BiciZen has great potential to consolidate, organize and analyze the atomized knowledge of urban cyclists, and to generate valuable information for everyday users as well as professionals responsible for managing cycling networks. Crowdsourced information may help cyclists to improve their daily cycling routines, assist policymakers with feedback from the cycling community, and generate data for scholars who aim to inform urban mobility policy. Importantly, also those people’s voices not typically heard in city planning and public discussion can be attained through BiciZen. We are hence committed to continuing the co-creative BiciZen research with practical partners and citizens, to make European cities more bikeable and sustainable mobile environments.
About the Author
Kirsi Pauliina Kallio is professor of environmental pedagogy at Tampere University. Her research interests form around the human subject as a constantly developing political being with capacities to act, and relational political space that actualizes contextually in the form of communities and societies with various scalar dimensions. Kirsi Pauliina is also actively involved in development projects on Positive Recognition, and is part of the Space and Political Agency Research Group (SPARG).