Image: Indigo Skies Photography
The City of Melbourne has launched an ambitious plan to boost the number of bicycle usage compared to cars as part of a wider scheme to grow the city’s bicycle network.
Under the plan dubbed as the City of Melbourne’s Bicycle Plan 2016-20, the city aims to increase bike use to one in four vehicles entering the city in the morning and eliminating serious crashes from the network.
Lord Mayor Robert Doyle said the city consulted widely, invested millions in infrastructure and are now ready to implement our plan to make Melbourne a safer, more connected city for all bike riders.
“We’ve consulted widely, invested millions in infrastructure and are now ready to implement our plan to make Melbourne a safer, more connected city for all bike riders,” Mr Doyle said.
According to Mr Doyle, Melbourne has more than 136 kilometres of bike lanes in our city and the number of cyclists using them has almost doubled since 2008.
“Over the past four months we have finalised the Bicycle Plan 2016-2020. One of the major changes in the plan includes new signage connecting people to the central network: this is about providing bike riders of all abilities with options when coming in and moving around the city.”
The City has presented the numbers in its plan, and it’s vision of a more bike friendly city is one that rivals that of City of Sydney Lord Mayor Clover Moore’s in her own ambitious plan to reformat the transport arteries in the CBD.
Mr Doyle said the City of Melbourne also plans to increase bike parking from 800 to 2000 and eliminate the likelihood of serious crashes by 2020.
“The City of Melbourne is investigating a possible second major east-west connection for cyclists through the central city to complement the existing La Trobe Street route and bringing forward the investigation of separated bike lanes in St Kilda Road as an immediate priority, in conjunction with VicRoads.”
The endorsed Bicycle Plan 2016-20 lays out practical measures to further connect the city’s bicycle network including:
- increasing bicycle parking by 2000 in key public locations and installing bicycle maintenance stations and counters at entrances to the city
- creating local neighbourhood routes in Kensington, North Melbourne, Carlton and Southbank – connecting to schools, shops and community facilities
- improving connections into and through the city centre including a possible second bike friendly east-west connection through the central city. This would complement La Trobe Street and improve bicycle access and transit across the southern part of the central city.
