UCI launches Cycling for All Manifesto to encourage more everyday riding

The UCI has launched a Cycling for All Manifesto aimed at getting people around the world to use bicycles as a means of getting around in their daily lives.

It covers a number of areas that will aim to promote cycling around the globe with the aim of helping tackle issues such as air pollution, congestion, obesity and poverty, with pro cyclists also brought on board to campaign for cycling.

In the manifesto, the UCI says: “We want to see cities, governments and international institutions around the world make cycling safer, encourage children to take up cycling and create better infrastructures for everyone to be able to use bikes for both transport and recreation, wherever they live, work or study.

“Every city should be inspired by the levels of cycling currently achieved in world leading places, like the Netherlands or Denmark, where up to a third of trips are made by bike.

“Cycling is an inherently safe, enjoyable and positive activity, but we need to ensure that conditions on our roads feel safer to enable many more to enjoy the benefits of cycling.

“Governments can enhance safety by ensuring that roads and junctions are designed to accommodate people cycling and experience across nations has proven that the places with the highest level of cycling are those where cycling infrastructures have been integrated into the road layout design.

“Policymakers can also enhance levels of cycling by enforcing the right traffic laws and we call on them to introduce and actively promote legislation on safe passing distances, restrictions on heavy goods vehicles (HGVs) in towns and cities, lower urban speed limits and good driver education on cycle safety.”

The organisation has summarised the aims of the initiative as follows:

• At the political level, the UCI will engage with policy makers to encourage countries and international organisations to adopt bike-friendly policy. For example, the UCI is working directly in Brussels to influence EU decision-making, ensuring that the European institutions are supporting  cycling, and looking to the bicycle to achieve EU policy goals. As part of this, the UCI and UEC are calling on the European Commission to adopt a European Cycling Strategy

• With the UCI Bike City label, the UCI is rewarding and working with cities that invest in elite cycling and everyday cycling activities

• The UCI is developing a UCI Cycling for All Ambassadors programme to work with professional riders on cycling advocacy campaigns

• With the UN Sustainable Development Goals in place, the UCI will push cycling as a tool for sustainable and inclusive development

• The UCI will support its National Federations, sharing best practice and encourage their cycling for all activities.

In the latter part of Brian Cookson’s period as president of British Cycling, the organisation increasingly undertook campaigning activities.

The launch of the Cycling for All Manifesto comes less than six months before he stands for re-election to the top job at the UCI, a post he has held since 2013.

He said: “The launch of the UCI Cycling for All Manifesto marks an important step in our strategy to drive grassroots participation globally.

“It provides a vital link between the sport of cycling and the much wider activity of everyday cycling that takes place in people’s daily lives.

“We want to create a more bike-friendly world, where higher rates of cycling deliver a whole range of wider benefits, from health to environmental.

“Across the world, far too often it is a challenge for people to choose cycling as a form of transport, be it riding to work, travelling to school, or transporting goods to the market by bike. The UCI wants to make journeys by bike safer and more accessible for all.

“We encourage our National Federations and Continental Confederations, the cycling advocacy community, the cycling industry, and political leaders across the world to work with us in this essential area.”

Former world and Olympic champion Chris Boardman, now policy advisor at British Cycling and a passionate campaigner for everyday cycling, said the bicycle had the power to be “world changing” as he welcomed the UCI’s initiative.

He said: “Whilst cycle racing is a marvellous sport and provides some of the world’s most exciting events, the bicycle itself has the potential to be so much more than entertainment; in truth, it could be world changing.

“If more people used it for everyday tasks it would have an enormous impact on reducing global pollution levels and improving health. There are nations and cities that do just this but those examples are still the minority.

“Often, other, more car-oriented cities aren’t even aware of the benefits of more cycling, in large part because no one is responsible for publicising the bicycle’s potential and spreading the word.

“I am delighted the UCI has decided to widen its remit and champion this amazing machine in all its forms around the globe.

“It is the ideal body to bring people together and share best practice, unify lobbying activities and to persuade world leaders that two-wheeled transport should be part of their cities’ transport future,” he added.