Ecobici, a greener transport in Mexico City(2)

Ecobici, Part 2

In that city of 675,733 people, there are 9,000 people who get around by bicycle, and the municipal government plans to build 30 kms of bike paths. “It is a growing alternative form of transport,” said Rojo, director general of the Ciclos Urbanos association.

Since 2009, Ciclos Urbanos has organized the Ciclonoche on the first Tuesday of every month, a seven-kilometer one-hour night-time ride in which 14,000 people from Culiacán have taken part.

Ciclos Urbanos estimates that 8,000 liters of gasoline were saved and 21 fewer tons of carbon dioxide were emitted as a result of those rides.

An assessment by the Mexican Center for Sustainable Transport (CTSEMBARQ) found that Ecobici users were more likely to leave their cars at home, and that the means of transport that was most replaced by the bicycle was the microbus, one of the six kinds of public transport in the city.

This NGO will study the impact of Ecobici on air quality, because increased bicycle use implies a reduction in the use of polluting means of transport.

What is needed is “an integrated system of transport, with different modalities and sustainable parking stations,” said Hilda Martínez, manager of air quality and climate change in CTSEMBARQ, which is linked to Washington’s World Resources Institute (WRI).

The Ministry of the Environment and the Center for Mexican and Central American Studies organized a survey among 1,000 users of Ecobici, whose results will be published in November 2013.

“It must be evaluated whether Ecobici is the best way to promote the use of bicycles. What we say is that it is not the only option to promote urban cycling. Infrastructure on every street, or exclusive bike lanes, are not indispensable,” Carreón said.

The government wants to expand the program this year to 4,000 bicycles, 275 stations and 87,000 users, as well as 42 kms of bike paths.

By 2013, the aim is to add another 35 kms of paths, with the expansion in neighborhoods far from the center, in the southern and eastern parts of the city.

Some, like Rojo, suggest adopting a system of public bicycles, with the payment of fees for individual trips, which would become a form of individual public transport.

Martínez said “the ideal would be to invite another partner to finance the program, because it could become self-financing.”

As a user, Longueira says better promotion of the system is needed. “There are people who work with me who don’t even know about it,” he said, while returning the bicycle.