Skip to main content

Desire Lines of 16536 Bicycle Users

The Bicycle Choregraphy of a Copenhagen Intersection
Here's the cover graphic of Copenhagenize Consulting's upcoming anthropological project tracking the Desire Lines of all the bicycle users in one Copenhagen intersection over 12 hours one day in April. We blogged about it earlier.

Here's a .pdf of a larger version, if you fancy that. Opens in a new window.

We filmed the intersection for 12 hours and anthropologist Agnete Suhr crunched the behavioural patterns over two months. Counting bicycle users and cars, tracking desire lines and observing the general behaviour of the bicycle users.

While it was a ballet of human-powered movement, it was also a spectacular display of mediocrity. There were only a handful of "rogue cyclists chipping away at society's foundations with their reckless behaviour" out of 16,536 Citizen Cyclists.

As we always say, well-designed infrastructure breeds good behaviour.

While data maps are great for tracking... data... observing 16,536 bicycle users gives you a whole different perspective and debunks a lot of perception about urban cyclists.

This intersection with it's 16,000 + cyclists is not one of the busy intersections in Copenhagen. We chose it because it is an east/west and north/south point, because it is a transport intersection without any shops or reasons to stop and, well, because we could film it out of the office window.

The purple line in the middle is the bike messenger who pretended he was a car and use the car lane. "The" meaning one guy out of 16,538 people on bicycles. There were a couple of other half-hearted attempts to be a Volvo, but only one who lived the automotive dream. Although he popped back onto the cycle track after the turn. There's one in every crowd. Sheesh.

The full results of the project will be released soon.

Popular posts from this blog

7550 New Bike Parking Spots at Copenhagen Central Station

For all of Copenhagen's badassness as a bicycle city, there remains one thing that the City still completely sucks at. Bicycle parking at train stations. At Copenhagen Central Station there are only about 1000 bike parking spots. Danish State Railways can't even tell us how many spots they have. They're not sure. Even in Basel they have 800+. In Antwerp they have this . Don't even get me started on the Dutch. 12,500 bike parking spots are on the way in some place called Utrecht . Amsterdam has a multi-story bike parking facility, floating bicycle barges round the back and are planning 7000 more spots underwater . Even at the nation's busiest train station, Nørreport, the recent and fancy redesign failed miserably in providing parking that is adequate for the demand . Architects once again failing to respond to actual urban needs. It is time to remedy that. Here is my design for 7550 bike parking spots behind Copenhagen Central Station. Steve C. Montebello i...

Traffic Safety Orgs Speak for Themselves - Not the Rest of Us

Classic traffic safety organisation narrative. "Stop cycling". By Stephanie Patterson With Mikael Colville-Andersen In the diverse world of traffic planning, advocacy and various movements for liveable cities, there is an odd group of outliers who broadcast conflicting messages. While “traffic safety” organisations seem like a natural part of the gallery and of the narrative, upon closer inspection they exist in a communication vacuum populated exclusively by like-minded organisations. There is little correlation with those organisations who advocate cycling, pedestrianism or safer streets. The traffic safety crowd are in a world unto themselves, with little or no accountability for the campaigns they develop or the messaging they broadcast. They are often allied with insurance companies who clearly take comfort in working with others who embrace scaring the population at large through constructed fear . In many ways, they are a classic subculture, with strong hints...

Cycling with Disabilities and Injuries

I haven't been on a bicycle for 7 days. The reason? A couple of cracked ribs. I've tried each and every day to cycle, but it hasn't been possible. When a simple cough is enough to bring tears to your eyes, riding a bicycle is a long shot. A serious blow to my pride but hey, at least I can walk around the neighbourhood. Which is nice. Many Danish cities have small cars like these to measure the level of comfort on the bicycle infrastructure . I have a better, cheaper idea. The city should just give citizens with broken or cracked ribs a smartphone, with activated GPS and a live line to a person at the Bicycle Office. Then they just ride around the city. Every time an OWWWW! or groan is heard, the GPS location is registered. That way the city will be able to map the spots that need maintenence. Now broken ribs are one thing, but what of citizens with more serious injuries or disabilities? So I thought I'd whips together this article with photos of Copenhageners an...