After all – the trend is positive. And Hanover is also doing well in a national comparison. In the bicycle climate test of the ADFC cycling club, the city came second among the municipalities with more than 500,000 inhabitants. The grade given on average by the 2,164 respondents, however, is not very flattering: 3.67 – that would be a 4+ at school. Two years ago, however, this value was even worse at 3.77.
“The city cannot be satisfied with that. She has to see this as a work assignment, ”says Eberhard Röhrig-van der Meer, spokesman for the ADFC in Hanover. He sees a lot of room for improvement, for example, when cyclists feel safe. They only gave it a grade of 3.9. They are also dissatisfied with the traffic light switching for cyclists, which they gave a grade of 4.6 – that is inadequate. The same rating is given for the width of the cycle paths, which the majority of those surveyed consider to be too narrow. In addition, they consider the controls of illegal parking on cycle paths to be inadequate (grade 4.9).
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Dangerous: wrong parking on bike paths. Cyclists therefore have to use the lane.
Source: Sonja Wurtscheid
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ADFC: Better traffic light switching and faster cycle route construction
“Better traffic light switching, bicycle-friendly solutions at construction sites or the consistent punishment of parking offenders on cycle paths do not need major concepts and no large financial pots, the administration just has to want that,” says Röhrig-van der Meer. The example of the Aegidientorplatz has shown that “the connections for cycling can be significantly improved with improved traffic light switching”.
The ADFC spokesman also sees it as positive that the city has tackled an important project with the Velorouten, which should make cycling in Hanover much faster and safer. “Now the city has to deliver and implement the routes quickly,” demands Röhrig-van der Meer. “But of course we also want to finally experience improvements in road space and will continue to mobilize for this,” he announced. The respondents in Hanover also saw that some things are apparently changing for the better. They gave the infrastructure for bicycle traffic a score of 2.6 by 0.2 points better grade than 2018.
Mayor Onay: “We’re just getting started”
“I am pleased that Hanover has again received second place and that we have thus defended this place. But you can imagine that I am of course not satisfied with the overall grade, ”says Mayor Belit Onay (Greens). He understands the results of the survey “as a mandate to implement our good plans quickly in order to create visible results in the short term – for example with our bike routes. We are far from finished. We’re just getting started. This award is a good tailwind for that ”. The city’s goal is to increase the proportion of cycling to 25 percent by 2025. Most recently, this stagnated at around 19 percent.
The respondents attested the best conditions in large cities with more than 500,000 inhabitants to the Hanseatic City of Bremen, which, however, also only achieved the grade “sufficient” with 3.57. Behind Hanover is Frankfurt / Main with 3.72. Essen (4.22), Dortmund (4.35) and Cologne (4.37) are at the bottom. Among the 39 cities with more than 200,000 inhabitants, Hanover ranks sixth behind the front runner Karlsruhe, who achieved a grade of 3.1.
The bicycle climate test, which is carried out every two years together with the Federal Ministry of Transport, is not representative, but is considered a barometer of sentiment. In what is now the ninth edition, around 230,000 cyclists from a total of 1024 cities and communities nationwide took part.
By Christian Bohnenkamp
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