I’ve bemoaned in the past how Christchurch has often gotten overlooked when it comes to global “best cycling city” rankings, often just focused on the largest cities and the capital cities. We partially addressed that issue when People for Bikes started including Christchurch in their rankings (and now other NZ cities as well). And now it seems that the Europeans are also paying a bit more attention…
Copenhagenize are a Danish company specialising in cycling and urban design. One of the other things they’ve also become known for since 2011 is rating the world’s cities in terms of cycle-friendliness via their Copenhagenize Index. The 2025 version of the Index has just come out and look who made it into the top 100…
Yep, Christchurch is in the Top 40 best cycling cities around the world (and for good measure, Wellington is in the Top 50). The reason for the inclusion in the ratings now is that they have started by reviewing and rating all cities with populations over 250,000 (previously it was 600,000) – yay, we qualify!
The latest edition of the Copenhagenize Index has been built on a robust, evidence-based methodology organised around 13 indicators grouped into three different aspects (or “pillars”) of a cycling city:
- Safe & Connected Infrastructure: Bicycle infrastructures, Bicycle parking areas, Traffic calming, Safety.
- Usage & Reach: Bicycle modal share, Modal share growth, Women’s share of bicycle trips, Bike share systems, Cargo bikes.
- Policy & Support: Political commitment, Advocacy, the Image of the Bicycle, Urban Planning.
These are all combined to produce a score between 0-100.
.JPG)
Not surprisingly, European cities dominate, with Utrecht (71.1/100) and Copenhagen (70.8) leading the way, although a few Canadian cities like Montreal and Vancouver are also doing well.
Christchurch gets an overall score of 48.0, with a particular strength in the “Policy & Support” pillar (in fact, on that score alone, we’d be in the top 10…). Interestingly, Auckland was not evaluated “due to low cycling modal share or insufficient data availability”. The best performing Australian city was Canberra, which ranked 80th – no others made the cut.
It’s always interesting to see what cities we perhaps should be aspiring to get up to over time. Certainly Portland (USA) is a little above us, as is London (UK), so it’s potentially instructive to learn from their successes. I might have to visit a few more of the European examples when I’m over there next year to see what makes them tick…
What do you think of the Copenhagenize ranking for Christchurch?
Fantastic to see that we are heading in the right direction
Interesting the Tokyo is so low. Seems their style of quiet streets and wide footpaths/ shared paths aren’t given as high scores as dedicated cycle infrastructure even though it gives them a high modal share.