Tag: Europe Study Tour

Posts from 2015 3-month study tour of Europe

Flashback Friday: Enschede – a pioneer for cycling

In my work, we’re about to start a really interesting project to hopefully trial some small low-level cycle signals at various cities around NZ. The inspiration for this is from several places in Europe that are already using these to …

End of Tour: Reflections on Cycling in Europe

So, two months after I actually returned home, we come to the end of the belated reports on my 3-month study tour of Europe. I finished with a couple of days in Frankfurt, Germany, before flying out, and I’ve …

Vauban and Rieselfeld, Freiburg: Suburbs for Cycling

During my time in Freiburg, Germany, I paid a visit to two outlying suburbs that have become poster-children for sustainable development. Vauban and Rieselfeld lie to the south and west of central Freiburg respectively, with about 6-7000 people in …

Freiburg – Cycling and Sustainability

We’ve seen a lot of examples of cities around Europe that are doing great things for cycling. But our local readers might say “You’ve shown us big cities (e.g. Munich, Vienna, London), small cities (e.g. Enschede, …

Cycling in Zürich: An uphill challenge

After my time in Munich, I spent a brief few days in the Swiss city of Zürich, a city of about 400,000 people (although there are about 1.5 million in the greater urban area). Unlike the afore-mentioned German …

Unterhaching, Munich: Cycling and good planning

While I was in Munich for a week, I made a visit to one of the outlying suburbs of Unterhaching. Technically it is a self-contained town just 10 km away from central Munich (about 20 minutes by train); what …

Vienna: Cycling on the Rise

After the hustle-bustle of Velo-City in Nantes, I headed across the continent to the Danube and the Austrian capital of Vienna. With 1.8 million people, Vienna is a major European hub and also well known for its fabulous …

Cycling in Nantes and #VeloCity2015 Conference

After the highs of a month in the Netherlands, I still had another month to check out some of the “lesser lights” of European cycling (which, compared with New Zealand, invariably still means better than most of us…). …

What can Christchurch learn from The Netherlands?

Having had a month ranging far and wide around The Netherlands (and a month since to reflect), I think I’m starting to see some common trends emerging in terms of what makes the Dutch get on their bikes so much …

Enschede – a pioneer for cycling

My final Dutch city report is about the place where I was based throughout my time in The Netherlands (I just took day trips by train to visit the other centres). Enschede (pop. 150,000) is near the eastern border of …

Groningen and Zwolle – the best for cycling?

My final visits in The Netherlands were to two more northerly cities. Groningen (pop. 200,000) is often considered by many to be the best cycling city in The Netherlands with over half of all vehicle journeys made by bike (unfortunately …

Arnhem and Nijmegen – Twin Cycling Cities

My Dutch cycling adventures continued with a visit to see two cities that are only ~18km apart and working hard to improve their cycling provision even further (do they ever stop…?). Arnhem and Nijmegen both have about 150,000 people …

Münster – Germany does Cycling too

While I was in the Netherlands I was based very close to the border with Germany. So it was an easy train ride to hop over one day and visit the German city of Münster, just 60km away. Why Münster? …

Cycling in Amsterdam – does it live up to the hype?

Five years ago, I visited Copenhagen for the first time and was blown away by the sheer numbers of people cycling. It was truly awe-inspiring to stand by a busy central city street and just watch the thousands of riders …

Cycling in Houten – a triumph in Planning

When providing for cycling, it’s easy to get hung up on the various design details in how to build best-practice cycling routes. As I showed you in my previous post about Utrecht, the Dutch certainly have many very good …

Cycling in Utrecht

Well my time in The Netherlands is nearly over, so I guess I should actually tell you about some of the interesting things I’ve seen. It’s been a struggle to find the time because I’ve actually been visiting many different …

Reflections on a Month in the UK

My time in the UK during my sabbatical has now come to an end and I’ve moved on to the Netherlands (more on that in the future!). I’ve provided a few thoughts and photos on London and Bristol specifically …

Cycling in Bristol – more photos

There was so much to look at during three weeks visiting Bristol. So here are a few more interesting things biking-wise seen around the city:

What do you think we could also do like this back in Christchurch?…

Cycling in Bristol

Well after spending three weeks in Bristol, UK, my time is nearly up. I came to spend time with some colleagues who also do quite a lot of work on sustainable transport issues like cycling, so it’s not surprising that …