There is a dire need for us to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from our cities. At present, our cities act more like chimneys, pumping carbon dioxide gas into the atmosphere. A lion’s share of these emissions comes directly from private vehicles that are powered by fossil fuels.
Apart from carbon dioxide emissions, private vehicles also cause congestion, which incurs a huge financial loss to our economy. As per a working paper by the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED) UK, Karachi city alone loses 663 million rupees (i.e., over 4 million pounds) each day due to traffic congestion.
Over the span of a year, the cumulative financial loss due to traffic congestion in Karachi skyrockets to almost 242 billion rupees (i.e., over 1.4 billion pounds). It’s a whopping amount lost due to traffic jams and just from one city in Pakistan. Now, imagine the extent of financial loss incurred due to traffic jams in each city in Pakistan. This points to the dire need for us to prepare our cities for a future where citizens would easily leave their private vehicles parked at home and prefer commuting by bicycle.
We can encourage bicycle companies to allow people to rent bicycles on a daily basis via mobile apps.
We can transform our urban areas into an ecosystem of smart mobility with less traffic congestion and significantly minimised financial loss due to traffic jams. We have what it takes to make it happen.
As per the UN Environment Programme (UNEP), the Netherlands has more bicycles than people. Its population is 18 million, whereas the number of bicycles in the country is over 22 million. According to another research paper, “Dutch Cycling: Quantifying the Health and Related Economic Benefits,” cycling helps Dutch people to live six months longer than they would have otherwise and prevents roughly 6,500 deaths each year in the Netherlands.
The overall health benefits achieved due to cycling account for over 3% of the country’s gross domestic product (GDP). From the case study of the Netherlands, we can conclude that cycling is good for our health, economy, and environment. Similarly, according to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Denmark, 90% of the population (i.e., 9 out of 10 people) have a bicycle in Denmark.
Danish people, on average, cycle 1.4 km each day, and 21% of the trips shorter than 10 kilometres are done via bicycle. Cycling is a part of everyday life in Denmark. Danish children receive training on cycling from a very early age, and for this reason, they learn to cycle before they even start school. Indeed, Denmark is another excellent example of how we can motivate people to cycle in our daily lives. If the Netherlands and Denmark can make cycling a part of regular commuting, so can cities in Pakistan.
To make our cities more bicycle-friendly, we first need to modify our road infrastructure to allocate a special traffic lane only for bicycles. By law, it should then be made mandatory that no other mode of transportation, including motorbikes, would use this lane. In fact, it would be excellent if the bicycle lane were somehow separated from the other traffic lanes through an unbreakable barrier. This would not only ensure the safety of people on bicycles but would also prevent other modes of traffic from using the bicycle lane. After this is done, we then need to ensure that the masses have easy access to bicycles. We can encourage bicycle companies to allow people to rent bicycles on a daily basis via mobile apps. People should be able to pay the rent via a mobile app and pick up bicycles from designated points in cities. Once they are done using the bicycle, they can then park the rented bicycle again in the designated spots. Similarly, we also need to ensure that people have access to air pumps to fill the air in the bicycle tyres. These pumps should be made available free of cost on the bicycle lane. Finally, we need to encourage people to use helmets while riding bicycles.
Pakistan can have a dedicated bicycle lane on each road, along with lanes for other modes of transportation. If Denmark and the Netherlands can make it happen, so can cities in Pakistan. With the right policy actions implemented in the right direction, Pakistan can bend the emissions curve from private vehicles and make its cities more friendly for bicycles. We cannot afford to choke our cities and citizens with greenhouse gases churning out of the exhaust pipes of private vehicles. Apart from the damage done to the environment and human health, traffic congestion also incurs a heavy financial loss to cities in Pakistan. We need to do all we can to make our cities more sustainable and mobility-friendly for all of us. The choice is ours and will always be.
The writer is a Stockholm-based policy analyst and the Founder / Operations Manager of Project Green Earth (www.projectge.org)