Parking your bike shouldn't have to be awkward...

We offer our solidarity to people living in cities who are forced to store their bikes at home in weird and ridiculous places because of a lack of cycle parking.

If local politicians want to take climate action by helping people jump on a bike and use their car less then they have to make it as easy as possible. Forcing people to do the ‘cycle salsa’ at home isn’t just an inconvenience, it’s utterly unfair given the abundance of space set aside for cars in our cities. In fact, in London, we found that more than 60,000 people are waiting for a secure cycle hangar space on their street – and that accounts only for those lucky to have the time and energy to put their name forward!

Over the past couple of years we have used creative ways to get public attention on this issue in London and to positively engage with local authorities, working with them to understand the financial challenges they have in meeting demand and exploring avenues they can adopt to procure more cycle parking for their residents.

Loads of Londoners lent us their support using #ThisIsAwkward by posting pictures of the awkward spots at home where they are forced to park their bikes. And we helped others to promote their tragic stories of bicycle theft through engaging poetry and prose. 

Our plan worked! Elected authorities committed to deliver 30,000 cycle hangar spaces, and to addressing inequalities by reducing the cost of spaces. And just last month, Sadiq Khan committed to deliver a further 40,000 spaces as one of six ‘key pledges’ to make London greener, which won him a third term and the second largest vote share in the history of the mayoralty.

New EU rules passing earlier this year established minimum bicycle parking standards for residential buildings, meaning one day this will be a problem of the past. However, for now, we know there are many other cities facing the same challenge and we stand ready with our partners to point out just how awkward this really is.

Thank you to the generous support of Impact on Urban Health for making this happen.