canberra.bike
Canberra continues to grow and we are squeezing more and more people into an ever-smaller place. Within a few years, 500,000 people will live in our city. We will be walking, cycling or riding a lot more than we do now. Walking to the bus stop makes public transport active travel, too.
Register here for a free webinar about Active Travel in Canberra.
Exploring Canberra Nature Park is easy with a smartphone. An app will help you find your way. You may use different apps for walking and cycling and that’s not surprising at all. In the car, you are likely to use something different again. So, what do we use and recommend for the walkers and hikers among us?
In Germany, the land of the Autobahn, cars driving 200km/h are not uncommon, with some reaching 240km/h. At this speed, the car roars and the fuel gauge plummets. Cars that change lanes loom up at an unnerving speed. The German government is considering reducing speed limits on autobahns to just 160km/h. Some Germans protest against driving so slowly. Other groups point out the benefits that include far less noise in the surrounding areas, and reduced fuel consumption, pollution and less road deaths.
Many Canberrans would say Germans are crazy to drive so fast, but then the Germans react the same way to us. In Germany, the speed limit in cities is 50km/h, even on major two-lane roads, and often even slower on local streets. To a German, driving faster than 50km/h on a local street is considered dangerous. Austroads would agree, yet this is our situation in Canberra.
In 2015 the ACT Government released a strategy for active travel. The document is called Building an Integrated Transport Network: Active Travel but also often referred to in short as the Active Travel Framework. This documented outlined the ACT Governments thinking regarding the future development of the ACT transport network. The concept of active travel is incorporated in the health, urban planning and environment strategies and now the well-being buget too. “Active travel” is an abstract concept and leads to confusion. “Active travel” also quite broad in scope and this continues to create difficulties.
