A new disturbing trend is being reported by the European Cyclists’ Federation. According to a recent study the number of kids who walk or ride a bike to school has decreased from 82 percent to 14 percent within the last 30 years. In the United States only 1 percent of children rode a bike to school in 2009, compared to 49 percent of children in the Netherlands. And getting kids back on the bike could help for healthier youth.
The irony here is that more adults are commuting, and the organizers of the Velo-city Global conference are looking at ways of helping make it easier for children to ride bikes.
“By making healthier mobility a universal right, we can boost the case for governments to invest in cycling for children. The more children cycle, the more parents buy bicycles too. Velo-city is the place where we will provide advocates, campaigners, politicians and planners with the tools and expertise to get more children cycling,” says Kevin Mayne, Director of Development at ECF, the co-organizing body behind the Velo-city Global conference.
Velo-city Global- the world’s largest cycling policy conference will take place next month (June 26-29) in Vancouver, Canada. We’ll be certainly watching to see what comes from it.