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Promotion of cargo bikes: Why the Greens proposal does not only benefit hip city dwellers

2021-08-23T19:32:23.552Z


One billion euros in funding for cargo bikes, that's what the Greens propose. The party then reaped malice. But the criticism is apparently based in part on clichés.


Enlarge image

Cargo bikes are now part of the street scene in many parts of Europe (symbolic image)

Photo:

Christophe Ena / AP Photo

What would be a marginal note in other countries is developing into a surprising ad hoc election campaign hit in this country.

The idea of ​​the Greens: not only financially support less climate-damaging e-cars, but also cargo bikes.

Doesn't sound spectacular, but it makes people gasp in the political competition and on social networks in Autoland.

1000 euros subsidy for the car alternative with the aim of increasing the number of cargo bikes in the country to one million, is the proposal.

In the transport sector, such sums are not really worth mentioning as long as four-wheeled vehicles are involved.

The extension of the A100 in Berlin alone costs the taxpayer 700 million euros - for three (!) Kilometers of the motorway - and the subsidization of diesel even costs seven billion per year.

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But the vice-parliamentary group leader of the Union, Ulrich Lange, meant not car riders but cyclists when he spoke of a "clientele whose way of life should be generously subsidized by others". The FDP worries that low-wage earners would be burdened in favor of the rich, and Twitter is dominated by framing, according to which cargo bikes are bought by the top ten thousand alone. The craftsmen, painters and chimney sweeps, who have been using it in a climate-friendly way for years and no longer have to park in the second row, do not even appear in it.

A study by the Sinus Institute refutes the overused cliché of the big city yuppie chauffeuring his children from the loft to the bilingual daycare center on a cargo bike.

Accordingly, the interest in buying cargo bikes does not "clearly depend on the level of income" and is even particularly pronounced among the "lower and lower middle classes".

Those who earn less tend to ride more bicycles anyway, while more cars are driven with increasing income.

Every second car trip could be omitted

More than 100,000 cargo bikes were bought in Germany last year. Most of them were cargo bikes with electric drive, which are also suitable for heavy goods and longer distances outside the city. Businesses have been able to apply for grants for a long time. Unlike in Austria, for example, the state has not yet supported the purchase of privately used cargo bikes across the board, which cost several thousand euros to purchase. From the perspective of scientists, this is a failure that is slowing down the traffic turnaround.

»Cargo bikes aren't just a gimmick.

You can make an important contribution to containing the flood of delivery vehicles in city centers.

Funding creates awareness and can encourage people, for example, to buy a cargo bike instead of a second car, ”said Wolfgang Aichinger, project manager for urban mobility at Agora Verkehrswende, to SPIEGEL.

In cities, cargo bikes could replace every second journey by car or delivery van, the EU transport ministers said in a joint statement in 2015.

At the time, a study commissioned by Brussels assumed that distances of up to five kilometers could be considered and that the maximum weight of the transported goods was 200 kilograms.

Today, many commercial users already drive significantly longer distances.

The hidden costs of car traffic

If only a fraction of this potential were exploited, CO2 emissions could drop noticeably, air and noise pollution could decrease and public space that was previously blocked could become free - as far as the theory goes.

Reality is different on the street.

The cargo bikes that are already on the move are not particularly popular with other road users.

Pedestrians in particular are afraid of the wide »bicycle SUVs«.

This cannot be solved with incentives to buy.

There is a lack of appropriate infrastructure.

»Funding for cargo bikes is most beneficial for the traffic turnaround if it is embedded in municipal mobility and logistics concepts and geared towards reducing the volume of motorized traffic. This also includes the expansion of cycle paths and the designation of delivery zones, ”said Agora expert Aichinger.

Where there are cycle lanes, they are usually too narrow for normal bicycles. Often, bike and footpaths also cross, especially at traffic lights, so that someone is always in someone's way - be it out of ignorance, foulness or ignorance. That creates conflicts and dangerous situations. In many places there would be more than enough space for spatially separated paths. But it is mostly reserved for the most inefficient of all urban modes of transport, the car. A political court recently had to declare that »bicycle streets« are not intended for cars.

A shift towards more bicycle traffic would not only be good for the climate goals, it would also save society money. The hidden costs of car traffic, for example due to accidents, traffic jams and environmental pollution, are around 20 cents per kilometer, according to a study by German traffic researcher Stefan Gössling from Lund University. Since these costs are only partially covered by taxes, the bottom line is that each car is subsidized with 4,000 euros.

According to the calculation, every euro that goes into expanding the cycling infrastructure brings a social return - depending on the study, around 20 cents per kilometer traveled. One reason is that cyclists do something for their health on the side, which relieves the burden on health insurance companies. Better air means fewer respiratory diseases. And the shorter the traffic jams, the smaller the burdens on the economy.

»The entire system of motorized individual transport costs us in Germany 110 billion euros annually. Mineral oil and vehicle taxes only bring in 60 billion, ”says traffic researcher Andreas Knie from the Berlin Science Center (WZB), comparing the direct costs and income of car traffic. "That means that all taxpayers subsidize the car with 50 billion euros every year." In contrast, the proposed subsidy for cargo bikes looks extremely modest.

Source: spiegel

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