Bikeability Audit in Urban Road Environment: Case Study in the City of Volos, Greece

Introduction

The promotion of bicycle as a transport mode in urban areas is a main target for many countries around the world who favor sustainable transportation. According to the World Business Council for Sustainable Development, sustainable transportation is the “ability to meet the needs of society to move freely, gain access, communicate, trade and establish relationships without sacrificing other essential human or ecological values today or in the future”.

Bicycle is a sustainable transport mode. It is affordable with benign environmental effects. Promoting the use of bicycle can also benefit non-bicyclists. According to the Federal Highway Administration, “Bicycling and walking conserve roadway and residential space; avert the need to built, service and dispose for autos; and spare users of public space the noise, speed and intimidation that often characterize motor vehicle use”. The use of bicycle as a transport mode in urban areas can address transportation challenges because of its flexibility, speed and affordability. Bicycle can be integrated in the supply chain transport network improving business and investments in urban areas and wider in global standards (Gershon & Rajashekharaiah, 2010). Health benefits of habitual, daily activity as bicycling is well documented (Oja et al., 1998). It is also more cost effective than highly vigorous and structural activities (Sevick et al., 2000). It is important to mention that bicycling may not always be an appropriate solution to transportation problems due to physical and geographic characteristics of an urban area. Planners and city officials can address these concerns with efforts such as good design and enforcing traffic rules. The urban transport network is a large-scale system and every management effort should consider methods of simulation and evaluation that are not time consuming while maintaining accuracy (Celik et al., 2010).

This study refers to the problem of the promotion of bicycle as a transport mode in the Greek cities, emphasizing in road safety issues and mobility problems. The growth of the Greek economy in the past decades raised the use of automobile as the main transport mode in urban areas. Due to that fact, the increase of traffic congestion and environmental pollution raised the need of promoting benign transport modes and intermodal transportation. Bicycle is a sustainable transport mode able to change the Greek cities transportation profile into a more sustainable one.

There are five basic characteristics in order to promote bicycling in urban areas: the bicyclists’ road and personal safety and the accessibility, convenience and attractiveness of the urban road environment and bicycle infrastructure. These characteristics can be summarized as the “bikeability” level of a selected route, an urban area or even an entire city.

This study aims to evaluate the bikeability level of the urban road environment across three selected routes in the city of Volos, using an audit tool composed of two checklists:

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  Road segment bikeability checklist (see Table 6 in the Appendix)

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  Intersection bikeability checklist (see Table 7 in the Appendix)