ECF has started work to put cycling into a number of platforms and initiatives that will be needed for Smarter Cycling to become a reality. This is the beginning of a process that will open up to the members of the Cycling Industry Club and the connections we hope to kick off at the Smarter Cycling conference at Eurobike and other events leading up to Velo-city 2017.

In May, Kevin Mayne was invited to deliver a speech on “The health benefits of Smarter Cycling” at the European Intelligent Transport Systems Conference in Glasgow, Scotland. This is the biggest event of its kind in Europe, organised by ITS Europe (ERTICO) to bring together all the stakeholders in the sector from the European Commission to innovative companies of all sizes. Kevin’s speech highlighted the potential for cycling to provide the “healthy mobility” part of new transport models in smart connected cities, based on the success of bike sharing and e-bikes.

ECF has also joined the new European Platform for Electro-Mobility which has been created to give all forms of electrically assisted transport a voice in EU policy. With members from the car industry to public transport it is an ideal setting to explore how e-cycling can take its place alongside modes without being squeezed out.

We also opened up a new range of discussions on a recent trip to Finland. Helsinki is the heart of a new movement called “Mobility as a Service” which aims to remove the barriers between all modes of transport to travellers always get offered the perfect combination of transport choices to make a quick, low carbon, low cost trip – every time. What is striking about the Finnish situation is that Mobility as a Service (MaaS) has been made a strategic priority by the national government, the service for new business development and the city. Together they all support new service providers and new business developments with substantial start-up funding, and they have set an ambition that no traveller should need a car in Helsinki by 2025.

However what was striking about the Helsinki development so far is that no cycling stakeholders currently feature in any of the new business developments – a significant worry for the future of cycling. However all our contacts made it clear that the door is open for cycling to be choice of city transport and ECF’s intervention is at the right time before new systems are locked in place.

Our ECF colleague Ceri Woolsgrove has written an excellent overview of the whole field and the challenges it throws up here, called “A rolling revolution”.