The City Council of Bordeaux expressed its strong support for the new Cycling plan 2017-2020. The plan which foresees cycling related spending of 70 million € was adopted almost unanimously. These investments are expected to raise a modal share of cycling from 4% (2009) to 15% by 2020. Ms. Brigitte Terrazza, a Vice-President of Bordeaux Metropolitan, in charge of alternative mobility was glad to announce, that it makes Bordeaux the city with the highest per capita investment in France. In comparison, Cycling Plan of Paris foresees 150 million € for a period of 5 years (2015-2020).

The biggest part of spending will be dedicated for cycling infrastructure: 26 million € are planned to be spent in order to improve the quality and continuity of cycle lanes, including connections from suburbs to the city centre and between suburbs, extension of contraflow cycling lanes.  Additional 18.5 million € will be used to extend the public bike share system, adding 10 new docking stations every year. It is expected that the city will have 200 stations by 2020.

In addition, 1 million € will be spent on bicycle parking: classic U-parkings, as well as bike boxes and new parking spaces at public transport hubs will be built. 2 new bike rent and information centres which also provide cycling classes will be created to replace existing 3 centres. Here, cargo bikes, e-bikes and foldable bikes will be available for testing (up to 1 month!) for each citizen, while the ‘ordinary bikes’ could be rented for up to 10 months. City is also planning to provide subsidies for bike purchase – 90.000 € will be given annually to support the purchases of citizens with lower income, and to encourage business to buy cargo, electric and foldable bicycles. Finally, 50.000 € will be spent annually for various campaigns that aim to promote cycling.

Although city’s aims seem to be very ambitious, the city council is convinced that in the years to follow, Bordeaux will become one of the front-runner French cities in terms of cycling.   

More information can be found here (in French).