Every year, the Municipality of Rio de Janeiro organises the national cycling workshop BiciRio on the occasion of the car free day. And this year was no different. The city of Rio, together with private and governmental partners and local civil society produced yet another great event. In order to celebrate the coming 450^th anniversary of the city, the theme of the conference was ‘Now it is a different (hi)story. Today, I go by bike’ to tell the history of the bicycle in the ‘Marvelous City’. The event lasted three days, starting with 4000 people gathering for a critical mass ride along Guanabara Bay with a view to the two main landmarks of the city: Christ, the Redeemer and Sugar Loaf.  Apart from the amazing view, lots of cycling and other active modes of transport were celebrated.

At the end of the parade there were lots of activities organized to bring together the participants of the event. The Dutch Consulate in Rio set up a slow biking competition, the city and state government had raffles offering bikes to the participants and a BMX competition took place among the many other attractions. The second day of the event was reserved for more serious business. The day started with local politicians supporting the use of the bicycle in the city and estate of Rio and around 150 delegates got together in the conference centre of the Hotel Marriot to discuss the use of the bicycle in Rio and Brazil. Within the program of the conference: WCA project officer Marcio Deslandes and WCA board member Ze Lobo from Transporte Ativo represented WCA as speakers. Among the speakers of the day were also Hans Nijland and Hillie Talens from the Netherlands, and ITAU bank which is the main sponsor for cycling in Brazil and the operator of the local public bikes. In order to finalize the event in a pedagogical way, the Municipality of Rio organized a technical visit to their newest cycling path in a neighbourhood of Rio, where people only had access by car and buses and the traffic has always been terrific. The ‘ciclovia de Laranjeiras’, as they call it, is a great project that connects a metro station located in a commercial area to Laranjeiras – a traditional residential neighbourhood of the city. On that tone, Rio granted the inhabitants of the area with a new option for their commuting possibilities. Click here if you would like to know more about BiciRio