We're into day two of the conference here in Adelaide and crikey, it's turning out to be a scorcher of a conference. Although we can't say the same about the autumnal weather! Back indoors, there have been so many interesting presentations and debates. We'll give you a low-down of some of Wednesday's events here. Remember, you can always find more info on our dedicated news page, and on social media.

• Morning sessions: Rio and Cargo
• Global Trends in Cycling
• Mayoral session

Morning sessions: Rio and Cargo

At Wednesday morning’s Spin Cycle presentations, we continued our round-the-world tour of the state of cycling practices. This time, we’ve decided to stop over in Rio de Janeiro. This is the second city of Brazil in terms of population, and it has been growing steadily. In the last 5 years, Rio has seen a great deal of urban development but cycling hasn’t been part of the plan. Clarisse Link’s organization noticed this large gap and started to try and add cycling to the picture.

How did they get about the business of convincing planners to take cycling on board? Just like our ‘Quote of the day’ yesterday says: data, data, data! A lot of their work involved collecting meaningful data and producing statistics that explained the situation. For instance, they found that a staggering 1/3^rd of all bikes in Rio are cargo bikes! They are actually large tricycles. Now that’s a statistic that even the bike-tastic Denmarks and Hollands of this world cannot emulate…!

Talking about bicycle transport solutions, we heard Ton Daggers speak about the Cyclelogistics project co-developed by ECF. Daggers said 70% of all costs for logistics are the first and the last mile in the delivery. Which is the main reason why the Cyclelogistics project was born: bike logistics is getting out of the niche. It turns out that a cargo bike festival was actually held on Sunday in Adelaide! The rise of internet shopping is changing the way we consume, so it’s also changing the way our logistics are drawn up. There is a resurgence of the postal system that was deemed less and less relevant in the age of email.  It turns out it's quite the contrary. Now, experts have even started looking into ‘drone deliveries’ for your online shopping. Sounds a bit too surreal for us: bicycles are a safer bet! The numbers speak for themselves. DHL in the Nerherlands and Germany are …….. Coming back to Daggers’ presentation, he said that there was still the need to increase product development in industry, to be able to meet the needs of the logistics companies. For more information on the Cyclelogistics project, check out the website.

Global Trends in Cycling

Kevin Mayne moderated the sub plenary session on Global trends in cycling which turned out to be a an excellent session with three speakers, all leaders in their own right within the cycling community, pulling together creating a unifying cross cultural plan for cycling growth.

 Tracey Gaudry Vice President of UCI (Union Cycliste Internationale) representing the global sports cycling world reasserted the UCI’s commitment to leveraging their standing in the world of sports to improving cycling to all. She made reference to the IOC-UN agreement to promote cycling at all levels.

 Tracey said that the UCI will be working on three levels

1. To do what they can to make sure that every child has access to a bike from an early age
2. To use their position to leverage political power that the stars of the sport have to improve everyday cycling
3. To improve cycling safety for sport and for everyday cycling.

She ended by emphasising the development of kids cycling as being critical to create a sustainable cycling growth.

 Tim Blumenthal as President of Peopleforbikes introduced this newly formed organisation that is a recent coalition of the advocacy groups in the US.  He spoke of the success of cycling advocacy in the US that has brought about 29,000 federal funded bike projects, pouring in over 10 million dollars in funding for cycling projects and programmes. Another important part of their work is putting together a list of individual citizens stating that they support cycling, building a list of currently 800,000 signees to get attention from politicians and decision makers. Tim’s 3 important strategies for PeopleforBikes is to build infrastructure for cyclists; get support from the ‘grasstops’ (leaders in politics and business); and support at the grassroots with the cyclists themselves. He emphasised the importance of making cycling look safer, not just being safer, in order to get more people cycling as well as getting cycling more mainstream.

 This idea of mainstream cycling was an important theme picked up by Klaus Bondam, the director of the Danish Cyclists Federation (DCF). Cycling in clothes that you wear every day is an essential identifier to a good cycling city; the bike being just an everyday tool for mobility. He reminded participants that Denmark was not always a bike friendly country. It took a long term strategy, political and citizen will to bring about a sea change in urban planning. And it is urban planning that is the key, not cycling per se, but a commitment to think holistically about what city its inhabitants want to live in. Copenhagen made the decision to create a liveable city for families and cycling was an essential part of that equation.

Reacting to Kevins question to provide their one key development tool, Tracey said that UCI will use their stars and their major sports events to leave a legacy in the cities that their stars compete in for the benefits of everyday cycling. Tim claimed that changing the mind-sets of decision makers is essential and Klaus said that kids are key to form the habit of cycling across generations.

 Three leaders from different continents and different cycling fields pulling together to champion the growth of everyday cycling across the globe.

Mayoral session: Leadership challenges in treating cities as public spaces

Four mayors from four cities took part in a session devoted to leadership challenges. They were asked to describe the situation in their city, and to explain what are the challenges for them and their teams in developing cycling. Morten Kabell, the Copenhagen Mayor (Tech and Env't) perhaps has the most flattering of statistics: 41% of people in his city cycled to work in 2013. But he actually admits that the target was much higher. They had hoped to achieve 50% rates by 2015. In any case, promoting cycling is not an end in itself, it's a means to a cost-effective urban transport system. In terms of investment, a kilometer of cycle track costs 100 times less than a kilometer of metro line. "How can you afford not to invest in cycling?" he asks.

Likewise, Stokholm has been investing heavily in cycling facilities. Per Ankersjö, Vice Mayor of Stockholm, told us that about 1bn Swedish Kroner is to be invested between now and 2018, which corresponds to about 20 euro per capita annually. Just like in Copenhagen, the objective is to increase the share of cyclists in the city. In Stockholm, they want to double the rates to 20% by 2030. You can do this by converting car lanes into bike lanes, turning on-street car parking into bike parking, or even raising the congestion charge to finance the construction of a new metro line. Maria Vassilakou, Vice Mayor of Vienna, said that in her city, three quarters of streets are now 30 km/h zones, and the authorities have invested in Public Bike Schemes. All of this, in essence, is to get people to use their feet, so that they can meet. Vassilakou says that the vitality of cities depends on the social interactions and human attractiveness of the space tha