18:46 24 June 2020
Poland and Germany implement successfully bicycle spaces in trains
Bicycles and trains have become the mobility keystone of the ‘new normal’ with great potential for the green European recovery. The EU must ensure they go hand-in-hand, according to the European Cyclists Federation.
In order to promote safe and sustainable domestic tourism, many regional or national authorities like Luxembourg or the region of Trieste, in Italy, are promoting this form of multimodality. This bike & train combination was already popular before the lockdown as one of the best alternatives to reduce transport’s environmental footprint in Europe.
A simple demand is to ensure that all European trains will include a designated space for the carriage of a minimum of eight assembled bicycles. The requirement to provide a minimum of eight bicycle spaces per train has been supported by the Parliament and already implemented successfully in countries like Germany and Poland.
In the case of Polish Intercity trains, the number of passenger seats has only decreased by six with this infrastructure (from 360 to 354), proving that the loss of capacity due to the bicycle compartment is very low.
(EURACTIV)
