City will join Dutch programme to promote use of bicycles among urban commuters

Come May, Bengaluru will have its first ‘Bicycle Mayor,’ or BM, with as many as 19 cycling enthusiasts in the city vying for the post.

The winner will get an opportunity to bring together the city’s cycling community and take up advocacy with the government to bring more bicycles onto the roads.

The Bicycle Mayor, an honorary two-year position, is a global programme envisioned by the Amsterdam-based NGO ByCS. The group is targeting a world with 50% of all city trips covered by bicycles by 2030. Bengaluru will be the third city in the country to have a BM, after Baroda and Guwahati.

ByCS has joined hands with the Evangelical Social Action Forum (ESAF), an NGO, to introduce the programme in India. ESAF is one of the organisers of BCOS (the Bengaluru Coalition for Open Streets), which initiated the Cycle Day concept in October 2013.

The applicants for BM include cycling enthusiasts, activists and those who have been actively involved in making Bengaluru bicycle-friendly, said Manju George, Senior Programme Manager, ESAF, Bengaluru.

“The applications were open for ten days and closed on April 23. After May 12, we will make the announcement,” she said.

Cycling enthusiast and activist Murali H.R., involved with several bicycle projects in the city in coordination with the Directorate of Urban Land Transport (DULT), says there is a lot to be done to implement the existing regulations. “We have had DULT and BBMP for over 10 years now. We are partially successful. This [BM] will be a confidence booster for the work that we have been doing thus far.”

Nikita Lalwani, who was selected BM of Vadodara (Baroda) last year, is working to encourage corporate professionals and students to make use of bicycles regularly. Having represented India at the Bicycle Mayor summit in Amsterdam in 2017, Ms. Lalwani said, “We need to begin by changing the image that cycles have in our society.”

BM of Guwahati Arshel Akhter, who took charge recently, aims to start by working with educational institutions and corporate establishments to set up parking slots for bicycles, and encouraging more people to use bicycles regularly.