manager magazin: Mr. Carsten, Federal Transport Minister Volker Wissing recently approved 110 million euros in funding for bicycle parking garages at train stations or central public transport stations agreed
– extended to three years. Is that enough to better connect bicycles, buses and trains in cities?
Stefan Carsten: No, that’s not enough at the back and front. More than a million such parking spaces are missing. According to the bicycle associations, at least three billion euros are needed for this alone. As always, the move is purely symbolic politics, which will not change or advance anything in the traffic misery and above all in the mobility turnaround.
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Stefan Carsten is an urban geographer and futurologist in Berlin. He has been analyzing mobility trends and developments for more than 20 years. As a future and mobility researcher, he advises and supports companies, institutions and organizations – including as a member of the expert advisory board of the Federal Ministry of Transport, where he develops strategic guidelines for public transport. Among other things, he designed new mobility services such as car2go and moovel for Daimler AG. Together with the Zukunftsinstitut in Frankfurt am Main, he publishes the annual mobility report, who just appeared
.
Pure symbolic politics? With the National Cycling Plan 3.0
there is at least a strategy for expanding bicycle traffic and there is funding programs
. In this legislative period, i.e. until 2026, the federal government wants to make a total of 2.88 billion euros available for the promotion of cycling.
It’s worth taking a closer look: According to your own financial planning
the federal government spends around 12 billion euros every year on federal trunk roads alone. That’s more than four times what he allegedly intends to spend on promoting cycling in an entire legislature. Knowledge-based societies rely on public transport, cycling and walking when it comes to city, spatial and transport policy. All over Europe, governments and local authorities are promoting and expanding these three forms of mobility. This also happens in countries with a strong automotive culture – for example France, Italy, Great Britain or Spain. This means that the principles of doing business and living together have changed and will change even more in the future. Only in Germany the challenges of the present and future are still being tackled with answers from the past. If nothing else changes, prosperity in this country will be massively endangered.
“The federal government spends 12 billion euros every year on federal trunk roads alone”
In the Netherlands, the bicycle plays a major role in the transport infrastructure. What has to change in order for similar bicycle-friendly conditions to emerge in Germany?
Everything. It needs a mobility minister – better still a mobility minister – who understands how mobility will change the future of Germany in a positive sense. There are countless delegations that constantly visit the Netherlands to understand how mobility works in a different way. Unfortunately, they are repeatedly slowed down by national transport and subsidy policies and traditional legislation.
Please give an example.
There are more than 500 municipalities in Germany that want to introduce 30 km/h in their towns across the board. And there are more every day. However, this is not possible due to the legal basis of the federal government. It is interesting to see how citizens, but also business associations worldwide, initially react with great skepticism to a new transport policy and a new division of public space, but then take a positive view of this new order. So it takes positive examples and implementation to show what could be possible in this country.
And you can’t think of a positive example where a municipality provides sufficient parking spaces and cycle paths?
Yes, some municipalities take the issue seriously – Karlsruhe, Münster or Freiburg, for example, are bicycle-friendly cities for me. As far as the redesign of public space is concerned, these cities still have a lot of untapped potential. It’s amazing how much street and parking space is still made available for cars. Berlin has created the world’s first mobility law and is planning to build or expand 3,000 kilometers of cycle paths. We shall see how much of these announcements will remain after the political reorientation following the recent election.
“The brakemen should be aware that the transformation towards a new mobility is irreversible”
You do not trust the promises of politics?
No politician can stop fundamental social trends. However, he can slow her down. And that still happens in too many places in Germany. It should be clear to the brakemen in the town halls and governments: the social transformation process towards a new mobility is irreversible. As a result, there will be many more cyclists on German roads in the future than previously assumed in any forecast. Some cities have already understood this: Hamburg, Hanover or Heidelberg, for example, are changing their transport policies in this direction. Many other municipalities will have to bear the economic consequences.
You speak of forecasts. The Federal Transport Minister has his Long-term traffic forecast
just delivered. Accordingly, the performance of bicycle traffic will increase by 36 percent to 54 billion passenger kilometers in 2051. Nevertheless, there is criticism, especially from bicycle associations. Is the minister drawing the wrong conclusions from this?
Highly controversial: Bicycle and environmental associations criticize the long-term traffic forecast published in March. She cements the supremacy of the car and massively underestimates the role of the bicycle in the mobility transition.
The role of the bicycle in the mobility transition is massively underestimated in this forecast. Not only cities are creating new facts, but also rural areas. More and more municipalities are just learning that e-bikes are being used for longer and longer commutes. The prerequisite for this are cycle expressways that enable comfortable and safe journeys – but the financial support for this is insufficient. At the same time, there are still too many bureaucratic hurdles when expanding the cycle lanes.
Let’s get back to the subject of bicycle parking spaces. It is said that there is also a lack of safe places near train stations because the municipalities and the railways are pushing each other for responsibility in the dispute.
This is indeed an essential and critical point. The responsibility of the railways, i.e. DB Netz, ends on the station forecourt. From here the municipalities are responsible. The lack of expansion shows that there is no common, integrated transport policy and strategy in Germany. There is no shared idea of how we want to move in the future. Instead, a silo mentality prevails. Everyone operates and optimizes for themselves and everyone against each other. Pedestrian associations against bicycles, bicycles against public transport, cars against everyone…
“The role of the bicycle is massively underestimated in Wissing’s forecast”
It seems that in Dutch cities the parties are long past this tussle when you see the sometimes huge multi-storey car parks.
In fact – in the Netherlands, the large bicycle parking garages at the train stations have a direct effect on the neighborhood. This creates new public spaces, such as in Rotterdam or Utrecht, where the world’s largest bicycle parking garage is located. Here, cyclists take the shortest route to the underground parking facilities under the station and from there have direct and, above all, safe access to the platforms. This means that public space is free of wheels and available to people.
A possible role model for German cities? In this country there are few opportunities to safely park a high-quality and expensive bicycle …
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Battle for space and safe routes
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Photo: Alexander Heinl/ dpa
Absolutely! The bicycle parking garages are modern, monitored and equipped with additional services such as repair service or bike sharing. The pitches can be reserved and are accessible 24 hours a day. This design literally draws people into public transport or onto their bicycles. In Germany we experience exactly the opposite: unsafe public spaces that do not offer a safe place even for high-quality bicycles. Since bicycles are becoming more and more expensive due to electrification, digitization and the cargo bike boom, there is a need for completely different parking options than the classic steel brackets in Germany – if these are available at all.
There is not only a lack of parking space for bicycles near train and bus stations, but also in most inner cities themselves. Why is that?
“A reassessment of the use of public space is only beginning now”
50 to 60 percent of public space in Germany is available for cars. This prioritization has existed since post-WWII reconstruction. A reassessment of the use of public space is only beginning now. Often there is also a lack of imagination that all stakeholder groups in a city will benefit from a rededication: the economy, retail trade, the citizens. In addition, an automobile-centric paradigm still dominates in most planning offices. It is only now that positions in the traffic administration for cycling are being advertised, but their work does not bear fruit immediately. And only those municipalities that already have a permanent bicycle position will be able to apply for the funding that has been advertised.
more on the subject
How are companies dealing with the topic? Job-Rad is on everyone’s lips. Do the companies themselves provide sufficient bicycle parking spaces? Are they possibly even reallocating car parking spaces for bicycles?
A lot will change for companies in the future when legislation on ESG certification takes effect. By then at the latest, i.e. from 2024, companies will have to provide transparency about their environmental and social commitment as well as corporate management – the keywords are environment, social, governance. Companies that then rely exclusively on company cars and car parking spaces will find it difficult to remain in supplier systems or to find suitable specialists. Already today, more than half of all executives – in Germany 55 percent, in Europe 63 percent – say that they no longer want a company car, but instead a mobility budget. The first companies are leading the way with sustainable examples, for example SAP and Telekom.