Within 15 years, Milan should have one of the most comprehensive networks of protected bicycle lanes in all of Europe.
When complete in 2035, the network — approved by the Metropolitan City of Milan in November 2021 and due to deliver its first major cycle highways by this summer — will provide Italy’s most populous metro area with 750 kilometers (466 miles) of segregated lanes. Dubbed the Cambio Biciplan (the “Change Bike Plan”) the 250 million-euro ($285 million) project’s target exceeds even the 680 kilometers of tracks planned for Europe’s current trailblazer for grand scale bike infrastructure, Paris and its surrounding metro area.
Reaching from Milan’s core far out into the surrounding countryside, the ambition is to make cycling the first and easiest choice for getting around the Metropolitan City of Milan — a district that includes both the city proper, its suburbs and some of its immediate rural hinterland. If the plan seems grand in scale, so are the problems it seeks to tackle. The region surrounding Milan has some of Europe’s worst pollution, created by a combination of dense population, large-scale industrial activity and widespread car dependency. The emissions created become especially harmful in winter, when temperature inversions commonly trap pollutants in the lower atmosphere, leaving a toxic blanket of smog cloaking the city.
Only neighboring Turin has exceeded Milan’s poor national record for pollution in recent years, leading to a legal ruling against the Region of Lombardy by the European Court of Justice, in which Milan is located, in 2020. According to Milan’s own research, 50% of the city’s PM10 and nitrous oxide pollution comes from transportation emissions, meaning that Milan’s pollution problem is substantially a car and truck problem.
The city has already started a battle to clear the toll that vehicle emissions takes on its air. It has had a congestion charge in place in the city center since 2008, and has banned diesel vehicles (in classes Euro 1-4) from most of the city since 2014. In 2020, it brought in emergency short-term driving bans enforced with fines during periods of especially acute pollution.
Then with the pandemic’s onset, it converted car lanes into bike tracks and pedestrianized squares to create 36 “tactical plazas” designed to facilitate outdoor social life, repurposing 35 kilometers of road previously used for motor traffic. These have made central Milan easier to cycle but have remained only a partial, makeshift solution. Provisional bike- and pedestrian-friendly interventions in the city’s street plan are now looking a little shabby and bike lanes often abruptly re-integrate with heavy traffic as they leave the city center.
The new network seeks to make sure that the kind of benefits created for downtown cyclists since the arrival of Covid become accessible to all of Milan’s residents. It will seek to ensure that 80% of Milan’s homes are within one kilometer’s distance of a fully protected axial cycle route, making it possible for residents to conduct almost all of their daily business on two wheels. This would be a paradigm shift in a city where heavy motor traffic still makes using shared streets unsafe and unappealing for bike riders.
This attempt at full coverage is clear from the proposed network plan. Resembling a spider’s web, the network will be organized around five concentric bicycle beltways emanating out from the city core — a reflection of a street plan initially laid out around concentric canals, most of which are now buried. These beltways will be crossed by 16 spoke-like tracks connecting the city’s heart with the periphery, some of which will be classified as “super-fast” — in other words, tracks for swift commuting with as many obstacles and bottlenecks as possible removed.
By intersecting spoke tracks with the beltways, Milan should avoid a classic blind spot for cycle networks, and indeed for all public transit. Too often, cities provide decent routes in and out of a city but fail to connect outer neighborhoods with each other, except through downtown routes. Moreover, the new paths will extend far beyond Milan’s built-up area (and the current reach of the city’s metro system) reaching out through suburban towns and farmland before reaching the network’s final feature — a ring of “greenways” for leisure use that connects woodland and nature reserves.
The city says that in addition to cutting pollution, the plan will improve access to the city core for people with lower incomes, many of whom live in a donut-shaped circle of neighborhoods on Milan’s fringes. Another aim is safer streets. Not only will cyclists get better protection, increasing the volume of bikes on the roads increases their visibility and thus shifts attitudes toward greater awareness and respect for their presence.
These promised benefits don’t necessarily mean that the city’s plans will go ahead without upset. At the heart of one of Europe’s most industrially productive areas, Milan has a strong attachment to car culture in some sectors. As the home of automobile manufacturer Alfa Romeo, it’s perhaps not surprising that one right-wing politician has accused the city of acting like the “Taliban” in its assault on cars. But as Europe’s cities move increasingly in unison towards more comprehensive bike infrastructure — Milan cites growing networks in Paris, Berlin, Lyon and Toulouse as role models — the city’s plans look like the shape of things to come.
1 comment
Within 15 years, Milan should have one of the most comprehensive networks of protected bicycle lanes in all of Europe.
When complete in 2035, the network — approved by the Metropolitan City of Milan in November 2021 and due to deliver its first major cycle highways by this summer — will provide Italy’s most populous metro area with 750 kilometers (466 miles) of segregated lanes. Dubbed the Cambio Biciplan (the “Change Bike Plan”) the 250 million-euro ($285 million) project’s target exceeds even the 680 kilometers of tracks planned for Europe’s current trailblazer for grand scale bike infrastructure, Paris and its surrounding metro area.
Reaching from Milan’s core far out into the surrounding countryside, the ambition is to make cycling the first and easiest choice for getting around the Metropolitan City of Milan — a district that includes both the city proper, its suburbs and some of its immediate rural hinterland. If the plan seems grand in scale, so are the problems it seeks to tackle. The region surrounding Milan has some of Europe’s worst pollution, created by a combination of dense population, large-scale industrial activity and widespread car dependency. The emissions created become especially harmful in winter, when temperature inversions commonly trap pollutants in the lower atmosphere, leaving a toxic blanket of smog cloaking the city.
Only neighboring Turin has exceeded Milan’s poor national record for pollution in recent years, leading to a legal ruling against the Region of Lombardy by the European Court of Justice, in which Milan is located, in 2020. According to Milan’s own research, 50% of the city’s PM10 and nitrous oxide pollution comes from transportation emissions, meaning that Milan’s pollution problem is substantially a car and truck problem.
The city has already started a battle to clear the toll that vehicle emissions takes on its air. It has had a congestion charge in place in the city center since 2008, and has banned diesel vehicles (in classes Euro 1-4) from most of the city since 2014. In 2020, it brought in emergency short-term driving bans enforced with fines during periods of especially acute pollution.
Then with the pandemic’s onset, it converted car lanes into bike tracks and pedestrianized squares to create 36 “tactical plazas” designed to facilitate outdoor social life, repurposing 35 kilometers of road previously used for motor traffic. These have made central Milan easier to cycle but have remained only a partial, makeshift solution. Provisional bike- and pedestrian-friendly interventions in the city’s street plan are now looking a little shabby and bike lanes often abruptly re-integrate with heavy traffic as they leave the city center.
The new network seeks to make sure that the kind of benefits created for downtown cyclists since the arrival of Covid become accessible to all of Milan’s residents. It will seek to ensure that 80% of Milan’s homes are within one kilometer’s distance of a fully protected axial cycle route, making it possible for residents to conduct almost all of their daily business on two wheels. This would be a paradigm shift in a city where heavy motor traffic still makes using shared streets unsafe and unappealing for bike riders.
This attempt at full coverage is clear from the proposed network plan. Resembling a spider’s web, the network will be organized around five concentric bicycle beltways emanating out from the city core — a reflection of a street plan initially laid out around concentric canals, most of which are now buried. These beltways will be crossed by 16 spoke-like tracks connecting the city’s heart with the periphery, some of which will be classified as “super-fast” — in other words, tracks for swift commuting with as many obstacles and bottlenecks as possible removed.
By intersecting spoke tracks with the beltways, Milan should avoid a classic blind spot for cycle networks, and indeed for all public transit. Too often, cities provide decent routes in and out of a city but fail to connect outer neighborhoods with each other, except through downtown routes. Moreover, the new paths will extend far beyond Milan’s built-up area (and the current reach of the city’s metro system) reaching out through suburban towns and farmland before reaching the network’s final feature — a ring of “greenways” for leisure use that connects woodland and nature reserves.
The city says that in addition to cutting pollution, the plan will improve access to the city core for people with lower incomes, many of whom live in a donut-shaped circle of neighborhoods on Milan’s fringes. Another aim is safer streets. Not only will cyclists get better protection, increasing the volume of bikes on the roads increases their visibility and thus shifts attitudes toward greater awareness and respect for their presence.
These promised benefits don’t necessarily mean that the city’s plans will go ahead without upset. At the heart of one of Europe’s most industrially productive areas, Milan has a strong attachment to car culture in some sectors. As the home of automobile manufacturer Alfa Romeo, it’s perhaps not surprising that one right-wing politician has accused the city of acting like the “Taliban” in its assault on cars. But as Europe’s cities move increasingly in unison towards more comprehensive bike infrastructure — Milan cites growing networks in Paris, Berlin, Lyon and Toulouse as role models — the city’s plans look like the shape of things to come.
[paywall](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-01-14/milan-plans-bike-lane-infrastructure-to-rival-paris)