Integrating Cycling with Urban Riverfront Revitalization in Motorizing Cities: a Case of Kunming, China

In motorizing Chinese cities, car traffic keeps taking increasing amount of economic, social and environmental resources, whereas bicycle use is shrinking significantly. In addition to political preference for cars, the lack of cycling data at the project level has often led to biased and short-sighted decisions, shaping urban projects more car-oriented at the cost of deteriorating non-motorized traffic environment. This paper develops a systematic and operational method to count and analyze bicycle data, and illustrates its application and value in an urban riverfront revitalization project in Kunming, China. We find that the time-spatial pattern of cycling is similar to walking, but the volume of cycling is 40-70% more, and the bicycle flow along the north-south river corridor increases dramatically as approaching to the city center. However, the problem of continuity, connectivity along the riverfront route and of the quality of public space has undermined the potential of the riverfront being as a cycling and public life corridor. Based on the analysis, we develop the overall retrofit vision and key recommendations for the project.