Biking to work, training on weekends

On May 20 this year some 1,500 bicyclists took part in the All-Ukraine Bicycle Day in downtown Kyiv. The participants assembled next to the Friendship of Nations Arch at 10:30 a.m. By 11:00 they set off on their route: Khreshchatyk, Chervonoarmiiska, then on to Leo Tolstoy Square, Volodymyrska Street, and St. Michael’s Square. The event ended there at around noon and the participants headed home.

According to the organizing committee, last year’s event caused traffic jams downtown, so this year it took place on a weekend. The bicyclists urged their colleagues to cycle to work on May 20, thus making “Cycling to Work” a non-centralized event aimed at demonstrating the advantages of this kind of transport as an alternative to cars and directing the attention of the Kyiv authorities to the need for bike paths and parking lots.

According to Viktoria Yesaulenko, the coordinator of All-Ukraine Biking Day, the organizers informed the Kyiv City State Administration about the event. Yesaulenko said that there were no traffic restrictions along the cycling route.

Similar events took place in other cities on May 20, including Zaporizhia, Kharkiv, Dnipropetrovsk, and Mykolaiv. According to Yesaulenko some 200 bicyclists took part in each event. Bicyclists in all the cities tried to synchronize the biking events. Nine or ten cities will stage such events in 2008.

The Kyiv City State Administration urged bicyclists to found an association through which they will be able to cooperate more effectively with the authorities and lobby for organizing road traffic for bicyclists, reports www.korrespondent.net, citing Ukrainski novyny.