Mixed balance after a year

At the end of September 2019, some good-humored members of the “Verkehrswende Jetzt” alliance opened a few bottles of cyclists in the town hall and celebrated the city council’s decision in principle that made a cycling decision in the city superfluous. A year later, the results of the cycling activists are pretty mixed.

After all: “We like the new cycle path on the south side of Röntgenring and Haugerring”, said Alliance spokeswoman Marie Büchner recently in an online discussion by the Würzburg Greens on the subject of “One year cycling decision”. The wide cycle path between the Congress Centrum and Berliner Ring corresponds to what the alliance demands and what the city council decided with a large majority on September 26, 2019: wide cycle paths that are structurally separated from car traffic, especially on the main roads where people are traveling Get from A to B safely and quickly on a bike of all ages.

The new bicycle garage in the Juliuspromenade was also positively mentioned, but the alliance is demanding more parking spaces in the city center, including on the market square. The bicycle streets that have now been introduced, including those on Münzstrasse and Peterstrasse, “are not yet the real thing, but at least a good attempt,” said Büchner.

Criticism of protective strips

Otherwise, from the point of view of “Verkehrswende Jetzt”, there is still a problem with the infrastructure for cycling at every nook and cranny, although some projects were implemented this year.

This includes the new protective strips in Frankfurter Strasse, which, as an older plan, did not meet the clear specifications of the cycling decision, but were built anyway: “We don’t really want to see protective strips anymore,” emphasizes Büchner. In addition to the cars parked on the roadside, the lane on Frankfurter Strasse is so narrow that cyclists cannot be overtaken by drivers on the protective lanes at the prescribed distance.

The new cycle lanes marked in red on the Real in Nürnberger Straße heading out of town are also causing criticism for several reasons: On the one hand, drivers who want to turn into the parking lot of the supermarket have to cross the cycle lane ?? in the worst case, cyclists can move unprotected between two trucks. Secondly, cyclists can only reach the left-turn lane under the city ring towards Aumühle if they cross a busy car lane.

“Fearful” rejected categorically

Bicycle activists categorically reject this type of traffic management as a “fear switch”. “This shows that a little bit of paint on the road does not mean that the infrastructure is safe,” criticizes Büchner.

The example of Munich shows how things are better from the activists’ point of view: In the state capital, the cycling decision adopted by the city council in July 2019 is being implemented gradually by a red-green coalition ?? It was only this week that the decision was made to build 20 new cycle paths with a length of 17 kilometers.

The key to success in Munich is a regular “cycling dialogue” between the initiators of the cycling decision and the city administration. Marie Büchner hopes “that we might be able to establish something like this in Würzburg and get in touch with the administration.”

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• Würzburg

• Patrick Wötzel

• motorist

• Berliner Ring

• Cycles

• Major roads

• Inner cities

• Municipal administrations

• Trucks

• Bicycle traffic

• Bike paths

• Cities

• Würzburg traffic

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