Vancouver is one of North America’s top cycling cities

The City of Vancouver is committed to making Vancouver a cycling city. The City is currently developing its first ever Active Transportation Master Plan, which will form the basis for Vancouver’s long-term walking and cycling network and policies for the next 10 years.

Vancouver has a vision of being the greenest city in the world by 2020, and Green Transportation is one of the 10 goal areas of the Greenest City initiative. To get there we have set two targets: (1) to make the majority (over 50%) of trips on foot, bicycle and public transit; and (2) to reduce distance driven per resident by 20%. Vancouver is creating compact neighbourhoods with higher density to provide easy access to work, shopping and recreation. The City’s population has increased by 18% and jobs by 16% over the last 15 years, but at the same time the number of vehicles entering the City everyday is declining.

We have developed over 400 lane-kilometres of bicycle facilities throughout Vancouver, a network designed to improve connections between homes, work, shopping areas and our many parks and beaches. Moving forward the City is considering other cycling initiatives such as Public Bike Share and hosting a Ciclovia.

Vancouver is one of North America’s top cycling cities:

• Mild winters mean we can cycle all year round
• Many Vancouverites commute less than 5 kilometres to work – this distance is ideal for cycling
• Local street bikeways are away from traffic, noise and air pollution 
• Vancouver offers beautiful scenery and is relatively flat
• Cyclists can take their bikes on rail transit, passenger ferries and buses