Forum Wrap: cycling is for everyone

Well the feedback is in, and the Your Move community loved the May forum! Copenhagenize your Workplace or School focused on communicating cycling as a great way for everyone to get from A to B, not just the lycra-warriors. 

According to one participant: “Listening to James and Michael from Copenhagenize is a reality check about how and why we ride or don’t ride – it gets you thinking about getting back to basics and how riding is an easy normal thing to do day to day – something that has been lost in Australian cities.”

If you couldn’t make it on the day some of the key take-homes included:
• Copenhageners ride, not because they are passionate cycling enthusiasts, but because it is convenient.

• Over the last decade, town planners and engineers have increasingly realised the need to make cycling for transport an easy choice by providing safe and dedicated cycling facilities. The $129 million earmarked in the WA state budget for cycling facilities confirms this tendency.

• Now is the time to focus on marketing cycling as an everyday activity, not a dedicated sport or recreational hobby.
• Our campaigns should be aimed at the 20% who could be cycling but aren’t currently. Let’s nudge them in the right direction.
• Don’t take a subcultural approach that assumes that everyone wants to be a ‘cyclist’ but just doesn’t know it yet. There is a danger when you do this that you will come across as insular, protecting, defensive and arrogant. This is not a good way to mainstream any product.
• When it comes to marketing cycling the key words are: liberating, modern, elegant, effortless, social and convenient.

A big thank you from the Your Move Team to James Thoem and Michael Wexler from the Copenhagenize Design Co for such as inspiring session! In the words of another participant, “This forum reenergised my views on bike travel and the need to make the bike choice the easy choice.”

And lastly the Your Move team would like to thank everyone who came along to be inspired! We think our network of Your Move champions is simply awesome.