Bid to promote bicycle culture

Ashraf Sadek

Now with road congestion and air pollution ever worsening nationwide, the Environment Ministry said yesterday it would launch an ambitious project to revitalise Egypt’s once-thriving bicycle culture by selling very low-priced bikes to students and Government employees.

“This plan aims at resolving the problem of getting around the nation’s cities and towns for people needing to travel short distances,” the Ministry said, adding that it would start the project in Shebin el-Kom City, Menufia Governorate.

Once commonplace images of hundreds of cyclists ringing their bells in small towns have been replaced by traffic jams and blaring horns, as the nation’s rich  embraced the private car as a means of transportation.

As the nation launched its economic reforms in the early 1990s, the number of Egyptians using bikes dropped significantly.

For Government agencies like the Ministry of Environment, which advocates clean public transport, the bicycle is the perfect solution for Egypt’s traffic and pollution problems.

Some Egyptians have told The Gazette that they support the Ministry’s project.

“I like riding a bike. I don’t like taking public transport, or driving a car, ” says Nadine Kamel, a 19-year-old university student living in the Cairo neighbourhood of Hadayek el-Qubba.

“To protect the environment, the number of cars allowed in Cairo has to be limited,” Nadine recommended.

Unlike other major cities such as Cairo, Shebin el-Kom City Council is  considering the Ministry’s project, which will help reduce traffic and improve air quality in Menufia Governorate, some 80 km northwest of the capital.

The project, according to Ministry officials, aims at putting nearly a quarter of the city’s students, employees, or workers on bicycles, which the users can buy at affordable prices or on installment basis.

However, the Ministry did not reveal the price at which it would sell these bikes.

At the exit to the Manshiyaat el-Sadr underground train station in Hadek el-Qubba, 19-year-old student Alla Hossam el-Nadi of Ain Shams University says he likes the project.

“It’s very environment-friendly and safe means of transport. It also allows young people like myself to get some exercise. It is really because it will reduce traffic jams and protect the environment,” el-Nadi said.

However, the project may be difficult to implement in Cairo, where cars are more than a means of transport, he said.

“They are a status symbol and a sign of being rich,” el-Nadi said, adding that the Ministry’s project may succeed at the provincial level.

In the small Suez Canal city of Ismailia, some 120 km northeast of Cairo, many residents use bikes to go to their works and schools. But, many cyclists ride without lights, helmets, or reflective clothing.

Children often ride sidesaddle on the back of their fathers’ bikes after a school day.

Bikes fitted with small electric motors for the elderly are becoming increasingly popular in this small city these days.

Some Egyptians, specially in Cairo, are masters at cycling while holding a tray full of bread on their heads.  They balance bags or even boxes of shopping on their handle bars and some cyclists are seen in the city streets transporting children, chairs and even television sets.