After half a century of campaigning cyclists will be able to ride their bicycles all the way across the Sydney Harbour Bridge.
This development has both practical and symbolic significance.
From a practical point of view, the current five steep flights of stairs that cyclists have to negotiate is dangerous and physically challenging for all but the fittest and most determined cyclists. Despite this, the bicycle route is still one of the busiest in Australia, because there are about a million people living on the north side of the harbour and this route is the only way that most of them can cycle to the city center which is on the south side.
From a symbolic point of view, because the Sydney Harbour Bridge is arguably one of the most famous bridges in the world, news of this upgrade is important and no doubt thousands more cyclists each day including tourists, will use this route, once they can easily access it via a ramp.
One of successive governments’ lame excuses for decades of delay has been the engineering challenges involved in designing and constructing a safe cycling ramp with a gentle gradient that meets regulations, that reaches up to the significant height required to replace the current massive staircase.
The solution announced on Wednesday 7th December will be expensive by bicycle infrastructure standards at $35 million. But this cost also includes major upgrades to the cycling access to the bridge from the southern, city end.
But compared to the $16 billion Westconnex tunnel and related works currently under construction in Sydney the Sydney Harbour Bridge cycle way upgrade will be 0.2% of the cost, in other words 1/500th as much money.
Bicycle NSW president Jon Leighton said his group had been working with the state government to ‘unblock’ the city and make it more bike friendly.
“People who are older who ride bikes ... physically cannot cross the bridge, they cannot carry their bike up the stairs,” he said.
Mr Leighton said there were more cyclists in Sydney than ever before but missing links in cycleway infrastructure had discouraged people from cycling.
“The Harbour Bridge ramp is a classic case in that more people would be able to get to cycle into the city, and from the city, if they didn't have to lift a bike up the steps,” he said.
Recent figures from Roads and Maritime Services showed the number of people cycling in central Sydney is lower than it was two years ago.
The average daily number of cyclists counted during peak hours at the Anzac Bridge, Anzac Parade and the Harbour Bridge rose from 3830 in 2009 to a high of 5249 in 2013.
That average dropped to 4453 in 2015, and has recovered only to 4859 in 2016
Some of this story was first published in the Sydney Morning Herald
