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Conversations about Creating a Culture of Activity: Profiling the people, places, programs, and policies that help to promote a culture of activity within our communities.
Note: This transcript was exported from the video version of this episode, and it has not been copyedited
00:00:00:02 - 00:00:23:20
Chris Bruntlett
What's remarkable, I guess, is it's happening absolutely everywhere at a scale, at a pace that is quite breathtaking, but for many different reasons. The world does not necessarily know about this story. They're not seeing these images. They're not privy to to what is happening. And so that's part of my motivation. I have an audience of Dutch consultants that I'm trying to convince to come and work in China.
00:00:23:20 - 00:00:40:00
Chris Bruntlett
But I also have this, this global audience that I want to show what is happening there as a perhaps a beacon of hope and a warning sign to other cities that are trying to build their way out of traffic congestion by continuing to build car infrastructure.
00:00:40:01 - 00:01:08:09
John Simmerman
Hey everyone, welcome to the Active Towns Channel. My name is John Simmerman and that is Chris Bruntlett with the Dutch Cycling Embassy back again for gosh, I don't know how many times he's been on the channel, but we are going to be talking about China, the Dutch Cycling Embassy in China, part two. We're super excited for that. But before we dive into that conversation, I just want to say, if you're enjoying this content here on the Active Towns Channel, please consider supporting my efforts by becoming an Active Towns Ambassador.
00:01:08:09 - 00:01:28:27
John Simmerman
Hey, super easy to do right here on YouTube. You can just click on the join button or you can leave a YouTube super thanks Super Chat. Or you can navigate over to Active Towns and click on the support tab at the top of the page. And there's several different options, including becoming a Patreon supporter or making a donation to my nonprofit advocates for Healthy Communities.
00:01:28:28 - 00:01:36:09
John Simmerman
Okay, let's get right to it with Chris Bruntlett
00:01:36:12 - 00:01:40:10
John Simmerman
Chris Bruntlett, thank you so much for joining me on the Active Towns podcast. Once again.
00:01:40:12 - 00:01:45:15
Chris Bruntlett
Thanks for having me, John. Yeah, I think this is appearance number six. I don't know, we've lost count at this point.
00:01:45:18 - 00:01:53:04
John Simmerman
We've just totally lost. Lost count. You know, like I can't recall. Have you and I ever done an on bike interview?
00:01:53:07 - 00:01:58:00
Chris Bruntlett
Absolutely not. But that's definitely an idea for the next time you're in the Netherlands.
00:01:58:02 - 00:02:19:12
John Simmerman
Yes, we have to do that. We have to do that because I know that I filmed at least in part one tour or did I? I think I did some snapshots of one tour that you led there in the Netherlands, but I don't think I ever published anything. But yeah, we need to do an on bike interview. That would be much more fun.
00:02:19:14 - 00:02:22:21
John Simmerman
Not that this isn't fun, but.
00:02:22:24 - 00:02:40:13
Chris Bruntlett
Yeah, yeah, no. And that's the great thing about the infrastructure and the traffic calming of the Netherlands is you can quite easily record side by side for miles and not really have to worry about traffic or. Yeah, anybody getting angry at you for hogging the road?
00:02:40:15 - 00:03:09:07
John Simmerman
Yeah. Yeah. Well of course in your you're based there in Delft and you sent me out on a, a scavenger hunt of sorts a couple of years ago where you gave me some locations to go film, but you sent me out solo. And so I kept referencing you as I'm, like, going along to these wonderful locations that had transpired, some of their parking spaces into more public open spaces.
00:03:09:07 - 00:03:17:28
John Simmerman
And so you were there with me in spirit on that particular video that I produced. But you weren't there in person.
00:03:18:01 - 00:03:43:02
Chris Bruntlett
Yeah. I mean, it's part of the work we do, I guess, is international ambassadors is to show people, yeah, that the work of a livable cities never done. And they're constantly improving the public space here in the Netherlands. And so we kind of keep lists of those in our head. And when people ask for recommendations, were more than happy to provide.
00:03:43:04 - 00:03:54:02
John Simmerman
Yeah, yeah, that's good stuff. Chris, I'm going to have you just quickly introduce yourself for those who don't already know who you are. So who is Chris Brown?
00:03:54:04 - 00:04:30:03
Chris Bruntlett
Of course. I am officially the international relations manager for the organization known as the Dutch Cycling Embassy. I'm originally from Vancouver, Canada, but relocated along with my family to Delft seven years ago now, and the coauthor of three books along with my wife Melissa. But here today to talk mostly about my day job with the DCE, which is, of course, this fantastic nonprofit organization founded and financed by the Netherlands Ministry of Infrastructure.
00:04:30:03 - 00:05:08:18
Chris Bruntlett
And we exist purely to exchange knowledge, ideas, principles, best practices with different countries and cities around the world. And if people recall my last appearance on this, on this podcast, we were talking about my first visit to China, which was one year ago, to the day almost. And well, since then I've been back now on five different occasions, and our work there continues to really escalate and accelerated a very exciting pace.
00:05:08:20 - 00:05:24:28
John Simmerman
Yeah, yeah. And now I want to correct you on one thing. I think the last time you were here, it was you and your lovely wife, Melissa, when we were talking about your new book. It was the time before that you were on solo that we were talking China part one.
00:05:25:01 - 00:05:51:21
Chris Bruntlett
That's exactly right. Yeah. And I need to sometimes separate my day job from my author slash social media advocate side. But I recall having a very fruitful conversation about women changing cities. And that book were now nine months or so into the promotion of that. And it's been very well received and continues to take us to different places around the world.
00:05:51:21 - 00:06:18:18
Chris Bruntlett
We were just in Brussels this past weekend for a very nice event with the European Cyclists Federation and the Mobility Minister, their brand. But yeah, the as you know, writing doesn't pay the bills, the Dutch cycling embassy pays the bills. And so today I'm mostly talking as on behalf of my work with that excellent organization.
00:06:18:19 - 00:06:47:01
John Simmerman
Yeah. Fantastic. I'm going to pull your website up here. Just so we have that. That way we can get a quick snapshot. There's Melissa right there. And again the three books that you have both published. And again that most recent was The Women Changing Cities. Just an absolutely fabulous book and delightful episode that we recorded. So we will definitely include those links in the show notes below.
00:06:47:01 - 00:07:12:16
John Simmerman
So folks, you know, you can pop on over if you haven't missed or if you haven't seen that, make sure that you check that out. But we have the the website here for the Dutch Cycling Embassy sort of scrolling at this moment. Give a little bit more context and background behind what is a Dutch cycling embassy. It sounds very formal.
00:07:12:19 - 00:07:49:22
Chris Bruntlett
Exactly. And well, the story goes back to, well, almost exactly 15 years because this year is our 15 year anniversary. But around that time, the Netherlands government was very much inundated with requests from other governments, from journalists, from advocates, requests from around the world for information, for cooperation and the decision, rather than to handle it internally, was to set up this external intermediary between the global demand for Dutch cycling expertise and the hundreds of experts that that work on it every single day.
00:07:49:24 - 00:08:20:25
Chris Bruntlett
And so the Dutch Cycling Embassy was very much a copy of the Cycling Embassy of Denmark, which had been established about one year earlier. So they basically took that concept and, well, for the first eight years or so before I joined, it was a very small organization. There were 3 or 4 employees, quite a small network, and I joined as their first full time marketing manager back in 2019.
00:08:20:27 - 00:08:54:08
Chris Bruntlett
And things well, with the addition of a new director and of course, the Covid 19 pandemic, we saw a growth that is seen us now grow to a team of roughly 13 people based in Utrecht, a network now of almost 100 organizations. And yeah, requests that number in the in the well over 1000 each and every year from various different stakeholders working on cycling around the world.
00:08:54:08 - 00:09:29:00
Chris Bruntlett
So it's been an incredible success story, I think, both as a form of diplomacy, as the name suggests. You know, we're creating a form, I guess, of Soft power for the Netherlands, promoting them as a thought leader on the topic of cycling, sharing knowledge for quite freely and openly. But then the hope, the idea behind that is that the sharing of that knowledge does lead to economic opportunities for the Dutch cycling sector internationally, and it is now been quantified to a number of over โฌ2 billion annually.
00:09:29:01 - 00:09:42:04
Chris Bruntlett
Is the export value of the Dutch cycling sector. That's products and services. So we help stimulate that, facilitate that and hopefully find them new markets and opportunities for their products and services.
00:09:42:08 - 00:10:17:21
John Simmerman
Yeah, because I guess that it bears kind of lingering on that just a little bit is that it is kind of a public, private quasi organization. You get some support from the the actual government, but you're really also serving semis, somewhat like, an example that I would kind of point to sort of in the same arenas, like people for bikes where there's a section, you know, a part of people for bikes, which is a foundation and a nonprofit that helps support organizations.
00:10:17:21 - 00:10:54:01
John Simmerman
But then on the other side, it's also a membership organization representing the trade industry, the cycling industry. Your members that you just referenced are a lot of firms, you know, that are actually partners in in helping assist cities municipalities there in the Netherlands, but then also increasingly helping municipalities, cities, governments, maybe even at the state and national level, get work done.
00:10:54:01 - 00:11:29:08
John Simmerman
So you've got these these members, these organizations, these firms are helping deliver the product because you are not a planner, an engineer that's going to roll up your sleeves and help, you know, Austin, Texas, implement things or but you'll you'll do what you the I think the think bike workshops were organized were these sort of workshops where you would come together and there's a learning sharing experience between technology and concepts.
00:11:29:10 - 00:11:45:12
John Simmerman
But it's really these member organizations that are the the engineers and planners and experts. That's what they do, is they deliver the guidance. And then oftentimes they're also rolling up their sleeves and doing the actual designs.
00:11:45:13 - 00:12:20:13
Chris Bruntlett
That's exactly right. Yeah. And so part of our funding comes from in the form of a subsidy from the Netherlands government. The rest comes from an annual membership fee from our network. And about 80% of that, as you've indicated, is private companies. The big engineering firms like Arcadis, the mid-sized consultancies like Mobile or Howard Apple, the small single person freelancers like my dear wife Melissa, and plenty of other independent consultants that that you've probably met over the years.
00:12:20:13 - 00:12:55:09
Chris Bruntlett
And as you say, yeah, they're, they're they're the ones that are doing the work. I'm a and the DCS and intermediary. We're storytellers. We're facilitators, we're connectors, we're door openers. And the hope is, of course, that these big engineering firms are able to create more long term relationships with the cities that we start working with and help them implement their cycling networks, the infrastructure, the parking, all the various pieces of the cycling ecosystem that are needed along this decades long journey to becoming a fully fledged cycling city.
00:12:55:12 - 00:13:31:01
John Simmerman
Yeah, and help with the knowledge sharing aspect of it too. So those Dutch firms may end up becoming subs under the resident engineering and design firms that exist within the country and are able to be the primaries, working directly with the city or on a project, but have a little bit of Dutch influence. And so, you know, I can think back to like a mobile con that has a offices here in North America.
00:13:31:01 - 00:13:54:12
John Simmerman
And also now that Leonard's down in, in New Zealand, you know, we've got him down in the Pacific area, you know, and able to reach out against throughout Asia Pacific area and then be able to give a little bit of that Dutch nuance to and information to be able to say, okay, yeah, if you want to do that.
00:13:54:12 - 00:14:19:27
John Simmerman
Dutch style roundabout, these are some of the tweaks that you need to be able to do or protect it, intersection or, you know, cycle ways. So it's not it's not like the the Dutch engineering firms are trying to take over the world. They're kind of sharing the knowledge. I mean, it's we're going to get to your job because your job morphed what started out in this marketing arena.
00:14:19:27 - 00:14:27:22
John Simmerman
But now I can't keep track of Chris. You're all over the place now. You have an international role. Talk a little bit about that.
00:14:27:25 - 00:15:07:18
Chris Bruntlett
Yeah, well, I think it was very much an organic evolution in terms of, you know, my job at the DC very much started with handling things like the social media and the website and the media requests. And I think over the years it's grown because of the, yeah, the online presence that I have and have built with the books and the knowledge that I've built over that period of time, and the network that I built out in cities around the world, a lot of requests were coming, not through the general Dutch cycling embassy channels, but directly to me.
00:15:07:19 - 00:15:40:12
Chris Bruntlett
And so it became clear that that it was worth expanding my role to rather than just handling the marketing and communications, but actually trying to identify these, these key strategic relationships and to become more or less one of the external faces of the Dutch cycling embassy to travel to these different cities as a first point of contact, to hopefully gauge whether there's there's interest in the long term relationship for the DC in our network.
00:15:40:12 - 00:16:15:12
Chris Bruntlett
And yeah, to to speak at conferences, to facilitate workshops, to do fact finding missions. I mean, all different types of activities, they're all quite different. But at the end of the day, it's about trying to create concrete project pipelines for the DC and our network. And of course, again, China is one of those recent, more recent developments that have come almost out of nowhere but have taken me to some really incredible and surreal places over the last year.
00:16:15:18 - 00:16:29:09
John Simmerman
Yeah, yeah. You reached out and said, you know, hey, we did that fantastic episode on China. We need to do a China part two. Chris, why why.
00:16:29:09 - 00:16:31:08
John Simmerman
Do we need to do a China part two?
00:16:31:09 - 00:16:50:09
John Simmerman
I mean, I there's and China is just one of the places that you're, you know, you're going to you're going back there time and time again. There's some enthusiasm there. And let's tap into what that enthusiasm about. But you are also were recently, I think in India. Is that correct?
00:16:50:10 - 00:17:34:21
Chris Bruntlett
Yeah. I just got back about a week ago from a week in Mumbai. And of course, already this year I've been to Spain, in the US and Canada and about to disappear to Slovakia and Albania later this month. So the job is certainly a global one, but it's really kind of request based. And well, as the story goes, with China, it really started with one single request to speak at a conference in Shanghai about 12 months ago, and that has exploded into a series of exchanges over the past 12 months that culminated in this this fact finding mission that I did about a month ago to to Guangzhou and Chengdu.
00:17:34:24 - 00:17:52:21
John Simmerman
So for those who have missed the first episode, China Part one. Why don't you give a little context behind the China story in relationship to the bicycle?
00:17:52:24 - 00:18:25:04
Chris Bruntlett
Yeah, and I think, I mean, the reaction to that episode was absolutely fantastic, by the way, which was in part the motivation why I wanted to follow do a follow up episode. But during that visit, I was lucky enough to spend a week in Beijing and a week in Shanghai, two cities that very much had a cycling culture and infrastructure as recently as the 1990s, and Beijing alone had a cycling mode share of 64% at its peak in 1995.
00:18:25:04 - 00:18:47:14
Chris Bruntlett
And then, of course, came the rise of the automobile. It was one of the pillars of economic growth that the national government promoted. They abandoned the bicycle by design by policy, removed it from their streets, removed the infrastructure from their streets, and, well, for the better part of 30 years, the car was seen as the mobility mode of the future.
00:18:47:14 - 00:19:13:12
Chris Bruntlett
And and then came, you know, a dead end. I think a recognition that that car based growth cannot be infinite, that you will eventually choke out your city in traffic and parking and pollution. And well, Beijing has been certainly the leader on that front. And since 2015, when they engaged with one of the Dutch consultants in our network, has gone on a new cycling policy.
00:19:13:12 - 00:19:49:08
Chris Bruntlett
At that point, the cycling mode share was less than 10%. And they've worked quite diligently over that period of ten years, the last ten years, to build out its cycling infrastructure network. It's now over 3000km in total, and they've effectively doubled their cycling mode share from 10% to 20%. And so I think it's an important warning sign. As you mentioned, I was just in India where they're building nothing but motorways and trying to go down this path of American inspired, car centric development in the name of economic growth.
00:19:49:08 - 00:20:13:22
Chris Bruntlett
But it's going to reach a point. They're inevitably the same as in China, where they recognize that the the fatalities, the congestion, the pollution, all of these externalities are not worth the cost of economic growth. And at some point they have to provide alternatives or else their cities just get choked by the car. So that was the motivation for for sharing that, that first story.
00:20:13:22 - 00:20:35:20
Chris Bruntlett
And of course, that was just my my first taste of China. And now I've been lucky enough to go back and see four or 5 or 6 other cities. And it's remarkable. What's remarkable, I guess, is it's happening absolutely everywhere at a scale and a pace that is quite breathtaking, but for many different reasons. The world does not necessarily know about this story.
00:20:35:20 - 00:21:04:10
Chris Bruntlett
They're not seeing these images. They're not privy to to what is happening. And so that's part of my motivation. I have an audience of Dutch consultants that I'm trying to convince to come and work in China. But I also have this global audience that I want to show what is happening there as a a beacon of hope and a warning sign to other cities that are trying to build their way out of traffic congestion by continuing to build car infrastructure.
00:21:04:15 - 00:21:11:06
John Simmerman
We've been cycling through some of these images. Why don't you just say a few words about this particular city that we're looking at here?
00:21:11:08 - 00:21:38:06
Chris Bruntlett
Yeah. So this was my first morning in Guangzhou. I woke up quite early 5 a.m., jet lagged, and it was pouring with rain. And I, for full context, was on this particular fact finding mission, was partnering up with a Dutchman by the name of Bram Van, who's born and raised in the Netherlands in Nijmegen, but has been living in Guangzhou for the last 15 years or so.
00:21:38:07 - 00:22:13:03
Chris Bruntlett
And he specifically recommended I stay in this neighborhood in the Dongcheng Co neighborhood, which is a little bit further out of the city center than I maybe would have originally chosen, but it was just this beautiful sight, my first morning in China to go out and walk the streets. And of course, they've got the narrow streets and the traditional markets and the bakeries and the and the flower shops and but there were so many cyclists on the road on this wet morning, kids going to school, parents taking their children to school, elderly people going shopping.
00:22:13:03 - 00:22:38:06
Chris Bruntlett
And it really reminded me of those rainy days here in the Netherlands, where you look out the window and you see all these diversity of people on bikes. And the rain certainly did not stop them because they had raincoats and umbrellas and all kinds of different devices. So despite the heavy rain, I took out my camera and I snapped as many pictures as I possibly could.
00:22:38:08 - 00:22:59:16
Chris Bruntlett
And I think it's a nice snapshot of yeah, what is still, I think, one of the world's great cycling cultures, you know, despite best efforts to build their cities around the car, people are still cycling in China in huge numbers. And for them, the bicycle is still the most practical, economical and flexible way to move around the city.
00:22:59:21 - 00:23:16:03
Chris Bruntlett
You'd see kids sitting in in the baskets of the shared bikes there. The blue and the yellow bikes that you see are shared bikes, kids standing on the back rack, you know, and I mean, these are all sites that are fairly common in the Netherlands, but you very rarely see them in other parts of the world.
00:23:16:09 - 00:23:42:25
John Simmerman
Yeah. And I'll reflect here that I'm sure we'll see this in, in, in some of the additional folders, in some of the additional images that will look at what we're looking at here is basically cycling happening in spite of the fact that there's really no quote unquote cycling infrastructure. These are just streets. These are just, you know, what I would consider shared spaces.
00:23:42:26 - 00:24:14:18
Chris Bruntlett
Exactly as they say here in the Netherlands, the best bike plan is a car plan, and some of the most effective infrastructure you can build is virtually invisible because it is traffic calming, traffic circulation, filtering out the car from local streets and relegating it to arterial roads on the outskirts of sensitive residential and commercial areas. And I think this is a great example that if you control the car traffic enough, then the cyclists will come out in droves and use that space.
00:24:14:18 - 00:24:31:14
Chris Bruntlett
And of course, I'm not saying that you shouldn't build protected bike lanes and more dedicated infrastructure, but both types have their place in the Netherlands. I think there's a good mix of local traffic on streets and then segregated infrastructure on the busy arterial roads.
00:24:31:21 - 00:24:43:12
John Simmerman
Yeah, and Gang Joe does have some infrastructure. We've got a quick little video here. Walk us through what we're going to see in this series.
00:24:43:14 - 00:25:09:28
Chris Bruntlett
Yeah. I mean, it's important to note that Guangzhou isn't just a little city. It's 18 million people in the south of China. And outside of these historic neighborhoods, they have a commercial district in the city center, glass towers. And a lot of this infrastructure that you see was built from scratch at the very beginning of when these streets were laid down.
00:25:10:01 - 00:25:40:10
Chris Bruntlett
I think Guangzhou, for the most part, you will see mostly off street greenways. I mean, that's where a lot of the early infrastructure in China has been built for cycling, where cycling was still very much seen as a recreational and sport. But, I mean, the numbers in Guangzhou were quite incredible. It's over 7000km. 4000 miles of dedicated greenways that are running along the water through parks.
00:25:40:13 - 00:26:12:00
Chris Bruntlett
And they do form part of the transportation network. But and while some of the on street infrastructure is there, it's still very much a work in progress. You can see some examples here where they're using just plastic fencing. And I think this was a popular pandemic era treatment for cities in China to reallocate space. You saw them in Beijing virtually everywhere, but to take a full lane of traffic in the city center is fairly common.
00:26:12:02 - 00:26:41:10
Chris Bruntlett
Now you can see. Yeah, here is along the river. That's Brown riding in front of me. I have the GoPro running, and one of the most incredible things you saw along these greenways was the freeway free range kids. I mean, this was a Sunday afternoon and there were young children, teenagers out on their bikes with not without a parent to be seen just using that space.
00:26:41:13 - 00:26:48:15
Chris Bruntlett
And again, it's something you don't see in a lot of places. But but if you build it, they will come, as you say, right?
00:26:48:15 - 00:27:16:01
John Simmerman
Right. Yeah. Gosh that's fantastic. And yeah, I mean, and here's another image of a series of images here on this video that is emphasizing that you can carve some space out of that car infrastructure that has been built and create some, you know, some lanes, you know, you've got, like I said, the lighter, quicker, cheaper materials to be able to give some separation here.
00:27:16:03 - 00:27:42:12
John Simmerman
It's interesting too, because in hearing you talk about the the China experience of how they really just they had a cycling culture and they really doubled down and decided that, hey, by policy, we and by infrastructure, we're going to prioritize the automobile. It reminds me of the story of Rotterdam. Of course, it's a different start to the story of Rotterdam.
00:27:42:13 - 00:28:28:01
John Simmerman
The the start, of course, being the the World War two and the bombing of Rotterdam and destroying much of Rotterdam. But the building back with the image in the idea of we're going to be a new modern city and we're going to be built around the car. And that happy motoring sort of approach to what Rotterdam would be existed for, you know, a few decades before they kind of realized the same negative externalities that China is experiencing and learned is that if you build for the car, you're going to get cars, and if you have cars, it's, you know, it's kind of a road to nowhere, pardon the pun, in the sense that you get
00:28:28:01 - 00:28:56:13
John Simmerman
pollution, you get gridlock, you get a compromising and an undermining, a vitality in life. And so when was when was that transition point starting with with Rotterdam? Was it like in the 1990s when they kind of like decided, oh, shoot, we kind of went the wrong direction because it was 1950s, 1960s, 1970s that they were building out the automobile.
00:28:56:15 - 00:29:25:03
Chris Bruntlett
Exactly. Yeah. And of course, I think a lot of the, the coalescing of the the road safety crisis and the oil crisis, which was happening all across the Netherlands in the 1970s, was was in part an inflection point. But it's not until the 1990s where you see actual changes to policy and best practices at the national level. And often I think we often cite this as one of the major turning points.
00:29:25:04 - 00:29:54:01
Chris Bruntlett
And of course, the the advantage that Rotterdam had over every other city in the Netherlands that had the space. So it's it is the parallels are quite interesting. And now when you look at the streets of Beijing or Guangzhou or Shenzhen, you see they have these giant or six lane, eight lane arterials, but they're willing and able to take one lane in each direction for cycling and micromobility.
00:29:54:03 - 00:30:00:02
Chris Bruntlett
And that's certainly one thing that they also add to their advantage is they have space to utilize.
00:30:00:04 - 00:30:23:21
John Simmerman
Yeah. In this image right here, if if you know, someone didn't know, you could say, oh, this is an image from Rotterdam, you know, where you've got your public transport, you've got a tram running on grass and you've got these high rises off in the distance. That's kind of what you do see in Rotterdam right now is because they when they decided to go all in on the car.
00:30:23:22 - 00:30:51:22
John Simmerman
They also went all in on these massive high rise buildings. And so it's it's one of the cities in the Netherlands that looks the most like one of these quote unquote, modern cities where you have high rises and, you know, the wide boulevards and that that transition that started taking place in the 1990s and really took up steam in the last couple of decades, and they're making that transformation.
00:30:51:22 - 00:31:11:15
John Simmerman
And the reason why I bring that up is because just like the experience that we're seeing here in China, where they, you know, went all in on the car and then realized, oh, shoot, that wasn't the right thing to do. And they're now starting to carve out space once again. You can see that happening right here in this image.
00:31:11:15 - 00:31:37:20
John Simmerman
They're carving out space to be able to create a safer. It's not particularly pleasant, I'm sure riding along this this particular stretch where you've got multi lanes of high speed motor vehicles, but at least you can do it. And so that's that's part of this very interesting and fascinating process from your perspective. I mean it looks like there's a lot of good stuff going on here.
00:31:37:21 - 00:31:42:09
John Simmerman
You know Chris why do they need you.
00:31:42:12 - 00:32:03:24
Chris Bruntlett
Yeah that's a good question. And this is I think I said this the last time I spoke about China was it was the first time in my seven years with the Dutch cycling embassy that I had to change my story, because it wasn't just about what the Dutch could teach in this case, China, but it was also potentially what the Chinese could share with the Netherlands.
00:32:03:24 - 00:32:38:10
Chris Bruntlett
And I think this is, for the first time, one of those bilateral exchanges. That is also quite exciting, because I think the Dutch potentially have something to learn from these cities experiences. Now, having said that, I've really photographed the best of the best infrastructure and there's a lot of streets with room for improvement. But and then I think there's a lot of specific areas where China can learn from the Netherlands, not the least of which is the bike parking train and metro stations, where right now it's a bit of a free for all in terms of the the bike in the public space.
00:32:38:13 - 00:32:45:14
Chris Bruntlett
And so this is one, certainly one area of focus in the exchanges that we have planned in the months ahead.
00:32:45:15 - 00:33:04:16
John Simmerman
And I think that it also bears noting, and I think one of the reasons why you were enthusiastic about wanting to tell the story, part two, is that there's also a lot that other countries and other cities can learn from the experience that is there going through there in China.
00:33:04:19 - 00:33:34:01
Chris Bruntlett
Absolutely. Yeah. I mean, this is a great example, this particular photograph, because I've never seen this before in my entire life. And of course, one of the objections that you hear about dedicated cycling infrastructure is from the maintenance staff who say, we do not have equipment or snowplows or, you know, to maintain the path. Bram and I, cycling on a Sunday, came across this fully autonomous psychopath sweeper, and it was just going about its business through the lane.
00:33:34:01 - 00:33:53:27
Chris Bruntlett
And if you happen to get in its way or block, it would come to a stop. So it was aware of your existence and navigating around you. But I think maybe an example of why China is very much in the future of urban mobility. And a lot of the things that we say are impossible. Perhaps they were already doing.
00:33:54:00 - 00:34:15:15
John Simmerman
Yeah, yeah. That's fantastic. What was your biggest surprise since the last time? You know, we talked about China. What what were, you know, maybe the things that resonated the most with you and what you wanted to, to share. And we're going to go through some images from Shenzhen here as well.
00:34:15:18 - 00:34:48:18
Chris Bruntlett
Well, yeah, it's a that's a big question. And of course, I mean I having up to that point only visited Beijing and Shanghai. I was curious about whether that consistency of the infrastructure was, was seen outside of what are the two economic centers of China. But as you see here in Shenzhen and in Chengdu, in these so-called second tier cities and third tier cities, you see the quality of the investment and in this case in in public transportation.
00:34:48:19 - 00:35:26:12
Chris Bruntlett
And Shenzhen's a really interesting example because it's very much kind of a tech hub, a former fish fishing village that exploded into this global manufacturing hub of what is now over 20 million people. And they've gone from two metro lines to over 20 in that period of time. And it's not just functional infrastructure, as you see from the photographs here, but really beautiful, architecturally designed to give you a sense of civic pride and to use the public transportation system to be motivated to do so.
00:35:26:13 - 00:35:59:16
Chris Bruntlett
And I think seeing that consistency, we'll look at some other projects. The greenway in Chengdu, there just a level of ambition that that you rarely see and I rarely see in my global travels, pride in a quality that they're putting into their their civic infrastructure that yeah, I think we certainly have a lot to learn from. This is the Fu Greenway in Chengdu, 109km.
00:35:59:16 - 00:36:41:19
Chris Bruntlett
So 70 miles of a green belt that encircles the city, 100 ecological parks, nearly 80 architecturally designed bridges six meter wide. So that's a 20ft wide cycling path. And yeah, I mean, it's one of the best cycling paths I've ever used in my all my time and all my travels. It's just it was incredible. On a solo on a Sunday afternoon, absolutely packed with families and children and yeah, something that I thought the world needs to see because otherwise, you know, you're not necessarily seeing these photos and images online.
00:36:41:19 - 00:36:57:02
Chris Bruntlett
This becomes Remains of Chengdu little secret. But I think it's it's just an incredible piece of infrastructure and was one of the highlights of my trip for sure.
00:36:57:04 - 00:37:09:22
John Simmerman
On this particular bit of infrastructure, is this primarily recreational, or is there also plenty of connectivity to be able to deliver people to meaningful destinations?
00:37:09:25 - 00:37:50:00
Chris Bruntlett
Yeah, I will say, I think primarily it's it's currently used and intended as a piece of recreational infrastructure, but they have bigger plans. And right now it is this green belt that encircles the city. But the intention is in the years ahead to create this kind of spoken hub network of greenways that connect the various neighborhoods and parks and attractions, and to better integrate the greenway into the the transportation infrastructure, because right now, I think the usage is really, really peaks on Saturdays and Sundays and Monday to Friday.
00:37:50:00 - 00:38:28:13
Chris Bruntlett
It may be less used, but there is potential there. And I think one of my big takeaways, and that I've brought back to the Netherlands, is that the transportation infrastructure that we see here, especially the door feeds routes or the cycling highways, they're very much designed as practical, functional, very sparse pieces of infrastructure. And the greenway, in contrast, had food outlets and toilets and seating and, you know, public art and sculpture.
00:38:28:13 - 00:38:55:24
Chris Bruntlett
And it was really integrated into the urban fabric incredibly well. And this is something that I think the Netherlands could learn from because as I said, right now, a lot of the bike lanes here are intended just as bike lanes and aren't very well integrated in in the city, and they don't anticipate the needs of the cyclist who maybe, you know, once in a while want to break or a snack or to use a toilet.
00:38:55:26 - 00:39:31:16
John Simmerman
Yeah, yeah. And and it kind of reinforces how a pleasurable experience on a beautiful facility like this, with the art and with the comfort facilities can kind of reinforce, you know, it creates that, that muscle of getting out on the bike and going to places. And it's, you know, we see this globally where cities may have recreational facilities like this.
00:39:31:18 - 00:40:03:09
John Simmerman
And that could be the starting of using the bike for more utilitarian trips. It gets people thinking differently about, oh gosh, we were able to ride this facility to this wonderful park and this other, you know, meaningful destination. Gosh, I wonder if it were only safe and beautiful and welcoming to do so for other trips like grocery shopping and getting kids to school and going to work, et cetera, etc., etc..
00:40:03:09 - 00:40:16:27
John Simmerman
So in other words, it could be it doesn't have to be one versus the other. And you and I have had this discussion multiple times of how sport and recreation cycling could be. The intro to utilitarian cycling.
00:40:17:00 - 00:40:49:27
Chris Bruntlett
Absolutely. Yeah. And you can see, I mean the, the looks on the kids faces in these photographs, I mean, that was one of my big takeaways, was just the sheer joy that they were experiencing, the smiles. And, you know, that changes hearts and minds. And you get young kids cycling on a bike. You have that positive emotions connected to it that's going to change their potentially get them nagging their parents to take them to school on the bike and potentially to turn them into advocates for better cycling infrastructure in their neighborhood.
00:40:49:28 - 00:41:18:19
Chris Bruntlett
I mean, Chengdu is very much, much like Guangzhou, a work in progress and the on street infrastructure just isn't there right now in terms of the network level. But they know where they need to get to, and they've got the ambition to build it out. And so it's it's just a matter of time before they do so. And this is where I think the opportunity for the Dutch expertise certainly exists.
00:41:18:21 - 00:41:33:24
John Simmerman
Yeah. And we shifted over to the Shenzhen greenways as well. So they also have some wonderful greenways in this environment and in this context. And again.
00:41:33:25 - 00:41:34:12
Chris Bruntlett
Exactly.
00:41:34:14 - 00:41:36:27
John Simmerman
Yeah.
00:41:37:00 - 00:42:15:26
Chris Bruntlett
Yeah. And yeah Shenzhen I think they're there. Greenway network is almost 3000km as well. So you know we're not talking small small numbers. These are vast megaprojects that have also been built into the city fabric. But but for a slightly different purpose as a restorative space, as an active space. Well, as you said, I think the next frontier of cycling infrastructure in China in a lot of these cities, of course, is to take that pleasant experience, that attractiveness of their greenways and start applying it at street level.
00:42:15:26 - 00:42:44:08
Chris Bruntlett
And as we indicated earlier, they've certainly got the space to do so. They've got the political will. And the interesting thing is that maybe they don't have the technical know how, because by not doing this for a generation or two, you know, they've lost a lot of that institutional knowledge. And one thing that we heard over our period there is, you know, they're they're studying the Dutch manuals like the Crow Manual.
00:42:44:08 - 00:42:58:27
Chris Bruntlett
They're borrowing a lot of the standards and ideas right now. And our hope is that we can actually formalize and turn that into a better exchange than just them kind of seeing stuff on the internet and ordering the books online.
00:42:58:28 - 00:43:46:09
John Simmerman
I'm pausing on this particular image here, which shows one of the greenways going through a park, and you see the high rises off in the distance. And what I wanted to to emphasize here is that this is something that cities can do understanding, and we mentioned it earlier with the other Greenway is that if you have that connectivity to your street network and to all of those other meaningful destinations, you can have a redundancy of routes and one of the most enjoyable bike rides on bike interviews that I that I did in Amsterdam was with Jason Slaughter from Not Just Bikes, and he wanted to show me a slice of Amsterdam that a lot of
00:43:46:09 - 00:44:15:03
John Simmerman
people don't get to see. And one of the things that we ended up doing was linking. I think it was five different parks and going through images that were much like this, where they were parallel routes to bike network and infrastructure that existed just right over there where the cars were and where sirens were blaring and everything. But yet we were embraced by green.
00:44:15:03 - 00:44:42:07
John Simmerman
We were in the park. We didn't ride through Vondel Park, but I had ridden through Vondel Park earlier that day. And so it's I think one of the things that that cities can do is understand that it's not an either or. It doesn't. This doesn't just have to be recreation and restorative and all that. It can also be part of your overall network of active mobility.
00:44:42:07 - 00:45:04:28
John Simmerman
And so I think that in the the quote that he had was, John, where would you rather be right now? Would you rather be on that protected bike lane over there on that busy avenue with the blaring siren? Because right on cue, there was a siren going by versus where we were, which was in a beautiful park with, you know, tree canopy and all that.
00:45:04:28 - 00:45:43:07
Chris Bruntlett
So now you've hit the nail on the head there. And I think the key word is redundancy. And this is something that the cycling network planners in the Netherlands do remarkably well. You'll sometimes see two parallel routes that are 100 or 200m apart. And the key thing there is you have the choice of writing a very attractive scenic route that's less stressful than maybe a little bit further out of your way, but some cyclists are willing and able to do that, and others prefer the more direct route because they're more time competitive and want to get where they're going.
00:45:43:09 - 00:46:08:25
Chris Bruntlett
Inversely, we need to also recognize that there is a social safety aspect to this that works a little bit differently. And sometimes, particularly, women don't want to cycle through an unlit park after dark. And so they prefer those other routes where there are eyes on the streets. So it works both ways. But because you have that redundancy, you have that choice between the park route and the and the on street route.
00:46:08:25 - 00:46:15:01
Chris Bruntlett
And I think a lot of cities could learn from that, that so-called redundancy.
00:46:15:03 - 00:46:40:07
John Simmerman
Yeah. And I'd like to emphasize to that one of the beauties of the Dutch system is that the redundancies go across all of their mobility networks. So whether you're walking, whether you're cycling, whether you're using transit, and yes, you can also drive. So there is that redundancy of being able to say, well, my trip between Delft in Utrecht, it could be a variety of different ways.
00:46:40:08 - 00:47:01:00
John Simmerman
It's probably a little bit of a long bike ride from, from Delft to attract, but use Rotterdam as an example. Maybe today I'm going to ride to Rotterdam versus taking transit. It's a beautiful day. That redundancy I think is is just beautiful because it gives mobility choice in freedom, in independence.
00:47:01:03 - 00:47:20:13
Chris Bruntlett
And a sense of resiliency as well. Because when one link in your network goes down, then you've got 2 or 3 other alternatives as well. So we see all the time when there's outages on the train or maintenance on a street, there's always an alternative option and you're not left scrambling as a result.
00:47:20:19 - 00:47:26:22
John Simmerman
Yeah. Now this the image here, these images, this reminds me of the snake there and Copenhagen.
00:47:26:26 - 00:48:04:27
Chris Bruntlett
Well, it's funny you should say that because this exact project was designed by the very same architects. So this is Jamin, which is the smallest visit city that I visited on this trip. It's just 6 million people. But as the story goes, actually, the Dutch Cycling embassy hosted the municipality of Sharman for a study visit before my time in 2016, and they went back to their city and decided they wanted to do this signature bicycle Skyway, an elevated eight kilometer long cycling route.
00:48:05:00 - 00:48:35:27
Chris Bruntlett
At the same time that they were building out their bus rapid transit system. And unfortunately, they made some phone calls to some Dutch consultants who weren't interested in working on this project. At least that's what we were told, because we, Bram and I, actually had a beer with the Danish architect that worked on this project. He now lives and works in Sharman, and yeah, he worked for D and architects who were based in Copenhagen and did the Cycling snake project there.
00:48:36:00 - 00:49:13:14
Chris Bruntlett
So yeah, this is I mean, I think we need to recognize that vertical separation isn't the best solution and it does create its challenges. You know, you are taking potential activity away from street level. You are creating pinch points with your access and egress. But in this case, because they were building a BRT anyways, it didn't really cost them very much to to add this cycle route and walking route, by the way, to give people, yeah, a bit of a respite from the traffic and and a nonstop cycling route.
00:49:13:14 - 00:49:34:09
Chris Bruntlett
So you can cycle the full eight kilometers without having to put your foot down. And it's, by the way, connected to a lot of the public transport, both the bus and the metro stops along the way. So it's it's a very nice piece of infrastructure. I wouldn't say it's the best I've ever seen, but but certainly noticeable and notable.
00:49:34:10 - 00:50:01:09
Chris Bruntlett
Sorry. And if you do find yourself passing through and I would recommend checking it out. But yeah, they still, much like all the cities we've, we've visited, have a lot of work to do at street level, but they're very good at these kind of signature projects that are mostly catering to recreational cyclists right now. But, you know, could could serve both at a future date.
00:50:01:12 - 00:50:03:07
John Simmerman
When was this built?
00:50:03:13 - 00:50:10:14
Chris Bruntlett
2017. So they literally built it. They got back from the study visit and built it it under a year.
00:50:10:16 - 00:50:19:24
John Simmerman
I would imagine. I mean, if I were to see this built in the current era, I would think that it would be wider.
00:50:19:26 - 00:50:45:24
Chris Bruntlett
Well, and this is one of the interesting things is it's actually two separate routes. You can see basically from this photo. And when it first opened, it was each of those sides was one way cycling traffic only. But because it didn't ultimately attract the ridership that they were hoping, they converted one side to pedestrians and then made the other side by bidirectional.
00:50:45:24 - 00:50:49:09
John Simmerman
So it's got it. That makes a little bit more sense. Yeah, yeah.
00:50:49:10 - 00:50:50:13
Chris Bruntlett
Yeah, it.
00:50:50:13 - 00:50:53:26
John Simmerman
Seems a little narrow for two way traffic. Yeah yeah yeah.
00:50:53:27 - 00:51:27:28
Chris Bruntlett
But it's but now the and you know Sharman has I think pivoted it since it built this project to really lean into the elevated pedestrian infrastructure. And I included some photos from a different project which is part of this. They now have over 100km of elevated walking paths that are also connect the parks and the green spaces with some really iconic bridges and staircases designed by the same Danish architect.
00:51:27:28 - 00:51:50:04
Chris Bruntlett
Well, this is a section that we walked the next day through the Central Park there, and I was just an incredible experience to be up above the trees, looking down on the lakes and and then along the ocean. So they really leaned into this idea of a more pedestrian friendly city after building that initial link. And the cyclists didn't come.
00:51:50:08 - 00:51:58:10
Chris Bruntlett
Maybe they need to learn a lesson. That one single route does not make an entire network.
00:51:58:12 - 00:52:41:14
John Simmerman
Right? Right. And way back with your first book, we we talked a little bit about this concept of cities building out iconic pieces of infrastructure. One of the great examples that you highlighted in the book was, you know, the Hoven ring in Eindhoven is that cities can leverage building an iconic piece of infrastructure, whether it's like the elevated roundabout, like the Hoven ring is, or whether it's an iconic bridge that bridges a barrier that exists within a city, which I think was another example in the book.
00:52:41:16 - 00:53:15:19
John Simmerman
So these can be leveraged. Being able to do I pieces of infrastructure could be leveraged to create attention and experience. And it's not necessarily that you're going to do this on every project. But just like the projects that we were looking at are examples that we were looking at with the greenways, with the beautiful architecture and artistry and art that's integrated into it, you're creating a wow effect, which could then start to change people's minds of what active mobility could be.
00:53:15:19 - 00:53:19:26
John Simmerman
And I think that was one of the subthemes that you had talked about in that first book.
00:53:19:28 - 00:53:44:28
Chris Bruntlett
Yeah, yeah. And this was very much done by design. In the case of Jarman, I think prior to the construction of this walking path, the number one image that you would get if you Google it was kind of an obscure statue of Chinese warriors. And so now it's this spiral staircase that you saw in those photographs, the kind of upside down pineapple.
00:53:45:01 - 00:54:08:02
Chris Bruntlett
It's the top image that you that you get when you Google it. It's now on fridge magnets. When we were walking the path, we got an ice cream popsicle that was shaped like this upside down panna pineapple. So it's intentionally become a symbol of the city. And of course, that's, I think, not an accident.
00:54:08:04 - 00:54:18:08
John Simmerman
Yeah, yeah. And then sticking with John and we're at this, this island talk a little bit about this. This is looking a little bit more historic in nature.
00:54:18:09 - 00:54:49:04
Chris Bruntlett
Yeah. This is also something that I wouldn't have necessarily done on my own, but from my local tour guide was insistent that we carve out a couple of hours in the afternoon to go and see this island, which is called Gulag New, which is a former foreign concession. So this was when China was being colonized by the French, by the British, of course, they set up their shipping offices and their consulates on this island.
00:54:49:04 - 00:55:12:02
Chris Bruntlett
And so you see a lot of colorful historic architecture, a lot of well, and it's completely car free and remains to this day, with the exception of a few service vehicles, completely car free. And so this was also one of the highlights of my visit. And it's become a major tourist attraction. You can just walk for hours through these narrow streets.
00:55:12:02 - 00:55:44:10
Chris Bruntlett
There's, you know, a handful of residents that still live there and then some some hotels and then otherwise it is just this, yeah, delightful, walkable place. And I think if again, if anyone happens to find themselves in Sharman, that would highly recommend. It's only just a 20 minute ferry ride across the the water. But in such a contrast from the the sky rises and the hustle and bustle of the city, you get such a nice calm zen experience.
00:55:44:13 - 00:56:20:12
John Simmerman
Yeah, I highly recommend if you if you're traveling somewhere and someone says they have an opportunity to show you a car free island or city, I definitely check it out. I mean, Mackinac Island in Michigan is an absolutely delightful place. It's probably one of the most famous, you know, car free spaces in, in North America. And it's just it's so amazing how quiet it is when you are able to experience, you know, a car free place like this.
00:56:20:14 - 00:56:49:14
John Simmerman
Yeah. By by all means, when you have that opportunity to do that, you know, do that. It's a lot of fun. And this is very I mean, when you look at the this first image was a little bit more I wasn't when I saw this first image, I'm like, oh wow. Yeah, this looks very, very Chinese and very but then as you continued on, it got more and more European and, and look to it.
00:56:49:14 - 00:57:00:27
John Simmerman
So yeah, very, very, very pleasant. I'm, I'm imagining that the, the noise level just really dropped and was, you know, quite profound.
00:57:01:04 - 00:57:25:04
Chris Bruntlett
Yeah. Exactly. And yeah, just you could sit there for, for hours. We were there just as the sun was setting and the birds were chirping and yeah, just one of those kind of magical moments and reminded me a little bit on the topic of car free islands. We did on our Australian book tour way back in 2018, had an opportunity to visit Rottnest Island, which is on the west coast of Australia.
00:57:25:04 - 00:57:47:00
Chris Bruntlett
And another kind of magical afternoon. This in this case the full family was there, but we cycled for hours there and I don't know if there are many of these kind of car free oases left in the world, but definitely find your opportunity to get them. Get to them when you can.
00:57:47:04 - 00:57:53:06
John Simmerman
Yeah. So in conclusion.
00:57:53:08 - 00:58:46:03
Chris Bruntlett
Well, yeah, I you know, in addition to all the beautiful site visits and photographs we did, Bram and I actually did do some work over this period of time, and that was kind of four seminars in four different cities trying to introduce some of the ideas and best practices, and to the local planners and policy makers. But in this case, finding myself in Chengdu at the very end of my trip, and I was just two hours away from this kind of mythical city of Chungking, which is, I think, quite well known online as the place that inspired Blade Runner and Spirited Away, the Studio Ghibli film, and is kind of known as this five D
00:58:46:04 - 00:59:12:06
Chris Bruntlett
city, which is vertical, is it's built into the side of a cliff. You think you're at street level, and suddenly you're glancing down 10 or 15 stories, and they have trains going through buildings and neon signs, and it's I just made a point of taking one day at the very end of my trip, to walk the streets of Chungking and walk I did.
00:59:12:06 - 00:59:32:02
Chris Bruntlett
I think I did almost 40,000 steps that day with with my camera and to try to soak it all in. And because I didn't know, of course, when I would be back in Western China again to take that, that opportunity while I could. And so this is just kind of some of the snapshots of the things that I saw and observed.
00:59:32:03 - 00:59:59:01
Chris Bruntlett
I guess one of the more notable things about my time there, and you'll notice from the images, is there are zero bicycles. They have completely banned the shared bike systems from the downtown peninsula. I think in part it's the response to the the demand on public space, but also just the verticality of the city makes it very unpractical for cycling.
00:59:59:02 - 01:00:19:16
Chris Bruntlett
So it's lots of staircases, lots of elevators, lots of escalators. It is, in all essence a vertical city and was a nice way to cap my. My trip was just to take one day of personal time and not have to think about cycling policy or infrastructure.
01:00:19:24 - 01:00:44:06
John Simmerman
Yeah, yeah. What's interesting though, is that a vertical city can have a bit of a cycling presence, but you have to think about that intentionally. I experienced that a little bit in Luxembourg, where you know, you're able to cycle on a little, little section and then you actually have to get in an elevator to go down to be able to get to the lower level, to be able to then continue cycling.
01:00:44:06 - 01:00:49:04
John Simmerman
So it is possible, but you have to think a little bit about final thoughts.
01:00:49:07 - 01:01:11:19
Chris Bruntlett
I mean, I completely agree. And one thing will often here in contrast of course is the Netherlands works because it's flat, as if terrain is the one and only thing that makes or breaks the cycling city. But of course we can point to plenty of other places in the world Oslo, Vancouver, Bogota that are quite mountainous and still have cycling cultures.
01:01:11:20 - 01:01:34:13
Chris Bruntlett
It was quite disappointed, to be honest, that Chiang Ching hasn't even tried or the attempts that they have tried they ripped out or painted over. And I you know, it's not another small city. It's a city of 20, 25 million people. So maybe at some point that will realize that it's actually the car that's taking up all of the public space.
01:01:34:14 - 01:01:44:14
John Simmerman
And yeah, because some of those images you saw there were there were multiple lanes of of motor vehicle space that was done. Well, in conclusion.
01:01:44:16 - 01:02:15:19
Chris Bruntlett
Well, I think you can hear from my my voice and my enthusiasm that I'm quite positive about our experiences in China and hopefully what the future holds. You know, it's it's in my wrap up, I refer to it as a place where anything feels possible and where the default setting is. Yes. You know, and if you'd have told me one year ago that we'd be at this point, I would have never believed you.
01:02:15:19 - 01:02:59:08
Chris Bruntlett
But but the the appetite and the ambition on the Chinese side is there. As I said earlier, we're working on the the interest on the Dutch side, but I think we have some, some workshops, some training, some other activities planned in the months and years ahead that hopefully mean that we can learn from each other. You know, also, as I said earlier, I think the Netherlands has things to learn from China, and I definitely think the whole world has things to learn because they, they discovered or admitted that that the car cannot be this one size fits all solution for our urban and transport planning needs.
01:02:59:08 - 01:03:17:12
Chris Bruntlett
And at some point, we do have to look at diversifying and using more space efficient modes. The bicycle is not going to also be the one size fits all solution, but it needs to be part of the mobility mix, particularly in combination with fast, frequent public transportation.
01:03:17:16 - 01:03:30:07
John Simmerman
Yeah, and going back to what we were talking about earlier, the redundancy of the mobility networks, it's not the single thing, but you need to have that mobility choice and option and it could be part of the solution.
01:03:30:08 - 01:04:11:24
Chris Bruntlett
Yeah, yeah. And the we also talked about this, the I think the breakthrough, the advantage that China has is the ubiquity of the share bikes, because they've essentially solved the problem of private bicycle ownership by making these share bikes available for pennies a ride. And it's so affordable, it's so accessible that virtually everybody uses it. And they don't need to own a bike, which solves a lot of the challenges around theft and parking and and so on that the Netherlands is certainly experiencing with with mass private bike ownership as well.
01:04:11:24 - 01:04:31:13
Chris Bruntlett
So it's maybe they've they've leapfrog the Netherlands, maybe they're in the position to leapfrog the Netherlands with this cycling culture. 2.0. And that's. Yeah. What what keeps me coming back and yeah, fills me with excitement and optimism about the future.
01:04:31:15 - 01:04:38:07
John Simmerman
I love it, I love it. Well, next time, Chris, we're going to do an on bike interview together.
01:04:38:09 - 01:04:42:06
Chris Bruntlett
Absolutely. We can do delta y. Your choice.
01:04:42:13 - 01:04:50:24
John Simmerman
We definitely need to get you and Melissa out here to Hawaii. So let's plan on that again. Chris Brant with the Dutch Cycling Embassy. Thank you so much, Chris.
01:04:51:01 - 01:04:53:02
Chris Bruntlett
Thanks for having me again. Until the next time.
01:04:53:02 - 01:04:56:28
John Simmerman
Hey, thank you so much for tuning in. I hope you enjoyed this episode with Chris Brundtland. And if.
01:04:56:28 - 01:04:57:21
John Simmerman
You did, please.
01:04:57:21 - 01:05:15:07
John Simmerman
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01:05:15:07 - 01:05:33:09
John Simmerman
Again, super easy to do right here on YouTube. Just click on the join button down below, or you can navigate over to Active Towns, or click on the support tab at the top of the page. And there's several different options, including becoming a Patreon support. Patrons do get early, and every access to all of this video content. Make a donation to the nonprofit as well as you can.
01:05:33:10 - 01:05:54:27
John Simmerman
Buy me a coffee. And again, I have to give a quick shout out to all my Active Towns ambassadors supporting the channel financially. I simply could not produce this content without your support. Mahalo Nwe. Thank you so very much. Again, thank you so much for tuning in today. I really do appreciate it. And until next time, this is John signing off by wishing you much activity, health and happiness.
01:05:54:28 - 01:05:56:24
John Simmerman
Cheers and aloha!