Bicycles are a vital part of the Colombian identification– common, less expensive and, in some metropolitan areas, commonly a faster method to navigate.
No Colombian city symbolizes riding on 2 wheels greater than the resources, Bogotá, where the city of almost 11 million occupants has no train system and some of the world’s worst traffic jams.
The city has more than 1.1 million bikes, according to authorities, and documents nearly 900,000 bike journeys each day. On Sundays and vacations, greater than 80 miles of significant roads are closed down, a practice that regularly draws 2 million individuals at once.
” It’s the D.N.A. of this city,” stated Bogotá’s mayor, Carlos Fernando Galán.
Yet a variety of burglaries and attacks of bikers this year have actually left numerous bikers in Bogotá on side. A recent news report approximated that a bike was taken in the resources every 42 mins and little gangs of burglars have actually targeted bikers.
” The instability for bikers goes to an optimum high,” stated Yim Ángel, an owner of the Bike Collective, a campaigning for team. “Bikers add to the setting, to transport, to wellness, to sporting activities, to entertainment. Yet in this minute, we do not have a warranty of protection to walk around openly in Bogotá. We’re terrified.”
Bicyclists, from day-to-day travelers to die-hard bikers, and campaigning for teams have actually required that the city do even more to make the city much safer for them, and Mr. Galán, that took workplace in January, stated authorities were currently checking out a selection of actions.
While authorities information reveals that bike burglaries have actually decreased in current years, a surge in some sorts of fierce criminal offenses in Bogotá in 2015, like burglaries, sexual offenses and carjackings, has actually sustained expanding worries that the expansive city is ending up being much less risk-free, consisting of for bikers.
Contributing to the agitation has actually been a string of fierce criminal offenses, consisting of the murder of a businessman and multiple armed robberies, in a lot more wealthy and generally quieter components of the city.
Mr. Galan, in a meeting, stated he stressed that enhanced concern was triggering individuals to desert even more eco-friendly means to walk around Bogotá.
” There are many individuals that can do journeys of 4, 5, 6 blocks from home to function or to go get something, however today they’re doing it by automobile, yet might be doing it by bike or walking,” he stated. “That’s why, for us, protection is a basic top priority.”
David Santiago Cortés Peña, 23, that runs a bike store in Bogotá and rode on an expert biking group in 2015, laid out lately on an approximately 30-mile training trip to a community outside the city.
Around 5:30 a.m., en course to conference buddies at the base of the hill near where he lives, Mr. Cortés stated a guy leapt out from behind a tree at night. He attempted to navigate around the guy, however he stated the guy discharged at him, a bullet grazing his brow and requiring him off his bike.
As he lay hemorrhaging on the ground, Mr. Cortés stated, he saw the guy competing off with his bike, which cost him $3,500. To spend for it, he had actually gotten a financing, offered some possessions and obtained aid from his older sibling.
” It was an initiative by the entire household throughout a whole year to pay it off,” he stated.
He had insurance coverage for his bike, however it had actually expired in December and he had actually not restored the plan. He had actually additionally determined it was obtaining as well pricey to spend for something that numerous innovative bikers in the city usage– a motorbike companion.
Nowadays, Mr. Cortés is making use of an obtained bike, and stated he would certainly ride just in daytime and would certainly work with a companion.
” I’ll wind up without cost savings, “he stated,” however it’s much better for safety and security.”
Luis Fernando Guarin, 37, was out a training trip when he dropped target. He was doing what numerous in Bogotá utilize their bikes for: travelling to and from job. He stated a nine-mile journey each manner in which would certainly take 2 hours by public bus takes fifty percent that time pedaling on 2 wheels.
” It additionally de-stresses me,” stated Mr. Guarin, that helps a telecom firm.
He was riding home on a current Friday evening on a bike course along a significant roadway when, he stated, he was confronted by 4 guys that leapt out from behind some shrubs attempting to burglarize him. When he stood up to, Mr. Guarin stated, he was stabbed two times in the abdominal area prior to his aggressors swiped his bike.
He attempted to submit an authorities record online from his cellular phone while at the health center and in your home, however he stated the internet site to go into such records was not functioning. He additionally never ever made it to a police headquarters to do it face to face. Also if he had actually logged a record, Mr. Guarin stated, he had little confidence that his bike would certainly be recuperated.
The city runs a bike register made to make it much easier to recognize taken bikes and return them to their proprietors. Up until now, 400,000 bikes have actually been signed up, according to Mr. Galán, the mayor, that would love to see that number surge substantially.
Of the 1,100 bikes taken in the city in the initial 2 months of this year, just regarding 15 percent have actually been recuperated, he stated. Specialists stated numerous burglaries might be combated if bikers secured their bikes or made use of more powerful locks when they were not riding.
Mr. Ángel, that assisted develop the bike campaigning for team a number of years earlier after the deadly capturing of a bicyclist in Bogotá, stated his company had actually delayed 2 current demonstration rallies after holding conversations with authorities regarding enhancing bike safety and security.
The team has actually pressed 10 recommendations, a few of which mirror what the city is thinking about established in the coming months.
Mr. Galán rattled off a checklist of feasible actions: concentrating on the 5 communities where most of bike burglaries happen; enhancing authorities visibility on highways; mounting even more road cams and lights; making it much easier to submit authorities records; and enhancing the penalty for burglaries as a more powerful prevention.
Andrea María Navarrete, that was the city’s cycling supervisor from 2021 to 2023, stated making biking much safer would certainly additionally to aid attend to a big sex variation amongst bikers and motivate even more females to bike.
” If females do not view danger in the facilities, that implies every person will certainly appreciate it,” she stated.
Mr. Galán guaranteed to improve the city’s wheelchair accomplishments to end up being “the bike resources of the globe.”
” I understand many individuals will slam that claiming, ‘With a lot instability, just how can you state that?'” he included. “It holds true: We have protection issues that we’re attempting to deal with. And we need to maintain broadening the bike courses and bike lanes so individuals can walk around. This city has a really unique link to the bike.”
Simón Posada added reporting.
