How and why to ride your bike more often in Taranaki
Transport emissions account for about 20% of all carbon emissions in Taranaki (see Emissions Reduction Plan - NPDC), and about 50% of all energy-related emissions in Aotearoa (see Efficient and Low Emissions Transport - EECA). As we look to reduce pollution and our reliance on fossil fuels, we need to make changes to how we move people and things around.
Taranaki is a growing region, and with more people comes more traffic, more congestion, and more difficulties getting around with personal vehicles. This means that simply changing from internal combustion engine cars to electric cars is not enough to create a sustainable and efficient low-carbon transport system.
One way we all can contribute to the collective effort to reduce transport emissions is to ride a bike for transport more often. If you’re keen to bike more, here are some ideas for how to get started.
Start small
To help reduce transport emissions, you don’t need to do all of your trips by bike. In New Zealand, 43% of trips are less than 5km long and 68% of trips use a car, van, or ute to transport just one person (Travel Planning Toolkit, Facts & Figures - NZTA). These trips are great contenders for going by bike. If you can ride to work one day per week, that’s a 20% reduction in your commuting emissions. We can make more change by lots of people riding their bikes occasionally than by a few people riding their bikes all the time.
Make it fun
One of the cool things about riding a bike more often is that it’s fun! You’ll find yourself chatting to other people at the lights and the bike racks, and rediscovering the joy of riding that so many of us found as kids. You can also do small things to make it even more fun. Decorate your bike with some fun stickers, lights, or flowers. Arrange to meet a friend and ride together. Find a coffee shop along your route that you can stop in for a treat any time you ride your bike.
Learn some maintenance
If you haven’t ridden in a while, you may have a bike that’s been in storage and needs some care and attention to become your transport machine. Or you may be worried about getting stuck away from home with a flat tyre or a maintenance issue that you don’t know how to fix. In Taranaki, we are very lucky to have the New Plymouth Bike Kitchen, a community bicycle workshop where a team of great volunteers will help you to repair and maintain your bike to get you moving on two wheels. They’ve got some great tips and tricks and are always willing to chat biking with people who are interested.
The New Plymouth Bike Kitchen is open on Wednesdays 5:15pm to 7pm and on Saturdays 10am to 1pm! It is located at the Metro Plaza Devon St.
Talk about it
You can also increase your impact on our collective emissions by talking to your friends and family about what you’re doing and why. Lots of people are interested in biking, and you never know who your biking efforts might inspire.
As you start riding, or even before you start, you may find that you have questions, stories, and frustrations that you want to share. The North Taranaki Cycling Advocates Group is a group of people who ride bikes and who know that we all win when more people bike, more often. You can join just for the conversation or you can start volunteering with the group in writing submissions, organising events, and finding other ways to let the people know how and why we should support biking as a great mode of transport.
The group is fun, and it’s also important because people in power need to hear stories of why people bike and what they can do to make biking better. There are lots of ways to speak to your local and regional councils about biking. One great easy option available at the moment is the Taranaki Regional Council transport survey. You can add your feedback until 30 April, and the information from this survey will flow into all sorts of important strategies and projects for our councils. Find out more and share your views here: www.trc.govt.nz/transport
Article written by Jenn from the North Taranaki Cycling Advocate.
