The Guardian newspaper recently had a piece on Luud Schimmelpenninck and his 1960s invention for Amsterdam, the bike-sharing scheme. Ironically given Amsterdam’s support and integration of the bike as transport nowadays, it wasn’t well received at the time, coming from a group of anarchist activists.
You can read more about the history and the successful adoption of bike-sharing in many other cities at the Guardian’s website by clicking on the logo.
Citylab from The Atlantic recently published a piece on a new scheme that Amsterdam is exploring - that of a (semi-)official Bike Mayor. The piece presents the role as a world-first, which may be a little bit of a stretch as other cities have established bike czars or bike coordinators previously with similar intentions. However, in Amsterdam this role will be far more integrated with city hall and at the same time still representing advocacy groups. The long-term plan is to export the idea to other cities to improve cycling infrastructure there. It will be interesting to hear about the outcomes in the future.
Click on the logo to the right to read the full piece at Citylab.