Biased calculations and estimates
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France Culture called one of its programmes "How to save the planet… by bicycle" (with neither an exclamation mark nor a question mark). The Fondation pour la nature et l’homme, meanwhile, claims that "cycling's modal share in France ranges from 3% to 15%". Sadly, these dreams are wildly inaccurate. In fact, bicycles account for less than 0.5% of mobility in France. What sleight of hand turns 0.5% into 3%, or even 15%?
The first trick is to consider only local rather than total mobility. Local mobility covers everyday journeys within 80 km of home. Looking only at local mobility means ignoring longer journeys made for work or holidays. Measured in passenger-kilometres, these account for slightly more than everyday journeys. Their drawback is that they are ill-suited to cycling: it is hard to imagine a Parisian employee cycling to a meeting in Toulouse… For such journeys, cycling's modal share is close to zero.
The second trick is to measure the importance of cycling by the number of journeys rather than the distance travelled. A Parisian who cycles from his apartment in the Marais to a ministry in the 7th arrondissement does indeed make one journey. So does a suburban resident who travels by metro and RER from his apartment in Aulnay-sous-Bois (Seine-Saint-Denis) to La Défense. Yet in terms of "transport"—distance travelled, speed, time spent, resource consumption or fatigue—the second journey is by no means equivalent to the first, and it can hardly be made by bicycle. Distance travelled is the measure that best reflects the complex reality of mobility! Since bicycle journeys are, on average, three times shorter than others, counting journeys rather than kilometres makes cycling appear three times as important as it really is.
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Cycling: freely chosen!
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