EPFL bikes to work
© Alain Herzog
The bicycle will be the center of attention on the occasion of the initiative “Bike to work 2011”. The objective is to encourage environment-friendly transport by making 50% of journeys from home to the campus by bicycle during the month of June. This will need some brain-work as well as leg-work!
Bike to work 2011 is really about getting EPFL students and staff to come to work on their bikes. To take part, you have to form teams of four people who are prepared to make 50% of their journeys to EPFL or to return home by bicycle, during the month of June.
The procedure is as follows:
- Form a team of four people and give it a name (the keener cyclists convince the ones who are not so keen)
- Each member registers directly on www.biketowork.ch, the first member registering the team (there is no longer a team leader!)
- Note that one person per team is allowed to take part by coming to work through other “muscular-powered” forms of transport; for example, on foot or on skates. The bicycle can be combined with public transport. Electric bicycles are also accepted.
- Registration date: May 31, 2011
Those members of EPFL who can’t find team members can write to [email protected] who will take care of associating them with a team and also registering them.
EPFL will organize a draw to pick three participants who will each win an electric bike. Three prizes will also be drawn at national level by Bike to work (travels, hotels, bikes and cycling equipment).
A boost for environment-friendly travel
According to mobility surveys conducted on the campus over the last eight years, cyclists now represent 15% of commuters, up from 11% five years ago. The Bike to work initiative is largely responsible for this increase. But it’s also thanks to the campus, which increasingly encourages use of bicycles. Examples of this are: the creation of 1500 secure parking places, 30% of which are equipped with free sockets for re-charging bikes and electric scooters; the refurbishing of many changing-rooms with showers for cyclists; the launch of the first system of free cycle pick-up points; and a Bike-point offering basic repairs and courses in bike maintenance.
The UNIL-EPFL Mobility Plan is intended, on the one hand, to guarantee easy access on the campus for students, staff, resident companies and partners from the academic and industrial spheres, and the public; and, on the other, to reduce by 10% by 2014 the 30 tons of CO₂ emitted daily by commuting vehicles on normal working days. Clearly, promoting of environment-friendly transport, walking and biking, constitutes one of the five leading initiatives in the mobility plan, and EPFL will further reinforce its efforts in terms of infrastructure, information and promotion to attain its objectives.