Hotels in Amsterdam

Amsterdammers use bikes more than cars

Amsterdam is famous for its bicycle culture and now official reports have it that Amsterdammers use bikes more than cars. Between 2005 and 2007 people in the city used their bikes on average 0.87 times a day, compared to 0.84 for their cars. This is the first time that bicycle use exceeds car use.

Also the trips per day in 2006 by Amsterdammers fell down by 8% compared to 1990 as the inhabitants of Amsterdam engaged in some 2 million trips a day. This is due to the number of trips per person per day falling from 3.6 to 3.1%. The number of transfers has fallen in the old city within the ring road in particular.

Compared to 1990 the number of trips by car has fallen by 14% in all districts whereas the number of trips by bicycle has only risen within the ring road with 36%. The bike is used most often in the town centre (41% versus an average of 28%) and the car least often (10% versus an average of 28%). The shift from cars to bicycles can be attributed to the restrictive parking policies enacted here since the 1990s.

The infrastructure department of the city, ‘Dienst Infrastructuur en Beheer’, registered approximately 235,000 car movements in both directions at the city centre in 1990. By 2006 this had fallen to 172,000, a decrease of over a quarter. Over the same period the number of daily movements by bicycle rose from 86,000 to over 140,000 (+60%).