Spreading a Bike Riding Culture in Skopje, Macedonia

Skopje is the capital and largest city of Macedonia, a small mountainous country in the Balkans. Macedonia was once part of the Ottoman empire, and more recently part of Yogoslavia. It is also the birthplace of Mother Teresa.

Today, there is a growing bicycle culture.

Recently, the European Commission has done a series of case studies on the “new culture of urban mobility” to discover and encourage sustainable transport methods within its own borders.

They discovered, among other things, that Skopje has had a municipally supported bicycle culture and infrastructure since 1999.

The case study Synopsis is as follows:

The principal objectives of Skopje’s transport policy are:

• improving existing and building new bike and pedestrian paths and shortcuts,
• planning the building of multilevel parking lots,
• reducing air pollution,
• improving the safety of specific target groups involved in the traffic,
• improving the mobility conditions of disabled people.

As a consequence, the major characteristics of its transport policy are:

• strengthening public transportation as a strategic goal;
• opening new pedestrians zones,
• re-allocating road space,
• reducing congestion by re-directing the heavy vehicles to pass-by roads,
• introducing electric vehicles in the public transport fleet.

Moreover, a sustainable mobility plan will be developed after completing the analysis of the current status.

The promotion of alternative transport modes, with an accent on bicycle riding, is an important action led by the Municipality in the field of sustainable mobility. The city of Skopje has participated in every “Spreading Bike Riding Culture” event since 1999. This event has taken place from March to September every year since 1999.

The Municipality focuses first on the establishment of appropriate conditions that support the use of bicycles by all categories of users. Such conditions include:

• improved bicycle paths (extension of existing paths, bicycle parking lots, traffic signs, maps for bicycle users, etc.) and repairs of poor roads (by placing a new layer of asphalt),
• increased public awareness with the Car Free Day Campaign, public campaigns, educational events in primary and secondary school.