Normalising cycling mobilities: an age-friendly approach to cycling in the Netherlands

Abstract

Cycling is promoted as a form of urban travel with well-established benefits to health, liveability and wellbeing. These benefits are comparatively large for older people, a growing segment in many populations. Yet, support for the normalisation of cycling mobilities for all ages varies considerably. It is usual to contrast low-cycling contexts, such as the UK, with high-cycling areas, typically favouring highest-rate paradigmatic urban centres. To challenge a too simplistic imitation and recreation of engineering solutions elsewhere, we draw attention to diverse cycling habits and norms in residents of a more ordinary high-cycling area (suburban Rotterdam), and observe how cycling is normalised throughout the lifecourse. Using mobile and biographical methods, we argue that a more nuanced appreciation of cycling normalisation is gained from viewing ageing and cycling relationally and biographically. This is because the habit-forming realm of normalisation functions through both conscious decisions and unconscious practice, bound up with life events and the external environment. The findings suggest that age-friendly city strategies and urban mobility policies should more closely consider locally constituted social and cultural processes, beyond providing infrastructure. This article thus provides an indepth account of what it takes for planning and policy to normalise positive, empowering, and age-friendly qualities in everyday mobility.

Investigating young children’s physical activity through time and place

“…However, we also showed that in our sample, cycling played a minor role in daily MVPA, which is in contrast with studies in older Dutch children [ 57 ] showing that cycling being one of the major contributors to daily PA in Dutch children [ 58 ]. This is in accordance with the long history of normalization of daily cycling mobility in the Netherlands [ 59 , 60 ]. Children usually learn to cycle around the age of 5–7 years [ 61 ].…”

Active Aging and Public Health: Evidence, Implications, and Opportunities

“…In addition to the conventional modes of travel (i.e., private motor vehicles, public transit), there are now diverse ways to move within a city, including car sharing, bicycle sharing, ride sharing, and on-demand transport (34). However, adequate infrastructure and age-friendly policies are needed to facilitate active travel, as they have in some parts of the world (32). For example, in the Netherlands, the CycleOn program aims to educate older adults on safety with local community partners (138).…”