PTV Group to support new international project to map cycling safety

Karlsruhe 16 March 2023. PTV Group is one of the partners of a new international project to map cycling safety. The mobility software provider is working together with the International Road Assessment Programme (iRAP), the non-profit institution Fundación Mapfre and the Union Cyclist Internationale to run pilots of the new CycleRAP risk assessment model in five cities.

Cyclist safety is still a major concern of cities around the globe which want to achieve greener, safer and more equal mobility. CycleRAP, an evidence-based infrastructure risk evaluation model, has been designed to help cities better address the safety of their street and path networks specifically for cycling and light mobility.In order to understand the infrastructure risk for cyclists and light mobility users and showcasing best practices, the application of this model will now be tested across five pilot cities: Madrid and Barcelona, Spain, Bogota, Colombia, Sao Paulo, Brazil and Fayetteville, Arkansas, USA.  The project works with local partners to identify network risks and produce maps showing how safe the infrastructure is for cyclists and users of other types of mobility vehicles. It is the first application of the model in Spain and outside Europe.

PTV will work with one of the pilot cities on the visualization of the CycleRAP model results and evaluate infrastructure improvements. Based on the latest technology of PTV Model2Go a supply model of the city will be generated using OpenStreetMap data for a detailed urban bicycle network configuration. The CycleRAP analysis will then be applied in the multimodal network and analysis platform, PTV Visum, which is well suited for managing, calculating, and visualizing bicycling corridor safety analysis.

“The bicycle stands for modern climate-friendly mobility. It’s efficient, ecofriendly, affordable and healthy. But unfortunately, cyclists are exposed to high risks, which is holding people back from using it as an alternative means of transport”, said Sofia Salek de Braun, Road Safety Ambassador at PTV Group. “The infrastructure must change, because we will not succeed in changing mobility behaviors as long as the streets continue to be dangerous, and people are killed or seriously injured on them. This is why we at PTV Group warmly embrace this cooperation iRAP, Fundación MAPFRE and the Union Cyclist Internationale to address bicycle safety.”

The project results, due in October 2023, will give cities a clear understanding of how safe their infrastructure is, and provide key safety recommendations to help reduce risks. The project also aims to create a knowledge base to help cities replicate the approaches and improve safety of their cycling infrastructure. All the outputs will be launched publicly at the UCI Mobility and Bike City Forum, which take place on 25 and 26 October 2023 in Bruges, Belgium.

About CycleRAP

The evidence-based infrastructure risk evaluation model was launched globally in 2022 at the Velo-City Conference in Ljubljana, Slovenia and the ITF Safer City Streets Network in Guadalajara, Mexico. It aims to reduce crashes and improve safety specifically for bicyclists and other light mobility users by identifying high risk locations without the need for crash data. The model uses data about the features of a road, street or path to evaluate the risk of crashes for bicyclists and light mobility users—irrespective of the type of facility and pinpointing and mapping where crashes are likely to occur, offering suggestions for treatments to reduce this risk.