WeCycle app aims to provide planners with useful cycling data - for free

So many flaws. I deliberately route my daily rides away from heavily trafficed roads and roads with >40mph speedlimits, because surveys tell us >20-45% of drivers are texting, taking selfies, or on Facebook while they drive. I don't have an iPhone, I have an Android, I don't use App.s. I use a GPS for my routes.
I'm certain there are many more reasons why this el-cheapo 'solution' will give a misleading dataset.

All these ride gathering apps, be they Strava or something else all have one fatal flaw. Most people now have a phone capable of running apps like this.

They rely on the person riding the bike being arsed though. A lot I see riding to work don't have oiled chains or enough air in the tyres. How are you going to get them logging their miles?

Also, it's not about where people ride now, it's about where people want to go. There won't be people riding there if it's completely impossible.

You don't decide where to build a bridge by seeing where people swim across rivers.

There's lots of reasons we can all speculate as to why this might not work or isn't perfect... but that's not a reason not to use it. Use Strava, use this, write to your local council, sign petitions, support Sustrans, and most of all just keep cycling everywhere.

The biggest incentive planners have is surely seeing and hearing about lots more cyclists, young, old, male, female, in lycra, in jeans, in skirts, in suits, everywhere, all the time (See lever monkey's picture).

(Same goes for getting bikes on trains, it's a pain in the a**e but the more customers wanting to do it, the more likely it will be considered by the operators when planning)

Just keep on pedalling!

Isn't there a danger the data will be misinterpreted, like the naive initial take on damage to surviving WW2 aircraft*?

i.e. what you should take away from this "where people ride" data is *where people don't ride* and therefore the places most in need of Space for Cycling.

* "[Abraham] Wald applied his statistical skills in World War II to the problem of bomber losses to enemy fire. A study had been made of the damage to returning aircraft and it had been proposed that armor be added to those areas that showed the most damage. Wald's unique insight was that the holes from flak and bullets on the bombers that did return represented the areas where they were able to take damage. The data showed that there were similar patches on each returning bomber where there was no damage from enemy fire, leading Wald to conclude that these patches were the weak spots that led to the loss of a plane if hit, and that must be reinforced.[4][5] This is still considered today seminal work in the then-fledgling discipline of operational research."

-- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abraham_Wald

Someone in Bristol has come up with a much more versatile open source tool, which lets users annotate a map with routes they use, routes they'd like to see, comments on bad road design, and more: https://bristolstreets.co.uk/

How about rolling this out to more areas so cyclists can actually say what they want, instead of having to vote with their wheels?

"the data from WeCycle will be given away, as long as planners promise to act on it."

Planners promise all kinds of things in the realm of cycle facilities, without any real intention to keep any promises, so that's easy: the planners can just promise the moon. Solved.

Nothing will get built though.

Problem is, this will be discussed here but people who use their bikes to pop down the shops for a pint of milk won't hear about it, won't download the app and their route won't be recordd or even considered. On the other hand "lycra louts", mamils and freds will skew the results away from utility cycling, where decent facilities could have the greatest effect.

In other news the US may be about to make a massive difference to the safety of its roads and their users:

"In a separate development on Monday, the White House said it wanted all cars and light trucks to be equipped with technology that could prevent collisions."

From a BBC article on Johnny cabs.

This would save more lives than a few cans of blue paint.

But why only light trucks?

Only works if a person has the app and has a Iphone so rather pointless.

Strava is not much better either as a way to do cycle roots. Can't councils and planners just use there heads

We don't need this App or any of the others that have gone before it, we already have the answer.

https://c2.staticflickr.com/4/3698/12906206594_3ab3839c14_c.jpg

Sometimes the simplest answer is the best.

Edit:
Note to planners. We want to go everywhere that it is possible to go, your job is to make it so.

Better still..... Get the planners on to bikes and make them ride on the roads they're planning. They'll soon get the idea, first hand. The survivers can then design a proper road infrastructure that's truly inclusive; and not just for cyclists either.

How about use Heatmaps from Strava? No need for another tracking app.

I gather that this has no financial strings attached?

TravelAI's belief is that transport authorities don't know where people ride

My belief is that that's because they don't particularly care.

TFL knew a lot of cyclists cycled through Kings Cross, they counted every cyclist as a fraction of a vehicle and told the road designers to ignore them. They narrowly avoided corporate manslaughter charges because of a loophole in the law.

We won't get anywhere until the planners recognise that traffic-smoothing = more traffic and less cyclists.