Over the past decade, cities around the globe have embraced cycling like never before. Streets once dominated by cars are now alive with two-wheeled commuters, cargo bikes delivering goods, and families riding to school. The Copenhagenize Index, the most comprehensive ranking of urban cycling friendliness, evaluates 100 cities on how far they’ve gone to make cycling safe, convenient, and appealing—from protected lanes and bike boulevards to parking garages and bikeshare programs.

The Cycle to Work Scheme is an employee benefit scheme set up by the government in 1999 that enables employers to ‘hire’ bikes and safety equipment to employees through salary sacrifice.

The aim of the scheme is to get more people to commute to work by bike, promoting exercise while reducing pollution.

The authors of the study, which was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA, used data from Google to determine walking and cycling rates in 11,587 cities in 121 countries, a far larger sample size than in any previous research. Perhaps unsurprisingly, they found that cities with lots of cyclists and pedestrians tend to be dense and filled with bike lanes.

The authors also found that higher gas prices meaningfully increase national walking and cycling rates. “You need carrots and sticks,” says John Pucher, an emeritus urban transportation researcher at Rutgers University, who was not involved in the study. “You need incentives for cycling and walking [combined with] disincentives to car use.”

The source is primarily an analysis from Cambridge Mobile Telematics (CMT) detailing a "Road Risk Alert" that focuses on dangerous driving behaviors during the Thanksgiving travel period. This analysis, spanning data from 2022 to 2024, reveals a significant increase in both distracted driving (up 10.8%) and speeding (up 68%) on Thanksgiving Day compared to typical Thursdays. The report provides specific time frames when these risky behaviors peak, noting that speeding dramatically rises by 187% on Thanksgiving morning and distraction spikes during midday travel times. Additionally, the source examines risky driving on the Wednesday before and Friday after the holiday, concluding that both days also see increased danger, with speeding showing the largest surge. The end of the source includes contact information for CMT and a brief mention of a separate initiative with the Oklahoma Challenge to promote safe teen driving.

Excerpts from a live event at Town Hall Seattle featuring the creators of The War on Cars podcast and CityNerd, who were discussing their book, Life After Cars.

The evening's conversation, moderated by the executive director of Town Hall, Kate Nickel Keralo, and co-sponsored by the Cascade Bicycle Club, focused on urbanism, sustainable transportation, and promoting livable streets.

The speakers—Doug Gordon, Sarah Goodyear, and Ray Delahanti—expressed excitement about Seattle's progress in developing world-class bike infrastructure and encouraged the audience to continue engaging with advocacy organizations to support further improvements.