Sunday, November 6, 2022

Cycling Downtown Cairo

 

Few days ago, I was thrilled watching with these tracks downtown Cairo.. Definitely; this project will launch other initiatives to catch up the global accelerated urbanity race.. Yet, the care should be given to the "imperfect technical" details that would attract negative response to a great effort.. Keep-on..!



It’s been ten days since the launch of Cairo Bike, Cairo’s first bike share system, and I have been reflecting on this journey. A journey that for me started with a question from an advisor at UC Berkeley, “what can you work on in Egypt now?” in a very judgmental tone- it was 2013 and the country was struggling post revolution. I said “ I will build bike lanes,” the influence of living in Berkeley and San Francisco had gotten to me. In 2014, I found my first partner for this journey, Rania Hedeya, UN Habitat Country Director, who not only bought my idea, but also became a champion. From there, it was an uphill battle, with some wins along the way, but truly with a lot of challenges. We were lucky enough to find a donor right away. Thanks to Wessam El Beih, Drosos has supported us this whole time. I also had the best team, Amira Badran,Yasmine Sabek, Eng Samy Abozeid, and the best consultants @Christropher Kost (ITDP), Nour ELDeeb El Deeb (ITDP) and @Mariam Sorour (ITDP), SETS International Hossam Abdelgawad, Ph.D. and Dr. Hoda Talaat, and Cluster, Omar Nagati and Hassan.

Bike sharing represents a strong threat to the business as usual model of mobility in Egypt. A model that is fixated on moving cars and vehicle level of service, and where people are an afterthought. The irony of this to me, but perhaps the biggest motivator, is that Egypt has very low car ownership. The average Egyptian is moving on foot or by public transport (a system that is need of a huge upgrade). For me, it was about adding one more mode for those women and men that I would see on the metro, absolutely squished, but nevertheless trying to get work, running errands, and going about their daily lives. What if for those trips that were below 5 km, we could provide a decent, high quality alternative: a bicycle. Many disagreed, feeling that bikes were a mode of the past, not of the future. Luckily, we had a champion in the governorate, Khalil Shaat, who fought side by side with us to change mindsets, and who taught me to always be optimistic despite being asked for another study to validate what we already knew. Today, the system is on the ground, and it feels like a dream come true. Yet, there is still so much to be done, and the success of the project will still be determined in the coming year as operations are smoothed out and as people take to the system.  Already we are seeing people walking or parking in the bike lanes, and I think we are sometimes quick to judge the citizen. In fact, people are walking the in the bike lane because the sidewalk is full of obstacles and is not wide enough. People are parking in the bike lane because behavior change takes time, and it won’t come without a consequence.

In 2021, I moved on, and since then Ahmed El-Dorghamy and Shaden Al Galaly El have continued to fight, advocate, and push. Abig thank you to them, and I wish them a lot of luck in the coming year as ensuring smooth operations of a bike share system is no piece of cake.

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