Here are a few afternoon shots from a cycling life in the French city of La Rochelle. Regular people using bicycles to get around their city. Just the way it should be. La Rochelle is easily my favourite city in France. It was slow long before ‘slow’.
With all the hype about urban bike sharing and the Vélib/Velov/Bycyklen/Bicing/Bixi/etc/etc let’s send a warm thought to the forgotten city that started it all, shall we? La Rochelle, on the French Atlantic coast had a legendary mayor back in the 1970′s. One M Michel Crepeau. He was quite the urban planning revolutionary and the rest of France thought he was quite mad. At that time progress was defined in concrete and asphalt.
Inspired by Copenhagen, he created pedestrian streets in the city centre and, in 1974, he started a bike share programme. Both Amsterdam and Copenhagen flirted with bike share programmes back in the 60′s, but they didn’t last. La Rochelle was the first city to make it stick.
Now the city is further expanding its bicycle infrastructure and the number of cyclists in the city is exploding.
All age and wage brackets are doing it. In the summer in La Rochelle the city centre is shut off to traffic and the streets are filled with people promenading slowly about, watching street musicians and shopping for a good restaurant.
Just off the coast of La Rochelle is the island of Île de Ré, another must. The whole island is criss-crossed by separated bicycle lanes and you can happily pedal from town to town. Keep your eyes peeled since many French celebrities, including Sarko, have houses on the island.
