David Hembrow, maker of beautiful wicker baskets, including ones for the Brompton (available at our store), has moved to the Netherlands last year. He has sent this report, counterbalancing our adulatory obituary of Hans Mondemann:

I feel the English speaking (and possibly other) countries have far more interest in these schemes than they should have. This, sadly, seems to be particularly true of cyclists in those countries, even though they have the most to lose.

His schemes are not nearly as popular here, where people have experienced them, as they are overseas where people generally have not.

We have a few Shared Space areas in Assen. Personally I avoid them as they offer the least pleasant cycling conditions in the city. New plans in he city are not for this kind of road, but for more traditional Dutch fully segregated paths.

I’m not alone in finding these ideas to be a problem. Back in November, the Fietsersbond newsletter was critical of these schemes as exposing cyclists to additional danger and causing people not to cycle. They described them as merely an “architects dream”, say that they encourage bullying by drivers and bemoan that people are put of
cycling due to them.

Virtually all references to shared space which are written in Dutch include at least some critical comments. e.g. the following:

On this page Hans acknowledges that he has been the subject of hype, and the feedback is from someone who lives in one of the towns where he lives and who doesn’t much like what has happened to it “Not everyone is so enthusiastic about Monderman’s ideas” “I live in Haren… now many residents find the situation is not so safe”:

Or this obituary in a quality national newspaper, which also includes negative comments in the 4th paragraph: “But there are also criticisms heard. Not all drivers like cyclists on the road…”

It is normally very rare to see cyclists riding on pavements over here, but that’s what you see where these schemes exist.

In some situations these things might work. I think the initial success is due merely to the novelty of it all, which soon wears off and results in “might is right” taking over the roads.

Last Sunday I rode to Oosterwolde, a “Shared Space” town, to take some photos of what a whole-hearted use of these principles results in.

It was very like entering a typical English market town. Just after the town name sign I found myself leaving the (excellent) cycle path I’d been on for the 25 km ride to Oosterwolde and found myself on a road with speeding cars passing much too close. At a huge open square I had to accelerate rapidly to get out of the way of a van which
emerged from a side street at considerable speed. Not pleasant at all!

On the other hand, this is a more normal Dutch city centre, served by high quality segregated cycle paths:

Guess which location has more cyclists in it.

I’d really like to see the hyping of these ideas calm down a little so that we can get back to trying to promote real safe conditions for cyclists.

I’m sorry to hear of the death of Hans Monderman, but let’s not make him a saint.

Image courtesy of Henry Cutler, who has recently posted this Japanese video of pavement surfing (no bikes involved)