Lima bike ways… A symbol of great cycling infrastructure need & enormous lack of road culture; that worthwhile to construct, take care & maintain them.
Information revealed by Latina Noticias, it was known that until 2023, Lima had 201 miles of bike ways. These are used for 102,000 cyclists per day to go to work, schools or to transport to any place.
Unfortunately, their users report that at least, exist 6.2 miles of path that had disappeared for complete. This is due these are constantly invaded by cars, are destroyed or used as trashcan.
All this impedes the cyclists’ passage in many bike ways of Lima. They mention that tire puncture is constant or ironically that is safer going by avenue than by the bike route. This isn’t protecting them from being run over.
An example of those are the tracks on San Miguel district, avenues Túpac Amaru, between Rímac & San Martín de Porres. However, is estimated that these sections will be demolished and a new project will be constructed over them.
Lima bike ways, with help and without help
In 2022, the Ministry of Transport and Communications participated in the Intergovernmental Negotiation about the Cooperation for the Development between Perú and Germany. The agreement was for German government to donate 24 million of euros to plan and implement different bike ways in intermediate cities of Peru.
The intention is help to reduce the greenhouse gases caused by the use of motorized vehicles. Instead, considers to prioritize sustainable mobility.
However, in May of this year, German ministry, Christian Lindner, commented that Lima bikeways won’t receive more support from their government. This is due there was a disagreement among German citizens, who required to use the money for their own country.
“We can’t keep paying every bike way in Perú with the money of German contributors”, indicated in an interview with ZDF.
However, a couple days after their declaration, German embassy in Perú reaffirmed that their support will continue with the project of bike ways. The purpose, mentioned, is “to ease the mobility of all sectors of population and reduce negative effects of environmental pollution”.
The biggest bike way of Lima, one of the greatest garbage dumps
Lima has a great bike way of more than 8.6 miles of length. In this bike way, transit more than 200 cyclists per day. Unfortunately, this doesn’t mean is the best cycle route to ride on it.
It’s a bike way of Universitaria avenue that cover 5 states: San Miguel, Cercado de Lima, San Martín de Porres, Los Olivos & Comas. Besides of the Universitaria, Carlos Izaguirre, Tomás Valle, Argentina, Óscar Benavides and Avenida Venezuela.
Unfortunately for cyclists, the biggest bike way of Lima is also one of the greatest landfills. Bike users report that, since 2020, adjacent inhabitants throw a great quantity of waste to paths, that neither garbage truck clean.
This situation gets worse with the years, over all since 2023. From that moment, we can observe how cyclists must drive in the middle of the garbage, from food, plastic bags, gravel, and other waste.
Lima bike ways, looking a better road culture
As we can see, road culture also depends on the external factors. In this last case, the Universitaria bike way is undermined for the supposed lack of sanitary services, as the passage of garbage truck.
Of course, this shouldn’t be an excuse for neighbors or strangers to dump their garbage in the middle of the bike route (or another place). However, for this situation to maintain like this since 2020, talks about the zero importance of certain governments to maintain in good conditions their bike ways.
Maybe German government don’t suspend their support for complaints of their citizens, but for the way Lima citizens & authorities treat their cycling lanes.
Is not about construct cycle paths just like that. After the construction of one, this must receive constant and permanent maintenance. Likewise, set it in key zones that demonstrate functionality for all the society or at least for a majoritarian sector.
