City cycling in the Fünfseenland: Starnberg takes 12th place, but where are the cycle paths?

City cycling in the Fünfseenland: Starnberg takes 12th place, but where are the cycle paths?

Cycling is very important in the Starnberg district! The “City Cycling” campaign has become increasingly popular since it was launched in the Five Lakes Region. District Administrator Stefan Frey had set himself an ambitious goal for this year's competition: one million kilometers should be cycled. But the weather thwarted his plans. Despite the adverse conditions, the almost 4,200 participants from 14 municipalities achieved a total of 729,118 kilometers and thus secured twelfth place in a Bavaria-wide comparison.

The municipality of Gilching was particularly active, collecting the most cycling kilometers with 170,739 kilometers. The neighboring municipalities of Gauting and Starnberg were also impressive and drove 116,945 km and 95,702 km respectively. While general satisfaction with the cycling infrastructure and cycle paths in the Five Lakes Region definitely needs to be improved, participants really enjoy exploring the landscape on two wheels.

Active and ambitious

The aim for next year is an even larger number of participants of 5,100 and a total distance of 846,138 kilometers. We can do that! In the race for the most active municipalities, Weßling stood out with an impressive 12.2 kilometers of cycling per resident, followed by Gilching with 8.8 km and Herrsching with 5.5 km. The campaign was supplemented by ratings in various categories such as companies, clubs and even schools, which made the whole commitment even more colorful.

Particularly noteworthy is the school cycling campaign, which took place parallel to the city cycling. Here, 12 schools with a total of 2,069 participants cycled an impressive 218,200 kilometers. The Arnoldus primary school in Gilching was proudly awarded the title “School with the most cycle kilometers” (76,059 km), while the Otto-von-Taube-Gymnasium in Gauting won the “School with the most active” category with 765 participants.

Together for better cycle paths

The district office not only supports the campaign organizationally, but is also actively committed to closing gaps in the cycle path network. An important point, because cycling in the region could be made even more attractive. Anyone who would like to capture their most beautiful cycling moments could submit them during the competition and thereby contribute to the visibility of the campaign. The results and the best impressions can be found on the district office website and on social media.

Another interesting aspect of cycling research is the BIKE MONITOR, a paid service for recording and processing cycling data. Although the participation fees for city cycling do not cover these expenses, the Hessian municipalities are able to access this offer free of charge thanks to special funding from the Hessian Ministry. You can read more about this here.

Overall, the city cycling campaign in the Starnberg district shows how much progress cycling has made in the region and how much potential there is still in improving the cycling infrastructure. So it will be exciting to see how the numbers will develop next year!