Bordeaux
Bordeaux’s cycling policy has been working across the board for calmer streets, steady network upgrades, and better parking and logistics. While recent years saw fewer major flagship projects, the coordinated, efficient approach is continuing to shape daily habits. Today, around 19% of workers commute by bicycle, evidence that consistent delivery is changing how the city is moving.
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Bordeaux has doubled down on traffic calming to promote a modal shift – nearly 90% of its streets are now limited to 30 km/h or less – ensuring that cyclists feel safer even in areas where full separation is sparse. While only a modest number of fully protected kilometres were added in recent years, ridership has grown on the back of a circulation plan that reallocates space and priority to bicycles. A showcase is the Quai des Queyries, where a former car service lane has been turned into a continuous cycle track framed and protected by greenery. The running development of the “Réseau Vélo Express” (ReVE) continues to close gaps in the cycling network, particularly along both banks of the Garonne River. The greatest achievement, the Simone Veil Bridge and its bidirectional cycle tracks, serves as an emblematic piece of its infrastructure. At a key point in the city, it is a milestone in the forthcoming completion of Bordeaux’s extensive bikeway in conjunction with its urban boulevards.
Beyond its network, Bordeaux is carefully crafting a complete cycling ecosystem. As safe and secure parking demands increase, “Bicycletteries” have been allocated to residents on the ground floor of buildings in the historic city-center. Four “Metstations” aim to reinvent the experience of bike parking with identity-rich facilities for cyclists. Bordeaux also fosters cargo bike uptake and urban cycle logistics. From waste and compost collection to artisan services and parcel delivery, cargo bikes have proved to be well suited to the compact, calmed street grid. Micro-logistics hubs and river-based freight pilots, with bicycles as the last-mile backbone, demonstrate a pragmatic, forward-looking approach that can tie everyday cycling to sustainable city operations.
“ Quietly but consistently, Bordeaux keeps momentum with a holistic strategy that is delivering a complete, efficient cycling system. ”
Bordeaux is still overly dependent on infrastructure types that are less favorable to cycling such as painted lanes and bus lanes open to bicycles on key parts of its network; the next step is to improve the quality of its facilities. The long-awaited redevelopment of the city’s boulevards provides the ideal opportunity to embed protected infrastructure, reallocate space to pedestrians and cyclists while developing a green corridor, and delivering a consistent standard that makes the whole network feel safer, coherent, and truly accessible.
