Researchers around the world use many different ways to measure how easy it is to get around by bike — but these approaches often don’t line up. As a result, it’s hard to compare findings across studies, which can blur the bigger picture at a time when promoting active transport has never been more urgent. To help bring some clarity to the field, our study reviews existing ideas and methods for assessing cycling accessibility and translates them into a clearer, more consistent model. We refined and tested an existing cycling accessibility index across three cities, looking at six key aspects — from the types of destinations people cycle to, to how distances and neighbourhood boundaries are measured, and how these factors affect results. We also compared our findings with real cycling ridership data. The outcome is a more streamlined, transferable index that uses improved destination data and simpler distance measures.

To cite:

Scott N. Lieske, Lihong Zhang, Simone Z. Leao, Dorina Pojani, Richard J. Buning. 2025. Clarifying bicycling accessibility. Journal of Transport Geography, 129:104450, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jtrangeo.2025.104450.