The City of Johannesburg is committed to become a cycle friendly city for all its residents. To promote cycling in the City, it will be hosting a whole week of exciting activities from 16 to 22 March 2015 in partnership with cycling stakeholders.

Events will include cycling activations in Orlando, Diepsloot, Braamfontein and Sandton CBD, a two day seminar on creating best practice cycling infrastructure, a national conference on creating cycling friendly cities and culminating on Sunday 22nd March with a third Freedom Ride, this time between Sandton, Alexandra and Houghton and surrounding suburbs.

This week-long cycling initiative follows from the two successful Freedom Rides held last year which attracted more than 5000 riders.

Reducing the City traffic congestion, making the city more eco-friendly through less carbon fumes in the air and encouraging a healthy life style amongst its residents, are just three of the important elements that cycling can bring to Joburg.

The City of Johannesburg wants to encourage more residents of Johannesburg to make use of cycle transport and use the cycle lanes that are being built in and around the city.

Cycle Jozi Week has been made possible through a partnership between key stakeholders including the Cycle Jozi Forum, Hollard Insurance, Qhubeka, the National and Provincial Departments of Transport and the Johannesburg Urban Cyclist Association.

The City encourages all cyclists, be they competitive or social, young and old, to take part in the various cycle events. The opening leg of the Cycle Jozi Week will be a 2.5 km ‘activation’ ride from Fourways towards Diepsloot on Monday, 16 March. The focus of this ride it to highlight safety issues especially for cyclists commuting from Diepsloot.

On Tuesday 17th February, learners and residents of Soweto will take to the newly constructed cycle lanes in Orlando. At lunch hour on Wednesday 18th March, cyclists will take to the streets of Braamfontein, on the newly constructed cycle lanes along the university corridor linking WITS and UJ campuses.  On Friday 20th March, #Decongest will be launching the ‘Cycle Fridays’ campaign for Sandton commuters and in the evening Critical Mass will take to the streets in the inner city.

The City of Johannesburg and its partners expect cycling enthusiasts to come out in numbers throughout the week, but none more so than at the final event of Cycle Jozi Week on Sunday, 22 March, known as the Freedom Ride. The Freedom Ride symbolically links up communities separated by apartheid – Sandton and Alexandra – and takes cyclists past the Mandela house in Houghton before going back to Sandton.

Registration for the Freedom Ride has already opened and more details can be found on www.freedomride.org.za or on the  FreedomRideJozi Facebook page.

Away from the saddle, the Cycle Jozi Week will also include several workshops and seminars.

A two-day SAICE Cycle Jozi Training Workshop for engineers and planners on designing cycling infrastructure will be held on 18-19 March.  On Friday, 20 March, the National Department of Transport and partners will host a National Cycle Cities Workshop to bring together planners and bicycle activists from around South Africa to share experiences.

Finally the City of Johannesburg will launch the Eco-Mobility World Festival (to be held in Johannesburg in October this year) during this week.

The Cycle Jozi Week is another world-class initiative actioned by the City of Johannesburg, in a bid to bring about a better life for those who live in and around the city.

For further information, find attached the Cycle Jozi Week Programme HERE