Social Cycling: Exploring the Use of Social Networks to Overcome Barriers to Cycling

Mechanisms to encourage the use of cycling for transport tend to focus heavily in the areas of infrastructure provision and education. While necessary components of the cycling environment, such efforts may not adequately address person-level barriers to cycling participation, such as lack of adequate information, discomfort with being in an unfamiliar environment, or feeling outside of the cycling “community.” Cycling Social Networks (CSN) have been proposed as mechanisms to overcome some of these barriers, as they provide both a repository of information for the interested party, as well as facilitating on- and off-line social connections that may contribute to overcoming some individual barriers. In this paper, the authors report on the findings of two surveys – one general population, and one directed towards users of The Chainlink, a Chicago-based CSN – to assess the potential for such networks to serve as mechanics for fostering ongoing and sustained use of cycling