What prevents people from urban cycling? Investigating impacts of wind speed, car ownership, and public transport use in three European cities

This study examines the importance of factors related to weather and passive modes for everyday cycling in Tallinn (Estonia), Braga (Portugal), and Istanbul (Turkey) using data from a six-month cycling incentive program. We analyze weekly cycling frequency with mixed-effects ordinal probit models. For weather, we focus on wind speed, and for passive modes, we account for car ownership and public transport use. We find that, across all three cities, wind speed was negatively associated with cycling frequency, with estimated coefficients of −0.125 ( p < 0.001) in Braga, −0.079 ( p < 0.001) in Istanbul, and −0.058 ( p < 0.001) in Tallinn. Private car ownership was also negatively associated with cycling frequency, with coefficients of −0.423 ( p < 0.001) in Braga, −0.419 ( p < 0.001) in Istanbul, and −0.949 ( p < 0.001) in Tallinn, while public transport use was positively associated with cycling frequency across all three cities: 0.225 ( p -value = 0.003) in Braga, 0.339 ( p -value = 0.015) in Istanbul, and 0.714 ( p -value < 0.001) in Tallinn. These findings suggest that efforts to promote cycling could benefit from infrastructure that mitigates exposure to high winds and policies that reduce reliance on private cars.