Some Remarks on Soft Mobility: A New Engineered Approach to the Cycling Infrastructure Design

Worldwide, countries are working to reorganize transport networks by promoting a new form of mobility that is sustainable and healthy for citizens. The task assigned to the designers is to create interconnected, safe, attractive and comfortable routes so that users begin to change their habits by favoring modal shift to sustainable transport. In this paper, a preliminary procedure is defined for the design of the different types of cycling routes based on area’s characteristics and, above all, cycling flows. An original estimation method for the cycling flow has been proposed that allows a refined safety-oriented cycling infrastructure design. Once that the design interventions have been defined, through a benefit-cost analysis and with the help of technical guides, it is possible to evaluate optimal cycling infrastructure layouts on the examined urban road network.