In urban planning applications, it is more feasible to modify conditions at the neighborhood level than at the regional level because these micro-environmental factors are relatively small-scaled environmental factors and potentially influenced by individuals or local actors. Micro-environmental factors, however, can be defined as specific characteristics of environmental features within a streetscape such as evenness cycle path surface, vegetation and speed limits. Macro-environmental factors are essentially beyond the influence of individuals and even for governments and nongovernmental organizations it is usually difficult to modify large existing structural features. These factors may be difficult to change in existing neighborhoods, because of their size and complexity and moreover because this would require a strong collaboration between regional authorities. Macro-environmental factors can be defined as the more “raw” urban planning features such as street network density, residential density and land use diversity. Ĭharacteristics of the physical environment can be classified into two broad categories: macro- and micro-environmental factors. Previous studies already indicated that the physical environment appears to be an important contributor to encourage bicycle transport among middle-aged adults. home, neighborhood), including aspects of urban design, traffic density and speed, distance to and design of venues for physical activity (e.g., parks), crime and safety”. The physical environment can be defined as “the objective and perceived characteristics of the physical context in which people spend their time (e.g. Environmental interventions and policies targeting the physical environment, can reach large populations over long periods of time and encourage more bicycling and less reliance on the car. One long-term approach to do this involves changes to the physical environment to make it more supportive of bicycling. Because of these benefits, communities should encourage people to cycle on a regular or daily basis. In addition, active transport has many other positive economic, social, environmental and traffic management effects. Prospective observational studies demonstrated a strong inverse relationship between bicycle transport and all-cause mortality, cancer mortality, and cancer morbidity among middle-aged participants. Cross-sectional studies indicated that bicycle transport is associated with higher general physical activity levels and lower body weight in adults. Bicycle transport is an accessible, economic, social, and environmentally sustainable form of physical activity, easy to integrate into adults’ daily routines and moreover has the potential to increase physical activity levels in European adults. In Flanders (Belgium), more than 70% of these trips (≤ 3 km) are currently done using passive transport.

In the European Union, there is a significant unfulfilled potential to increase bicycling behavior of the population, since 50% of all trips are shorter than 3 kilometers, a distance which can be cycled in 10 minutes. Globally, 31% of adults aged 15 years or older are insufficiently physically active,, which is reflected in the rapidly increasing prevalence of inactivity-related health problems.

Micro environment factors