Counts
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Bike counts are an important tool to help you manage your development of bike riding. Other stakeholders may refer to these statistics to help justify investment in cycling infrastructure and inititiatives.
- Can you make the counts a regular/annual program?
- Are you counting only or gathering other data (type of rider, male/female, etc)
- Are you doing multiple sites? If so they should be done concurrently to ensure accurate comparison.
- Location. Measure the most popular routes. However a route may have low numbers because it is currently unattractive to riders. If new facilities are planned, a before and after count is useful. Don't assume one point along a path/road encapsulates the whole route as riders may deviate.
- Time. Consider when you want to count (daylight/night), school/public holidays, day of the week. (The VicRoads loops appear to show that rider numbers are lower on Mondays and Fridays)
- Weather conditions. You need to note weather conditions as cold, dark and rain will temporarily reduce rider numbers.
- One offs. Tram strikes, petrol price rises, path collapses and other one off events can throw out a count.
Bicycle Victoria use a count sheet to record the data. Counters will print this count sheet to take with them to their count site. The counters should look at the count sheet before they head down to their site in order to make sure they understand how it works.
Each count sheet has a diagram of an intersection or count site. The diagram has a north arrow so the counters can line up the map correctly. The numbered arrows on the attached example indicate the different movements that can be made by cyclists in the intersection. Depending upon the type of intersection there could be up to 12 movements or as little as two movements.
The counter needs to fill in the tables on the top left of the count sheet including the date and weather.
Once they have finished their count the counters then enter the details back onto the original excel document.
The City of Yarra now benefits from a three year counting program which shows routes rising and falling in popularity as well as the recent boom.
Yarra City Council Counts (PDF 6467 bytes)
In November 2005 VicRoads installed 17 permanent inductive loops on the off-road path network around Melbourne. See here for more information.
Bicycle Victoria are interested in any data that you may collect. Please forward this to the Facilities and Development team.
