Skopje’s Persistent Cyclists Challenge City’s Car Culture

This time, however, the group ride in Skopje took place under the slogan "Bicycle City in A Dumpster" - in protest against a controversial recent decision of the city authorities to replace the big dumpsters that were already hampering bicycle traffic on city boulevards with even bigger ones.

"Our basic goal, to incentivise people to use bicycles, has been accomplished. Skopje is full of bikes, even in winter, when the morning temperatures are around zero degrees," Darko Arsovski, one of the activists from the "Na Tocak" initiative, said.

"Now we are investing our time and effort in changing laws and practices in the city, something that will stay as a legacy, force the institutions to conduct themselves properly and prevent the placing of dumpsters on cycling lanes."

Despite frequent setbacks, such as the placing of the new mega-dumpsters, cycling campaigners in the city have already achieved good results. They have caught the authorities' attention, which has resulted in various concrete actions being done to improve the cycling trails network.

Challenging the car culture:

Spread in a predominantly flat basin along the Vardar River and endowed with plenty of wide, straight boulevards, built mostly in the 1970s and 1980s, Skopje has almost perfect conditions for biking as a means of transport that can seriously compete with cars.

But cyclists say the existing bike trails are still not connected into one logical network that would allow for a carefree commute.

"Even those [trails] that do exist are often riddled with street signs, traffic lights or advertisement posts, dumpsters, parked vehicles, or have been usurped in other ways," Arsovski said.

"This exposes us to risks. We often have to circle...