The journal “Transportation,” has published an article examining the extent to which work-related factors influence, (1) whether an individual decides to cycle to work, and (2) whether an individual cycles to work every day.

The authors hypothesize that office culture and colleagues’ and employers’ attitudes – manifest in the provision of cycling facilities and financial compensation schemes – would significantly influence both decisions.  The authors then conducted a survey in four Dutch cities with over 4,000 respondents. The results suggest that the following factors increase the likelihood of being a commuter cyclist:

• A positive attitude towards cycling
• Colleagues’ expectations that an individual will cycle to work
• The presence of interior bicycle storage
• Access to clothes-changing facilities
• The need for a bicycle during office hours

 The presence of facilities for other transportation modes, an increase in the commute distance, and the need to transport goods, in turn, reduce the chance that an individual will cycle to work.

Cycling to work every day, on the other hand, was shown to be negatively affected by an increase in commute distance, provision of a free public transportation pass, and provision of automobile parking by the employer.

Readers should be aware that model parameters used to analyze survey data are based on Dutch cities.  These parameters would need to be re-estimated for the Chicago region.