World Bicycle Day on 3 June: cycling is fun, promotes health and helps protect the environment
All IT’S MY BIKE employees are coming to work on their bike today to celebrate World Bicycle Day together. Thirteen out of the total twenty employees make the climate-friendly choice of riding their bike to the office on a daily basis, not just on action days. The others use public transport or drive their conventional or electrically driven cars. IT’S MY BIKE employees cover an average of 813 km per week on their bikes, including leisure activities. The team thus saves almost 5,000 kilograms of greenhouse gases every year. That is equal to almost half of Germany’s annual per capita CO2 emissions.
“This may seem like a drop in the ocean, at first glance,” says Jürgen Veith, IT’S MY BIKE CEO. “But the more people switch to bikes, the more CO2 emissions we save. I personally use my bike every day to make my small contribution to bringing about the transition to sustainable transport. There are a whole host of reasons why the team uses a bike. Moritz Mair, the person responsible for system integration at IT’S MY BIKE, uses the ride to and from the office to relax and reduce stress. “Time and cost savings, fitness and climate protection also play a role,” he adds. Chief Technology Officer Felix Letkemann thinks “cycling is really fun and healthy” and only drives his car for very long distances.
To show the contribution that cycling makes to global climate protection, the IT’S MY BIKE app allows e-bike riders to calculate how much CO2 they save compared to using a car. This is based on average consumption in the EU (currently 127 grams of CO2 per kilometre according to a German Federal Ministry of the Environment study).
Third World Bicycle Day
First launched as European Bicycle Day im 1998, the United Nations officially declared 3 June as World Bicycle Day in April 2018. The UN seeks to use this day to highlight how important the bicycle is for people’s health, quality of life in cities and the climate worldwide. Many users on social networks commit to using a bike on this day every year, sharing how they spend the day and where they are currently riding their bike under the hashtag #WorldBicycleday.