[sustran] Cooled Qatar Cycle Path Designed and ready for construction

Pascal van den Noort operations at velomondial.net
Wed Dec 6 18:33:30 JST 2006


Cooled Cycling Infrastructure


A cycling project which Qatar's sovereign Emir Hamad bin Khalifa al Thani
has proposed to promote the health of his people. After all, a large
proportion of the population suffers from problems brought on by prosperity:
they do not get enough exercise, cardiovascular diseases are prevalent and
children are obese. This is a prestigious project with Qatar as an example
to the countries in similar conditions! 

For people in Qatar cycling is not at all the obvious thing to do. This
needs to be changed as the 30 kilometer cycle path - now designed - is to be
completed within a year after the signing of the contract. An attendant
problem is the fact that Qatar's climate is intensely hot and humid. The
project group therefore came up with the idea of cooling the entire cycle
path using cold ground water. 

The American consultancy firm the Rand Corporation has been leading in
advising the Emir on the realisation of his goal of getting Qatars
population to cycle. Velo Mondial played a major role in the realization of
the cycle path and proposed to involve the Dutch firm Goudappel Coffeng for
the technical aspects. Another Dutch firm Akertech was involved in preparing
the technical drawings.

Velo Mondial was leading in preparing the report: 'Developing Bicycle Paths
in Doha, Qatar; A Plan to Promote Use of the Planned Bicycle Path in Doha'.
As part of the work to develop this plan, and with particular reference to
the training and promotion of cycling to Muslim women, we have discussed
existing best practice with projects working in these fields in Tilburg (NL)
and in the London Cycling Campaign. We would like to express our thanks to
Lucy Davis of the Community Cycling Project, London Cycling Campaign, UK,
Angela van der Kloof of 'Stap op de Fiets & Fietsvriendinnen', Tilburg, The
Netherlands, and Aziz Bekkaoui, Amsterdam.

The reports have been finalized November 2006. Please listen to this
Interview <http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=3326850694033482725>
with Adnan Rahman, project leader.

 

Pictures and more information:
http://www.velomondial.net/page_display.asp?pid=32 

 

 

Pascal J.W. van den Noort
Executive Director Velo Mondial
 <http://www.velomondial.net> www.velomondial.net  
 <http://www.velo.info> www.velo.info 
 <http://spicycles.velo.info> http://spicycles.velo.info
 <mailto:operations at velomondial.net> operations at velomondial.net   

+31206270675 landline +31627055688 mobile phone

 

 

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