[Bicycling photo from shield on Flickr used without permission]
“The Australian car industry is reeling from a dramatic slump in sales, with petrol-price conscious consumers turning in massive numbers from locally made vehicles to smaller imports and bicycles.
Sales of Australian-made cars collapsed from almost 250,000 in 2005 to just 201,623 last year ? a drop of almost 20 per cent, according to preliminary figures released by the Federal Chamber of Automotive Industries.
For those in the bike business, however, it’s a different story, with bicycle sales out-stripping vehicle sales for the seventh consecutive year last year, according to the Cycling Promotion Fund.
Australian bike sales extended their lead over cars for 2006, with almost 1.3 million sold. Cool, lots of hard rubbish when I get back!
CPF spokesman Ian Christie said bike sales had extended their lead on car sales by 300,000 last year ? a sales edge that comfortably exceeds the total sales of market-leader Toyota.
Bicycle Victoria facilities development manager Jason Denhollander (Dutchy been busy?) said the increase was due to a combination of elements.
“There is no one silver bullet to it, it’s a mix of rising petrol prices, people finding public transport more crowded and health and fitness,” he said.
Mr Denhollander said latest Bicycle Victoria figures showed there was a 15 to 20 per cent increase on the number of cyclists entering the CBD between 7am and 9am compared with a year ago.
“That increase would represent about an extra 500 cyclists entering the city,” he said.
Mr Denhollander said cyclist numbers usually dropped 30 to 40% in winter, but that was not the case last year. “In the heart of this winter we had the same numbers as we would have in the peak months of November and March,” he said.“
Pity the Age article didn’t come with that photo!
Yes, well, their art editor isn’t as cool as me.
Possibly also some law about nicking people’s photos for mass publication too..