Oslo offered citizens up to 5,000 kroner per person to buy electric bikes. Here are the results of the campaign

In 2020, Oslo announced it would be paying citizens to use electric bicycles.

We spoke to Heidi Sørensen, director of the City of Oslo‘s Climate Agency, to learn more.

What are the project goals?

“1100 citizens of Oslo will receive a maximum of 5000 kroner if they buy an electric bicycle. Citizens could apply for the grant from December 7 until December 11.

“The goal was to give out grants for buying electric bicycles in a fair way. Oslo kommune had a similar grant in 2016, but some parts of the city received a majority of the grants.

“This time the grants were distributed among different parts of the city. The result was that the parts of the city that were least represented in 2016 got more grants this time.

“These are also the parts of the city were biking is less usual.”

Why is this project important?

“2020 showed a great increase in bicycle use in Oslo. Electric bicycles open the bike lanes for people who live too far from their job, school, etc to use a regular bike.

“When people are asked not to use public transportation, it is important that they have an environmentally friendly means of transportations they can use.”

How did citizens react?

“Most of the reactions were positive. A majority of the complaints we received were questions of why we had a limit of 1100 grants.

“We received almost 15,000 applications.”

Will the project be applied to other regions in Norway?

“We do not know of any regions that are planning to do this. However, Bergen had a similar grant earlier in 2020.”

Will the project be repeated?

“We do not have plans to repeat the project.”

Source: #Norway Today, #NorwayTodayNews

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