Number of cyclists tripled in Central Budapest in three years

The number of cyclists have tripled in three years, according to a bicycle traffic counting device installed in central Budapest's Museum Avenue, the Hungarian Cyclists' Club said on Friday.

The device installed with the help of donations from the community showed a total of 583,594 cyclists passing in the cycle lane in 2013, around three times as many as three years earlier, the club said. The daily record was broken several times last year, exceeding 3,000 in April and then 4,000 in June.

The first automatic cyclist traffic counting device in Hungary was installed in the summer of 2010 thanks to the help of the Critical Mass community, the Hungarian Cyclists' Club and private donations. A total of 1.275 million forints were collected for the project, the statement said.