The purpose of this paper is to enhance the understanding of cyclists’ speed on pedestrian and cycle paths and to understand how cyclists adapt their speed to other road users and the surrounding environment. The paper is based on a study where three different data sources were used: existing measurements of cycle speed and flow in three different Swedish municipalities, Eskilstuna, Linköping and Stockholm (19 sites); new measurements of cycle speed and flow in Linköping (4 sites) and Stockholm (1 site); and road side observations of bicycle types at these five sites.

The average speed of cyclists on the paths varied between 15 and 25 kilometres per hour. As expected, the lower average speeds were found in uphill directions, near intersections and on paths with high pedestrian flows. The higher speeds were found in downhill directions and on commuter routes. In all, 70–95 percent of the road users observed on pedestrian and cycle paths were cyclists while 5–30 percent were pedestrians. The most common type of bicycle used was a comfort bike, followed by a trekking bike. Electric assisted bicycles and racer bikes occurred at all sites, with a proportion of 1–10 percent and 1–15 percent, respectively. The relationship be-tween bicycle type and measured speed was not entirely clear, but the paths with higher pro-portions of electric and racer bikes generally had higher speeds. There also appears to be a con-nection between average speed and the width of the distribution – the higher the average speed, the wider the speed distribution. More research is needed on how this affects the accident risk.