Our first InnoFriday was successfully held on 24 July at The Good Lab. It was our pleasure to have invited Mr Zenda Kwok and Mr Ka Leung Chan from the Hong Kong Cycling Alliance to be our guest speakers and to discuss with us the role of cycling in urban sustainable development.

With an aim to explore the impacts of climate change, Zenda rode from UK to Hong Kong for over 30,000 km and helped to raise funds for UNICEF. Zenda selected children as his target group for fund raising because he thought children in developing countries suffer most in natural disasters caused by climate change, such as the loss of schooling opportunities and the shortage of food supply in the aftermath of climate disasters. Zenda aimed to complete his trip with minimum cost and resources. To achieve this, he even collected aluminum cans for recycling along his way in Europe to make extra money for his venture. Zenda himself is a vegetarian, and the completion of his trip serves as a solid evidence to break the misconception that vegetarians are physically less strong because they do not eat meat. The cyclist further encouraged our audience to adopt a less-meat-more-veggie diet.

As a member of the Hong Kong Cycling Alliance, Ka Leung Chan chooses to travel green by riding his bike wherever possible in his daily life. He encouraged the audience to commute by cycling, an efficient means of transport with no carbon emission, which also saves time, money and builds up body strength.  Referencing on bike-friendly cities in foreign countries, Zenda and Ka Leung shared with the audience examples of measures and facilities that encourage the public to take the bikes to reduce carbon emissions generated by urban transportation. Ka Leung even offered to design a point-to-point commuting route between home and office for those who are interested to cycle in the city.

As our city is getting hotter and hotter under the effects of climate change, would “green transport”, such as commuting by bikes, be one of the solutions to our Challenge Question #4: How to improve the comfort level of city living despite urban warming? We welcome anyone with a passion for this subject to join our InnoTeam for further brainstorms and solution suggestions!