Employees who ride their bike to work will be entitled to tax credits. Their employers will be required to provide them with showers in the workplace, and local authorities will create bike paths, according to a bill to encourage the use of bicycles that is being drawn up by MK Dov Khenin (Hadash), who chairs the Knesset environmental-social lobby.

Khenin touts bicycles as the best environment-friendly solution to urban transportation. Bike riding, he says, does not pollute the environment, promotes good heath and physical fitness, lightens traffic and decreases the need to earmark land for parking. In light of all of the above, he says, it is important to encourage the use of bicycles, and create appropriate infrastructure to this end.

"Nonetheless," says Khenin, "the state treats bicyclists as a public hazard, and the state government and most local authorities do nothing to increase use of bicycles in urban settings."