BOGOTÁ, Colombia—At 4 a.m. on Sunday, Dec. 15, Jerson Osorio stood at the center of several thousand traffic signs, speed bumps, and hip-high yello

“We Build a New City Every Sunday”

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2024-12-22 19:00:03

BOGOTÁ, Colombia—At 4 a.m. on Sunday, Dec. 15, Jerson Osorio stood at the center of several thousand traffic signs, speed bumps, and hip-high yellow cones. Walkie-talkie in hand, earpiece firmly in place, phone buzzing with voice messages, Osorio surveyed a fleet of 33 box trucks backing in around this cluster of roadway equipment. A hundred workers in parkas and ruanas began to load the trucks, each one bound for a different section of the Colombian capital.

“We build a new city every Sunday,” his colleague Katherin Amaya Roa shouted over the clatter. From 7 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Sunday mornings, Bogotá draws more than 1.5 million people out into the streets to bike, walk, skate, and roll. Keeping 75 miles of asphalt free from cars for seven hours is the purpose of this weekly predawn hubbub, and every last item here has been meticulously ordered so that it can be dropped off, according to each intersection’s traffic pattern, from the back of an open truck.

The seven-hour respite from Bogotá’s notorious traffic and dirty air is called Ciclovía, and this chilly morning marked its 50th birthday. More than 400 cities have borrowed the idea, from Los Angeles to São Paolo to Addis Ababa. If you have ever walked on a car-free roadway in your city, you have walked in the long shadow of Bogotá’s Ciclovía.