BERLIN Swaddled in sweaters and Gore-Tex, Peter Neubert is one of the few, brave cyclists youll meet on Berlin streets during the bitter winter months.

Come snowstorms or slushy streets, the teacher is pedaling to work.

Biking is faster and healthier, he says. And thats why I ride, regardless of the weather.

In Germany, a country known for its car industry, Berlin is taking steps to better its air quality and its citizens health by building 12 new bike superhighways that will connect the city with its suburbs. Other parts of the ambitious plan involve making parts of the city off limits to cars, and erecting barriers between bike paths and car lanes.

It will alter the streetscape forever, says Denis Petri, an activist who helped get the bike plan adopted. After a referendum last year that drew 100,000 signatures, officials took note.

The law is a mammoth task for the city, says Petri, who expects that the plan will be finalized this spring and then gradually implemented. Should it take longer, we will raise the public pressure.

As Germany tackles the global problem of air pollution, other cities in the country are looking to Berlin for inspiration. As much as 92 percent of the worlds population lives in places where air quality levels exceed the World Health Organization limits, and air pollution kills as many as 6.5 million people around the world every year. Poor people, especially in Southeast Asia and the Western Pacific regions, are most affected, according to WHO .

Mayors in Europe have pledged to lower air pollution in their cities. In March, Anne Hidalgo, the mayor of Paris, and Sadiq Khan, the mayor of London, announced a system to assess new cars based on their real-world emissions and their impact on air quality, in order to combat air pollution.

In Berlin, reducing air pollution is part of the goal for activists, but so is health and safety. Of 40 cities, the German Cyclists Association recently rated Berlin fourth-worst for biking, according to the newspaper Deutsche Welle .

I wish that cyclists could go through Berlin without being honked at or being driven around, says Lara Eckstein. Unfortunately, I experience that on my way to work.

She bikes every day from Neukln to the city center and back. The route goes over the Moritzplatz subway station through narrow, crowded roads and main streets, jostled by cars and small trucks.

That is around four miles, and only a small portion is on bike paths the only stretches on which I feel safe, Eckstein says.

The 27-year-old works for the Cyclist Lobby Association, and can hardly wait until the new law takes effect. I hope that, at the latest, in five years everyone can feel safe on a bike in Berlin.

Eighty percent of households in Berlin already own at least one bicycle. But unlike Copenhagen, where bikes outnumber cars and investment in bicycle infrastructure has long been an integral part of urban planning, Berlin has traditionally spent little public money on bicycle traffic.

Berlin spends around $4.65 per citizen per year on bicycle infrastructure. Cities such as Copenhagen, Amsterdam, Madrid, Barcelona, London and Paris generally spend $18 to $24 per citizen, according to Petris group , which helped organize the referendum.