New York Times' Battle of the Bike Lanes

I am traveling during the holidays, so I am just now catching up on some of my reading. Just before Christmas, the New York Times hosted an interesting five-way debate on the Bike Lanes of New York. It is about New York, but the issues really are universal.

Sam Staley calls bike lanes A Subsidy for the Few:

The hard, cold December reality of bike lanes in U.S. cities is that they will inevitably be a small part, even tiny part in most cases, of America's solution to congestion and mobility. Bike networks represent concentrated, subsidized benefits for a small portion of the commuting public.

Right. And roads, police enforcement, defence of international flow of oil and externalities like 40,000 killed in cars every year get no subsidy at all. But fortunately it gets better:

Alex Marshall thinks there are Better Ways to Help Bike Transit.

Promote biking on regular streets, and thus avoid "ghettoizing" cyclists into bike lanes. One problem now is that the bike lanes are usually put on larger streets and avenues, which means that cyclists are mixing with higher speed traffic and higher volumes of traffic. One solution is to make clear that bikes are appropriate on most city streets, even those without bike lanes.

Robert Sullivan sarcastically points out The Car Culture's Blind Spots:

On the idea that bikes ultimately can't coexist in a city with trucks and traffic, that restaurants and stores can't get goods: Too true! Moreover, what are we doing allowing those concrete swaths in that area between where cars drive and where the buildings are? Sidewalks, I think they call them. People really slow things down. Can they be put underground, or some kind of special lanes?

Caroline Samponaro claims that bike lanes are Creating Order Out of Chaos.

Last year, more than 75,000 motor vehicle crashes occurred on city streets and fewer than 4 percent involved a bicycle. Bike lanes make streets safer for pedestrians and drivers. It's the streets without bike lanes that New Yorkers should be worried about.

Felix Salmon, who is becoming one of my favourite writers, asks, Can We Please Be Patient?

Take a New Yorker, put her on a bike in Berlin, and she'll behave perfectly well, stopping at lights along with everybody else, and riding in the right direction on the street. It's not the people who are the real problem, it's just how those people behave when they're on the streets of New York.

Eventually, given time, New Yorkers will learn that a bike lane is not a convenient empty spot in which to park a baby. Cyclists will learn that it's unacceptable to ride the wrong way down the street. And drivers will learn to look first, before they turn left across a bike lane. But getting there from here is bound to be awkward and painful for many.

More in the New York Times

New Strap Lighting

Continuing my research on new safety features, and in this case bike lights, I turn my attention to the LBL (or Led by Lite). Unlike the recently released Fibre Flare and Bike Glow, the LBL, whilst also strip lighting, does not use a tube through which light is directed. Instead it comprises four straps of silicone encased light emitting diodes (LEDs) for each of the bicycle's forks. The fledging company, who plan to start selling their lights in early 2011, reckon their system is the first 360° light systems for bikes.

Nine red LEDs on each rear fork is partnered with 12 white LEDs on each front fork, and when seem from a distance the two light straps merges together giving very noticeable illumination fore and aft. Led by Lite claim that light is cast 60ft to the front and 40ft sideways.

Power is provided by 12 volt battery pack with options of rechargeable lithium (to retail for about  $145, or via a AA battery array, which is expected to cost $100).

The straps fit onto clips which are velcroed to the forks, and the battery pack mounts under the bike seat/saddle. It looks like it might be a tad fiddly to remove all the various components, if you lock your bike to public bike parking for any length of time, to overcome theft. But maybe it is easier in real life than suggested by watching the promotional video.

The silicone encased LED straps are waterproof, but I'm not sure about the battery pack assembly.
However, the LBL looks like a bicycle lighting system worth keeping an eye on.

Bike/Ped Culture is Thriving in the Steel City

This video by StreetFilms gives an excellent overview of Pittsburgh's bike culture and infrastructure. Having only visited there several years ago, and because Pittsburgh isn't as well covered by the national media, I had no idea that it was so vibrant and healthy. It's a nice surprise! Make sure to check out Bike Pittsburgh (become a member, or at least say "hello" on the message board). Pittsburgh has a growing movement for better bicycling and more livable streets. Among the cool things you’ll see…

• A newly renovated and pedestrianized Market Square, where two cross streets were eliminated to create a better place for people. The experts at Project for Public Spaces helped consult on the project.
• A morning commuter breakfast with the folks at Bike Pittsburgh, where they got to talk to cyclists about what they like about their city, and what could use some improvement.
• An unusual bike parking facility that uses retro-fitted shipping containers and is operated by a public-private partnership. For just $100 you can safely park your bike indoors for a year.
• The Over the Bar Cafe — a unique bicycle-themed restaurant serving great food and drink, and a frequent meeting place for rides and advocacy events. The walls are filled with cycling memorabilia and adorned with murals.

Munich Using a Marketing Campaign to Improve Bike Usage

Munich proves, not only by providing more bike lanes, a positive campaign will improve bike usage. Check the video:

Zip Tie-Snow Tire Chains!

Since I ride predominately in Florida, and definitely not in snow, I have never thought too much about the implications of riding on snow and ice. I saw this post on Dutch Bike and had to share it. One of the cyclists at Dutch Bike Co was caught without studded tires when it started snowing in Seattle, but no matter, that's nothing that a box of zip ties can't fix! This MacGyver trick isn't new, but now that winter is here, it's worth bringing up once more.


Fritz Rice, the DIYer on these photos, says that while the ties look "completely ludicrous", they work "beautifully":

I can accelerate, brake, and corner with aplomb, even on the vile snowpack/sheet ice mix the plows leave in the bike lanes. The zip ties dig nicely into the hardest packed surfaces, but they're thin enough not to bounce the bike around at low speed or on short pavement sections.

As you can see on this last photo, the tie heads as position so that they give extra grip when you are cornering, but they stay out of the way when going in a straight line. Just make sure you have enough clearance on all sides.

Via DutchBikeCo

New York Bike Counts Continue to Grow

Another year, another double-digit increase in New York City’s cyclist count. NYDOT estimates that the number of cyclists riding into the center of the city jumped up 13 percent in 2010, continuing a three-year pattern of rapid growth [PDF].

In terms of absolute growth, 2010 marks the third-largest increase in the number of cyclists counted since DOT began counting in 1986. Only 2008 and 2009 showed larger gains, according to DOT, of 32 and 26 percent respectively. This year’s 13 percent jump is on top of that rapid growth. In total, the bike count is up 88 percent in the last three years.

So what has changed in the city that would spur this growth? I would hypothesize that the city's investment in bicycle and pedestrian infrastructure has been the most determining factor. According to Streetsblog, "As the city continues to build out its biking network and add a bike-share system, we are certain that more New Yorkers will choose this affordable, healthy and non-polluting form of transportation."

In Toronto, the new Mayor thinks roads belong to trucks and cars, and thinks bike lanes slow them down. He calls bike lanes and streetcars a "war on the car." In fact, in many cases, a person on a bike might otherwise be taking up road space in a car. Car people often preach that bikes are a hazard, that they don't pay their way and that they should be licenced, and their riders should be insured, just like people in cars. In London, Peter Walker of the Guardian explains why this would be pointless and counterproductive.
First, Walker explains the benefits of cycling, not for cyclists but for society in general:

Cycling and cyclists are good for society; good for everyone, in fact. You might not like our funny, Lycra-wearing ways, but it's an undeniable truth. If 50% of a hypothetical city's car drivers abandoned their vehicles overnight for bikes it would slash pollution and congestion (for the remaining drivers, too), also bringing less wear to the roads and better health for the new cyclists. It would additionally, at a stroke, dramatically cut the numbers of people killed or badly hurt on the roads, saving millions of pounds and - more importantly - reducing the number of lives lost or devastated through grief or grave injury.

He then points out that any impediment to cycling is going to reduce the number of people who do it.

Cycling's appeal is that it is gloriously simple and impulsive, a habit usually acquired in childhood. It's been shown time and again that even compulsory helmet wearing reduces cyclist numbers. Imagine what would happen if you introduced a registry of bikes and riders, which you'd need to make any licence and insurance scheme viable. Only the truly committed would trek to the test centre, fill in the forms for number plates and screw them onto the frame.

So in the end, if you want fewer cars on the road slowing you down, lower taxes for road maintenance, and reduced health care costs, what you want to do is build more bike lanes, promote cycling, subsidize bike share programmes and stop complaining about cyclists getting a free ride.

When asked "What came first, the bikes, or the bike lanes? Do bike facilities encourage people to bike? Or are they a response to increased demand after there are more bikes on the road?"

One good image from an newspaper article was posted at Modern Mechanix, showing that bike lanes existed in 1928. Below is this cool video telling the history of bike lanes, which explains how they date back to Napoleonic times.



The film explains that there were not a lot of roads in the Netherlands; the primary means of transport was by canal boat. Road building was tough in the soggy soil. Napoleon build a network of roads, but they deteriorated rapidly. When the bike came along, the Napoleonic roads were narrowed and given over to bikes. By 1905 there were strong rules to keep cars and carts off the bike lanes, and soon trees and hedges were planted between the bike paths and the new roads being built to accommodate the car.

So in fact, the bike lanes did come first. Copenhagenize posted a great series of historic photos showing masses of cyclists from the 30s into the 70s. While there was heavy bike traffic even on streets without bike lanes, it’s clear Copenhagen had bike lanes and sidepaths even in the 1930s.