Transportation Alternatives - Bike Rules!

One of my biggest role models for advocacy has always been the Transportation Alternatives organization in New York. While I was visiting there, I found that their office was only one block away from my office and I was lucky enough to attend several of their events and presentations. TA has helped push the bike/ped culture that New York has suddenly gotten in the past few years. They helped implement 200 miles of bike facilities in the past 3 years and proposed 50 miles/year in the future.

Above is a video from their Bike Rules! campaign, from their executive director Paul Steely White. He sums up my thoughts exactly. I personally donated to their organization and received one of their "One Less Car" t-shirts. The money only goes to help New York cyclists, but I figure that by helping them, I may be helping to set a national precedence and get this type of treatment implemented here in Orlando.

Guerrilla Bike Lane In Baltimore

As I was cruising the internet today, I came across this interesting project that was implemented last month. guerrilla bike lanes have popped up in a few cities where cyclists and advocates have stepped up and put the power in their own hands to get the bike facilities that they so desire. Not to say that bike lanes are the best solution for all cases, but they do narrow traffic lanes which slows traffic speeds, and it creates awareness to motorists that bikes may be present. I only wonder what the officials will start doing when advocates start painting protected bike lanes or stripping complete lanes away. Maybe then they will see that the public does have a desire for more livable transportation solutions.

Check out the video of their work here: Guerrilla Bike Lane from Roving Media Productions on Vimeo.

In the middle of the night, on Monday, July the 26th (or more correctly, the morning of the 27th) a group of activist artists made a bold statement on the streets of Baltimore. They left behind a bike lane, stencil art, and their manifesto which reads:

"The Guerrilla Bike Lane arose from a desire to express ourselves and our passion for an escalating need to reduce the use of fossil fuels. We seek to promote and establish fair and safe riding conditions for cyclists in Baltimore. The intention of our guerrilla artwork is to educate the public using environmentally friendly and creative means in a non-aggressive way. We hope this will serve as a catalyst for people to see and build the community within the city, to consciously take action instead of settling for an inactive way of life."

Where will the GBL gang strike next? Only time will tell.

Mayor Bloomburg Pushes for Bike Sharing in NYC

Biking in New York City has been growing at a good clip in recent years, something that the local authorities have been encouraging with new infrastructure and policies. But something in missing from NYC's bike culture: a bike-sharing program. That might be about to change thanks to a proposal by Mayor Bloomberg and Transportation Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan.

The New York City bike share proposal would begin with 10,500 bikes, and quickly expand to 49,000 two-wheelers. The city is already home to several private bike rental companies, so the streets are already being flooded with tourists exploring the city by bike. By providing inexpensive alternatives for local residents and visitors to use, the amount of ridership in the city could quadruple and push 5+%.

The main complaints of the proposal is about accommodating more bike parking, reducing bike theft, and educating riders and drivers about the rules of the road. For all the complaints about rogue bike riders, the city says the dramatic reshaping of roads to accommodate riders is calming traffic. Traffic counts and studies are revealing that the notion of more bikes=safer bikes and pedestrians. One study found that after a car lane was eliminated and travel lanes for bicycles were added near Allen and Delancey streets, pedestrian injuries dropped 54 percent compared to the six prior years.

With most debates, there are "two sides to every story" and, after following cyclists going the wrong way or talking to people who have witnessed bike accidents, raises the question "is it a good idea to add more bikes to New York's streets?". Of course, they'd never follow around car drivers who don't follow the law or talk to victims of car accidents and ask "is it a good idea to add more cars to New York's streets?". There's always a double-standard about bikes...


The real solution to delinquent cyclists is not to reduce the number of riders, but rather to educate them about how to ride safely, to create infrastructure that makes it easy to do so, and to enforce the laws that already exist. Cities like Copenhagen have a lot more cyclists per capita than New York and their streets are enviably sane.

It's not yet clear when that program would launch and where the first stations would be, but it appears that NYC's bike culture is about to get even better.

Florida Racing Magazine - Mid August Issue

 

Click to view current issue

Bicycles as Transport-From Alternative to Mainstream

Last week was so busy and full of cool things in the cycling world, that I don't know what to share first. I think that I have to go with the best and share some of the other findings in later posts.

The AIA Center for Architecture has an exhibit called Our Cities Ourselves: The Future of Transportation In Urban Life, and last Thursday they had a guest panel give a presentation on Bicycles as Transport-From Alternative to Mainstream. The main goal of their presentation was to show that bicycles represent among most sustainable forms of personal transportation. Cities such as Amsterdam and Munich have integrated the bicycle as a key component of transportation modes, and have developed infrastructure, regulatory, and cultural changes as a part of this shift.

The main presentation was broken up into 5 main points, but was prefaced by the statistical data that the NYCDOT has been collecting since it started implementing the City's new bike infrastructure. They have created 200 miles of new bike facilities and plan on doing a minimum of 50 miles/year from now on. Their data showed that crashes have gone down 56% and volume is up 66%. They said that these stats were accomplished by designing safer streets and by increasing the ridership, increasing the awareness of the drivers.

This set up their first point, which was Protection. They didn't want to just put bike lanes on streets, but instead embraced the European and Portland models of road infrastructure. They have concluded that if they can get the ridership numbers up, that the crash statistics will automatically go down because of safety in numbers.

Their next point was to provide Bike Sharing. The goal for NYC is to get a system similar to Paris and have access to trains, buses, and bikes, all on the same Metro-Card. They felt that the bike rental program that is in the city right now is already a success and is a model that shows that adding more riders at all levels of experience and familiarity to the city hasn't been an issue because of the extent of their protected bike facilities.

Parking was the third topic and was the one that I had personally experienced. The city is already introducing hundreds of new bike racks and they are strategizing around metro stops to add new bike corals. They are struggling with the option to build bike lockers or bike stations, because they have such little available land and they are also limited underground because of the amount of utility infrastructure underground. They also emphasized their progress with passing the new legislation that required buildings with freight elevators to allow bike access and that any new or renovated buildings be required to add indoor bike parking and access.

The fourth point was Civic Bike Culture. The different city and advocate groups are trying to work together to build a better name for cycling and to push following the existing rules and get all user types out on the streets and on bikes. They are also working with businesses to create a "bike friendly business" program, that would allow businesses that participate to get a window sticker and give discounts to customers that come in on bikes.

The last point was a blend of the last point and was simply People. They are trying to shift the public opinion of cycling through marketing and sponsored events/rides. It again kept going back to the ultimate premise of the strength and safety in numbers and getting the ridership numbers as high as possible.

Orlando Bike/Pedestrian Meeting Recap

Even though I am not physically in Orlando to participate in this month's Bike/Ped Meetig, I was there in spirit and got a full recap from my friend Geoff. Below is his take from the meeting. It looks like Orlando is making the propoer steps to become a bike/ped oriented city. It feels like good things are on the horizon.

Geoff says-
Wow there was a lot of activity at the meeting today. A large crowd and many agenda items, including;

The Gertrude's Walk plan (they were planning bollards and landscape planters were suggested as an alternate)

A bike share program (Bike About USA), who runs the new Denver program, would center around the Sunrail stations, commuters would be a primary customer.

CITY ARTS FACTORY - The bike kitchen: The August "what moves you" program. Grand opening next Thursday Aug 19th, 6-9pm. Greg Liebowitz is partnering with the Rusted Chain and hopes after the City Arts run is over to keep the project going permanently. Possible connection to the city mountain bike park where there is a spare building.

CITY MOUNTAIN BIKE PARK: Public hearing w the city council next Tues Aug 17 8:30 am... one nearby resident is opposing the 16 acre project. Recommended for advocates to show up and voice our support for the project.

Kenneth Nuckols is looking to open a Bike Commuter Station in downtown, called The Spoke Stop. It will be located on a Lymmo line and be a for-profit business.

Cyclovia - The Sunday Parkway project: Tentative date is March 13, the route is 11.9 miles long, Robinson to McGuire to Bennett to Corrine to Orange and back downtown. Would be for all pedestrian, bike, rollerblade/skate people, highlighting local business districts along the route.

I was unable to stay for the training presentations about Cycling Savvy and Bike 101... I'll attempt to get a recap and share that soon.

It's really great that so many cool bike things are happening in Orlando, NOW is the time to get involved in something and make some of these great ideas successful realities.

Start with the Bike Kitchen opening next Thursday night 6-10 at the City Arts Factory... all you have to do to contribute to the success is just show up!!!

Another Contraflow Lane Opens in DC

DDOT just activated the new contraflow bike lanes on the two blocks of New Hampshire Avenue connecting from U Street. Cyclists traveling against the flow of car traffic now have separate lanes in which to travel all the way to the crossroads of U Street, 16th Street, and New Hampshire Avenue.



At the intersection, DDOT has installed special bike traffic lights to allow cyclists to cross into the bike-boxes ahead of the queues of car traffic waiting on Sixteenth Street. (See the green bike-boxes ahead of the stop lines in the diagram below.)  Click HERE for the District's New Intersection Design user brochure.

This is a pilot project for DDOT and there are a few kinks to work out. First, the bike signals are not placed in ideal positions. Look carefully at southwest corner of the diagram above. Notice that a cyclist stopped at the stop line on New Hampshire Avenue does not directly face a bike signal. The cyclist must know to look to the right and to look up to heights that are unusual for bike signage.

In much of the world, bike signals are placed five to seven feet above the ground. Even if the signals cannot be located to other poles, lowering them on their existing poles could help.

Second, there are induction loops embedded in the pavement to sense a waiting cyclist but there's no indication that cyclists should wait exactly at the stop line in order to trip the sensor. While filming, we pulled to the curb to stop and failed to trip the sensor.

This is merely the first step in DDOT's plan to reconfigure the intersection, which suffers a high number of pedestrian injuries. Until now, these two blocks of New Hampshire Avenue have been the missing link between the New Hampshire Avenue bike lanes and Sixteenth Street and the bike lanes on T and V Streets (eastbound and westbound, respectively).