Bicycling Improvements: ways of Enhancing Nonrecreational Cycling


By Francis Vanek,  Director of the Sustainable Technology and Energy Institute, 414 Triphammer Road, Ithaca, NY 14850, USA.  email: francisvanek@yahoo.com.

This paper was written while I was a Ph.D. student at the University of Pennsylvania. Written for the Clean Air Council, Philadelphia, PA.

Full text of article. This was written in June of 94 so it contains some references to current events of that time and may be otherwise slightly out of date.

"Pedal hopper" vans to carry bikers and their cycles across long urban bridges. Spot improvement programs to rapidly repair and remove cycling hazards from the street surface. Automated bike locking facilities at major bus and train stations. Freight- bikes instead of motorized vans for local deliveries. These are just a small sample from a list of 110 improvements for bicycling that the Clean Air Council has recently compiled from available literature on promoting and facilitating bicycling.

Bicycling is energy efficient and causes almost no pollution, but many people look unfavorably on it for point-to-point travel (i.e. work, school, or errands), so the number of people in the greater Philadelphia region who ride for other than recreation has been limited to a small minority. For some time the Council ha s promoted increased point-to-point cycling as a way of reducing the impact of transportation on air quality. The Council has concluded this literature search phase of the project at an opportune time. June 1 was bike-to-work day in the city, and at a rally that morning at City Hall, transportation commissioner Denise Goren announced the acquisition of funds to install 800 new car and bike "share the road" signs throughout the city. Bike Coalition chair Noel Weyrich spoke of a heightened interest amon g Center City employers in facilitating building access for bike commuters. Hopefully, this region will in the near future adopt other ideas from among the possible actions the council has surveyed, which reflect both the creativity and pragmatism of cit ies and towns across the US and in several foreign countries, especially the Netherlands and Japan.

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Infrastructure Improvements:

Enhancements for bicycling can work at many levels in the community and require different levels of commitment. Some of the best known also have the highest profile: bike paths and bike lanes. Bike paths are fully separated from roadways and either r un parallel to to the streets or on their own rights-of-way through parks or along old railroad grades; bike lanes are a marked lane in the roadway reserved for bicycles, usually between the regular traffic lanes and the shoulder or parallel parking area.

At first glance lanes may seem less secure than paths, but they can be designed to a sufficient width (5' according to highway design codes) to allow cyclists to avoid opening doors and other obstacles. Bike lanes may also cause less confusion where th e cycling and motorized traffic crosses, such as at intersections or driveways.

With adequate construction funds, Philadelphia might create a network of cycle paths and lanes in urban areas so that cyclists could make most through trips entirely on the network and away from traffic. Transportation Alternatives in New York City h as proposed a network of "Greenways" to connect all the major city parks, within which residents already have good cycling conditions. In the short to medium term, however, the limited funds available could go instead towards creating short paths and lan es where currently bottlenecks exist for cycling, most notably in crossing bridges or reaching shopping centers. A good local example: a wooden pathway built along one edge of the Bettswood Bridge (Rt. US 422) across the Schuylkill in Valley Forge, givin g cyclists safe access to the battlefield memorial. Communities can also create traffic-free bike routes by connecting adjacent dead-end streets with short bike paths.

Integration Improvements:

Even short linking paths cost large quantities of money and take time to plan and construct, so the majority of the enhancements in the literature look for ways to improve cycling without having to build new infrastructure. To begin with, we can take a look at the surfaces where cyclists ride now:

For quality-of-surface problems, a spot improvement committee in the streets department can receive calls from cyclists and then make the necessary corrections on short notice. For permanent improvements, the streets department can incorporate the additi on of lines, grates, better curbs, or new signs into their street improvement agenda, so that as each street in the urban area is repaired over the course of its life cycle, the improvements are incorporated without needing to undertake a separate project just for cyclists.

Instituting "traffic calming" measures in neighborhoods, which force motorists to drive slower or stay on main thoroughfares instead of taking short-cuts, can benefit cyclists as well as reducing the impact (physical danger, noise, emission) of passing c ars and helping to create a "woonerf" (a Dutch word which roughly translated means "livable neighborhood"). Planners can build chokers, speed-bumps, or barriers along streets to slow cars down; they can also close off streets or make them one-way except for bicyclists. Planners in Portland, OR, a leader in traffic calming in the US, recommend consulting residents for a 1- or 2-block radius from a project before instituting traffic calming. Devices can also be erected on a trial basis using police barri cades, steel drums, or jersey-barriers to monitor public response before pouring concrete or performing earthworks.

Cities and towns can also create bike routes along less traveled streets that will take bikes away from the main avenues and improve point-to-point cycling for a fraction of the cost of new paths and lanes or traffic calming devices. Signs along these r outes should convey more information than the current green "Bike Route" signs: they should tell destinations and distances, and be frequent enough so that cyclists won't get lost along the way. These signs can be particularly important in the vicinity o f long bridges or rail-trails, since cyclists may know that a path exists but become confused trying to find it.

Integrating bicycling with transit can give both modes of travel a boost. Where possible, transit authorities should allow bikes on board peak as well as off-peak trains, subways, and even buses (as has been done in Westchester County, NY). One source recommended folding bicycles for those who want to board transit with a bike during peak hours. In some western states buses have bike racks either on the front or back, so that the cyclist can put his or her cycle on the rack before getting on the bus a t any stop. Where no path exists across a bridge that otherwise creates a long detour for the cyclist, the "pedal-hopper" shuttle has come into being: a van usually outfitted with a bike trailer that carries cyclists back and forth across the bridge eith er for free or for a small charge. Transit stations can offer many other amenities: covered bike racks, bike lockers or a guarded locking facility, and bike rental or repair centers. Since some commuters in European cities use bikes on both ends of thei r transit journey, rental centers at certain stations can actually rent bikes out twice per day: first to a customer who arrives by train at the station in the morning, rides to work, and returns in the afternoon, and a second time to a customer who arriv es in the evening and rides the bike home, returning it in the morning.

Educational enhancements

Because it usually involves the purchase of some durable hardware, even improvements in the integration of cycling can cost more than a town can allocate to cycling. What about communities that want to enhance cycling but have very little spare fundin g to do so? Fortunately, the Council's survey came up with a list of "educational" enhancements which, if municipal office staff can allocate the time, only require purchasing stationary or paying for phone calls. Community outreach to residents and esp ecially those who drive can make the public more aware of cyclists and how to improve the interaction of bikes and cars on the roads. Driver education programs can bring in a unit on cyclists and cycling, especially clarifying the rules regarding right-o f-way on the streets; a course on defensive cycling can also help adult cyclists reduce their risk of accidents. If a community can convince their police department to begin patrolling on mountain bikes, or delivery companies to use two- or three-wheel f reight bikes, both sides can come out ahead: the public image of bikes as a credible form of transportation improves, and the police or delivery companies benefit from the cost savings and increased mobility of switching from motorized to non-motorized. Another aspect of outreach is simply providing maps, lists of bike shops and bike clubs, and other information to the community. After a point the outreach effort may require a full- or part-time coordinator to handle the volume of work. Still, having a paid position responsible for enhancing bicycling can make more of adifference than $25,000 worth of roadsigns, speed-bumps, or improved storm grates.

Because of their key role in helping to promote commuting by bicycle, the question of outreach to employers in the community is an issue unto itself. While this type of cooperation may not require a financial commitment from the community agency, some o f the recommended enhancements would be a large investment for the employer, such as sheltered bike locking facilities or changing rooms with showers. However, sometimes all that is required is a commitment from the employer that will help the cyclist: a llowing bicycles to be brought inside, allocating an unused room for their storage, or allowing the freight elevator to be used for moving the bicycle in a tall building. Employers can promote bike commuting by holding free lunches and raffles for people who commute by bike, or organizing a bicycling club within the organization. Sometimes bike commuting can save the company money, since the number of people requiring a parking space is reduced; some California companies are even willing to give the emp loyee a new bike if they will continually use it for commuting.

Naturally, people might be skeptical with regard to these simple measures, thinking that only a full-blown bike path network can truly "change the landscape." The case of the town of Cranford, NJ, helps dispel any such doubts. Starting in the mid-70' s and continuing into the 80's, the Cranford municipal government spent a few thousand dollars each year on their bicycle promotion program. They distributed key-chains and other items with bicycle awareness information printed on them, and also donated bike-promotion paper placemats to local restaurants. Each year they adopted a new theme related to bicycling, so that their message would change before residents became indifferent to it, and this theme would be displayed on banners hung from local overp asses. Over time, Cranford became a town where not only visitors perceived the number of cyclists on the streets to be above average, but motorists were also more aware of and courteous towards riders. This approach provides an excellent blueprint for c ommunities seeking an interim means of promoting cycling until funding for infrastructure or integration improvements comes through.

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As a way of reducing air pollution, bicycling may not be for everyone, but where it can be implemented, it has an advantage over carpooling or transit: a car with every seat taken, a bus, and even an electric railcar create air pollution somewhere, but the only pollution a bike creates is in the factory where it was put together. Obstacles to bicycling remain. But with the range of cycling enhancements available, we believe that these obstacles can be overcome, by creativity if not by investment, and that bicycling will play a meaningful role in helping to improve regional air quality.