The ad which ran in Canada a few years ago was a more radical departure from the automotive industry’s usually more subtle attempt to make alternative transportation less appealing than throwing down tens of thousands of your dollars on their product. Since I was the founder of Austin CarShare, I’m often asked what I think of the new Car2Go program launched by Diamler last fall. The carsharing scheme using a large fleet of Diamler’s SmartCars seems to be a significant change in outlook for an auto company by embracing alternative transportation. However, given the auto industry’s past history participating in non-automotive transportation, I’m wary of stated commitments from the industry in supporting a departure from single occupancy motorized vehicles. It can sound a bit like “clean coal” or the ads from ExxonMobile or British Petroleum touting how they’re really just working towards green fuels (pay no attention to the billions we make off of oil.)

So, next time you hear a car company say they are committed to the environment (as if buying any car can be environmentally positive) or how they want to change how people get around, remember this ad and their true colors.

Tuesday night, the City of Austin Urban Transportation Commission met to review the current progress on plans to create Austin’s first bicycle boulevard on Nueces Street. A group of property owners who oppose the project spoke in addition to members of the cycling community who spoke in support of concept. No new points of opposition were brought up but several previously mentioned points were, points that have been addressed as factually incorrect yet are still being spouted by this group.

Included in the criticisms were:

• parking will be removed (false)
• automotive traffic will be prohibited (false)
• street access to current properties will be removed (false)
• emergency vehicle times will be impaired (technically true BUT fire and EMS consider these delays negligible for response time)
• we don’t have the money (false, voter approved bond money is already set aside for this project)
• the bike boulevard will hurt businesses and property values will decrease (unproven PLUS all Austin and national data on traffic calming say the opposite.)

Although each of these issues have been addressed and corrected, the property owners are continuing to use these misleading statements to call for a delay or removal of the project from Nueces Street. What is most disconcerting is that two of the city selected property owner representatives for a committee to draft a compromise plan, Scott Sayers and Susan Harris, used some of these discredited points in their presentations. How can we expect a good faith solution from the stakeholder committee if members are continuing to make these statements in public?

Earlier this week, we saw a conspiracy theory floated against the cycling community by a business owner. He claimed we are all organizing through our blogs to ride more on Nueces Street to improve the traffic counts in a traffic study that is being done right now. Unfortunately, it was pointed out that the days and time of the traffic counts were unannounced to protect the integrity of the data. Also, I have not see a single cycling blog in this city suggest trying to skew numbers. Possibly are the bicycle counts higher than the opposition wants? Hey, if you don’t like the results, just make things up, right?

As I predicted earlier once Rio Grande was put into serious consideration, property owners on that street express similarly irrational NIMBYism. Indeed, a couple Rio Grande owners spoke at the UTC in opposition. We heard lots of people say how much they support cycling just as long as nothing is done to impede as much automotive traffic as possible. This seems truly patronizing and disingenuous. I believe you cannot create facilities that will encourage new cyclists to ride without a trade off in automotive traffic volume and speed.

The fact that the opposition is making wild accusations and repeating false statements does not bode well for finding a good faith compromise that will create a true bicycle boulevard and making these owners happy. I do not think the cycling community has much room to move here except to come out in strong support of a bike boulevard plan such as the League of Bicycling Voters proposal. The LOBV has an online petition supporting this plan you can sign online here.

City staff recommend ending 9:00 PM free swim at Barton Springs Pool

At Wednesday night’s Parks Commission meeting, there was a hearing to consider removing the 9- 10 PM nightly free swim at Barton Springs Pool to charging the $3 entrance fee charged during regular hours. The free swim at the pool has become very popular with large social bike rides causing a sharp increase in the number of people using the pool. This measure is seen as a way to offset staff costs and possibly reduce the numbers. Public input is being taken until February 25th. Anyone who wants to chime in with comments can contact the aquatics office at aquaticsoffice@ci.austin.tx.us.

I have spent a lot of time in my professional life trying to sell Texans and Austinites on a vision of life that does not center around the car. Whether it was sharing cars, using a bike for everyday errands, or riding rail, I’ve heard the consistent refrain that “those are great ideas, but you’ll never get Texans to give up their cars.” It seems we Texans have so little imagination that we think driving a car is a genetic trait, not a choice.

There have been times I have felt like throwing in the towel, letting everyone have their automobile induced sprawl in peace, and moving somewhere more developed on the cycling path. Then, I read a little more about Copenhagen in Jan Gehl and Lars Gemzøe’s book Public Spaces, Public Life: Copenhagen, and I feel our city and our country has some hope. It turns out when the city of Copenhagen began a program of creating bicycle infrastructure and closing streets and squares to car traffic, they ran into a similar objections. Many said “We are Danes, not Italians” and “Using public space is contrary to the Nordic mentality.” It seemed just as with Texans it was just not in the personality of the Danes to make places for people instead of cars, and yet today Copenhagen is one of the most bikeable, walkable cities on the planet. From World War II to the early 1970s, making concessions in public space to the parking and driving automobiles as fast as possible were the norm. Today, cars are banned in most of the town squares and on several major streets and 37% of Copenhagen residents bike to work with another 1/3rd taking public transit. Copenhagen has the distinction of having the least amount of traffic congestion of any city of its size in the Western World.

Living in an Austin where only 1/3rd of us drive a car to work is more than a little hard to image. Most of us say we want to be green, but when push comes to shove, we turn the motor over on our 2 ton steeds. Here’s where Copenhagen’s example is most helpful: When they started, no one could image the bike and pedestrian majority of today. Forward thinking planners began with small improvements such as closing a street to traffic here, banning parking in a square there, and putting in bike paths along roads elsewhere. It has taken 40 years of small gradual changes within a broader vision to make this a reality.

Last year we passed an ambitious Master Bicycle Plan and the current discussion over the Nueces Bike Boulevard is the first major step in making the goals of that plan a reality. Those who do not want to spend the money or divert the space from cars in the coming weeks, months, and years will make the argument that bikes are all fine a good, but that we can not do anything to reduce automobile capacity. They will say these ideas are pie in the sky and that most people will never give up their cars. When they do, point to Copenhagen and let them know people will not give up their cars unless we give them an alternative. Building more roads will only create more traffic, but building great public space will get people out of cars and onto our streets. That will mean better lives for all of us.

With the Climate Change Conference, Copenhagen remains very much in the news especially on the bike front. As a city with a dominate car culture until the 1970s, Copenhagen pulled back from the gasoline induced sprawl most of the Western world embraced and now has 37% of commuter trips and over 50% of other everyday trips taken by car.

In the last week, StreetFilms produced this video with of some of the latest bicycle infrastructure innovations in Copenhagen with Copenhagenize author Mikael Colville-Andersen.

Some of the improvements include:

• Counter of bike traffic for planning records and civic pride
• Double bike lanes on high bike traffic routes
• Separate stop lights for bikes allowing bike a 5-10 second head start before cars are allowed forward
• On-street bike lockers for cargo bikes
• LED lights embedded in the road warning drivers not to turn right when bikes are approaching in the inside lane
• And my favorite: Stop lights synchronized to the speed of bikes allowing bike movement without stops

Copenhagen is not letting up with a goal of 50% bicycle commuting by 2015. And lest you say “well, that’s Denmark, it will never work here”, the Practical Cyclist reminds us that these proposals met resistance from the public when first implemented. Danish urban planner Jan Gehl who is credited with spearheading the changes that made Copenhagen a cycling mecca says the initial response he got was “We Danes will never agree to this—Danish people won’t ride bikes.”

If the Danes can go from bikes being outside of the norm to a beacon of transportation cycling, than so can we. Couldn’t we all use a little more Copenhagenization?

Image courtesy of LivableStreets

Vehicular cycling versus bike lanes

The Dallas Observer recently did a story about the battles of the Dallas cycling community with the former City of Dallas Bicycle Coordinator, PM Summer. Summer was a vehicular cyclist, a philosophy that holds that a bicycle is just another vehicle on the road and riders should behave that way. On these lines, any infrastructure built specifically for bicycles is wrong because it makes bikes a different class of vehicles. This philosophy was popular in late 20th century planning and Summers was quoted saying “As long as I’m the bike coordinator for the city, Dallas will never have on-street bike lanes.” Interestingly, the proponents of vehicular cyclists have inevitably been middle aged men not especially in tune to what women want in transportation cycling. The attitude has been cyclist need to be trained before they can ride. While it may feel good to talk about education, this essentially creates a barrier to entry making cycling the purview of those with the time and commitment to take classes or those daring enough to brave automobile dominant streets. The VC track record is bleak where implemented with a flat less than 1% of the population cycling for transportation.

Vehicular cyclists have fallen out of favor in the last decade. In fact, Summer, as the coordinator of the 9th largest US city, was probably the highest profile VCer left, and he was removed from his position last fall. In their place are bicycle programs that emphasis bike lanes and paths where ever possible. This is seen as progress in much of the cycling community creating safer routes and making transportation cycling more accessible to more of the general community. While this infrastructure has been appreciated by established cyclists, it has not created the real large scale increases in bicycle usage promised. Why?

While the VC philosophy puts no infrastructure on the road, most bike lanes are retro fitted to existing roads putting cyclist on the edge of the street where they are least visible and road debris accumulates. The lanes create space for cyclists but little is done to change the dynamic of the street. Cars are still the dominant traffic taking up the majority of the road, remaining a relatively high speed vehicle, and often parking in the bike lane forcing cyclists out in the road. Bike paths are often worse being glorified sidewalks where cars again have dominance where the path intersects the path. While this gives the rider a feeling of security, it is in fact one of the most dangerous routes for cyclists to use. Add to this the fact that most paths are recreational in focus being built in parks away from the routes of everyday life.

Solutions for wide spread cycling use

So here is where the VCers are right. If we want a sizable portion of the population to bike, they need to be able to use existing roads so they can use a bike for errands and commuting with the minimum amount of inconvenience. And here is where the traditional bike lanes are right. If we want a sizable portion of the population to bike, they need to feel safe from being run over by cars.

I would argue both theories are incomplete and remain focused on a small dedicated group of cyclists. VC appeals to the hardest of hard core cyclist while conventional bike lanes appeal to those cyclists who might already ride recreationally but need more physical support to feel comfortable riding in the city. Both are destine to flat or slow growth because they focus on the needs of a narrow niche: established cyclists instead of people who happen to ride bikes.

Enter a solution: bicycle boulevards. Bike boulevards re-balance the streetscape by pulling the automobile back from its conventional roll of dominate transport. Bicycles are part of traffic, VCers, but infrastructure like bollards, raised medians, forced turns, and roundabouts slow the traffic and raise cyclists and pedestrians as equals on the street. A sense of safety in design and safety in numbers make the boulevards extremely accessible to all users. They also use existing roads in the midst of established neighborhoods making them sensible routes for those wanting to live all aspects of their lives on two wheels.

Tonight’s open house for our first bike boulevard is exciting and important to the future of Austin cycling and retaking our streets for people instead of cars. I hope you will make it tonight or let the Austin City Council know how critical this is to improving the quality of life and sustainability of our community.

Nueces Street Bicycle Boulevard Open House: Project Discussion and Public Design Exercise
Wednesday, December 9
6- 8 PM
Pease Elementary School, 1106 Rio Grande St

An apocalyptic remains of civilization? No, just the next subdivision ready to go in.

Over the Thanksgiving holiday, we loaded up the car (rental car in our case) and headed to Lubbock to see the in-laws. During this trip, I began reading “$20 Per Gallon“, a book about how our world will change with the inevitable rise of oil and gasoline prices in the coming years. I’ll do a full book review in the coming weeks, but so far while the book is a bit formulaic, it does get you thinking and worried about how ill prepared our country is for this reality.

I am often frustrated by the level of progress the City of Austin makes in turning our city into a sustainable metropolis ready to tackle the new green economy. Sure, we talk a good game. We get lots of award, but the fact of the matter is that most people in this city still live in wasteful single family homes located in barely walkable, sprawling suburban subdivisions using their car for a majority, if not all, their trips. We’ve make the commitment to change in our minds, but we are woefully slow at making these visions reality.

Well, there is nothing like a trip to Lubbock to put things in perspective. While in Austin, there is an attempt to tackle these economic and environmental crises coming down the pike, cities like Lubbock are continuing down the same path assuming last summer’s $4/gallon was an aberration. During my visit, I saw two different parts of Lubbock that are very telling. On Thanksgiving, we had dinner at the Lubbock Club, a dinner club at the top of one of Lubbock’s few downtown high-rises. From here, you could see all of downtown and all of the city on a clear day. Looking down at the streets of the central business district, I saw block after block of empty cement lots, places where the building that made up the heart of Lubbock once stood, now parking lots. Some of these lots didn’t even have parking spaces painted, instead the owners deciding to pave over the lot just to save on maintenance.

A day later, I went on a bike ride out south of town and on my way back in came across an empty subdivision a full 10 miles from downtown around 125th street (1st street is downtown). All of the roads of this subdivision were paved with street lights and signs. There were dozens of lots fully plugged in with electric and gas boxes ready to have a prefabbed ranch home dropped on it. It was a bizarre, apocalyptic sight I would have written off to silly over-reaching by a developer if not for the fact that there were new homes under construction not a 1/4 mile down the road. This was not some visionaries attempt to create some separate community from Lubbock. This was the edge of town and the next stop on further expansion. Just a bit further out there was a sign for commercial development, the strip mall to serve this new part of town. The street numbering goes on to 178th street, another three miles out.

All the utility lines are installed and ready for a home to be built, 10 miles from downtown.

In a city of 200,000 people, you have solid development radiating over 10 miles out from the urban core, approximately the same area as the island of Manhattan. Such low density, car centric development can only be sustained by cheap oil. This has been the reality of our world for two generations, but it is rapidly coming to an end. I found myself frequently asking myself, what will Lubbock do at the reasonable prediction of $8/gallon, let alone $20. Their current reality will cease to exist. Unfortunately for Lubbock, their leaders appear to have turned a tin ear to this possibility. Nothing is being done to produce sustainable communities where the car is not the only legitimate form of transportation. Lubbock’s bus system is sketchy at best, the single family home and strip malls dominate, and while they’ve taken the time to create bike routes, these routes intersect with the 6 lane major roads Lubbock has at 1 mile intervals with no stop light or safe way to cross. One wonders how many other cities in America are in the same state. There are probably enough to mean we’re going to be in real trouble as gas ticks up.

When looking at our own community, Austin can’t continue to make half measures. In the high gas price future, the cities and communities that prepared in these cheap oil times will thrive and grow. Those that don’t will struggle and wither. Whether it’s bicycle infrastructure, higher density walkable neighborhoods, renewable energy or a real transit system, we cannot afford to wait. Not only will these things improve our quality of life, they will be the economic saviors of our future. We either invest today to yield the dividends in the future, or play a painful catchup at risk of being left behind. It’s time to get real. Are you ready?

A recent Scientific American article suggests

For years, there have been arguments in the cycling community about how best to get more Americans using bicycles for trips instead of the car. Vehicular Cyclists said that cyclists just needed to act like cars on the road, that we didn’t bicycle infrastructure, and in fact bicycle infrastructure actually hurt cyclists by making the bicycle a second class citizen on the road. This theory was pervasive in U.S. planning for decades with the results being extremely low bicycle use. Moreover since this theory actively discouraged the construction of bike lanes or paths, it forced many cyclists who couldn’t hack acting like a vehicle onto sidewalks, the most dangerous place by cyclists to be. Fortunately, other theories have prevailed, and Vehicular Cyclists have largely fallen out of favor.

The focus of recent planning has been on bicycle infrastructure as is evident in the recently adopted Austin Master Bike Plan. Much of this is in the form of bike lanes, a relatively low cost, low impact way to make space on the roads for cyclists. Unfortunately, reports sited by the Scientific American article indicate this form of infrastructure may have a limited effect on getting more bikes on the road. A Portland State study found that women were less comfortable than men with on-street bike lanes, and that they were more likely to go out of their way to use a route that was car-free like a bike path or traffic calmed like a bike boulevard. Austin is getting it’s first bike boulevard this spring which would seem to be a helpful addition.

All bike paths and boulevards aside, it seems this infrastructure is still of limited effect if it does not connect people to everyday tasks. Austin has miles of bike/ped trails, but the focus is almost exclusively on recreation. Riding your bike along Lady Bird Lake may be a joy, but it doesn’t get you to the grocery store, dry cleaning, or to pick up your kid from school. Rutgers University urban planning professor John Pucher indicates in the article that this is a problem when trying to increase female use. Despite growing social gender equity, women still do the majority of the errands in most households, and unless biking can be presented to be as easy and safe as a car, it will be hard to make change.

Some of this has to do with land planning, but bicycle infrastructure planning is part of this as well. I attended the October Austin Cycling Association meeting where staff from TX DOT solicited responses from the cycling community about where cycling infrastructure was needed. In the face of a frustrated audience tired of TX DOT inaction, the staffers said the problem was they didn’t have enough data on where cycling traffic is. I pointed out that this was a backward approach, and they already had all the data they needed. I suggested they look at where people live and where they shop, go to school, and go to work and that will tell them were to build cycling infrastructure. The approach TX DOT took perpetuates the idea that cyclists are this separate extreme group that specific corridors must be made for instead of cycling being a natural, organic part of every day life. One of the TX DOT staffers said she wouldn’t feel safe riding a bike on our roads. If their own staff aren’t comfortable using their own facilities, I’d say they are a failure.

The one item left out of the Scientific American article was the actual vehicles readily available to the public. The U.S. bicycle industry has been dominated by performance and recreational use. Little but lip service has been paid to biking for transportation, and it has shown with the “commuter bike” offering being a recreational bike with a rack and (sometimes) fenders slapped on. More maintenance intensive components like rim brakes and external derailleurs are the standard while practical accessories like chain guards, kickstands, and lights are the exception. There has been a recent trend towards a more practical design, but while many of these bikes take style cues from English Roadsters, French Porter bikes, and Dutch city, they still present an incomplete package or maintain some of the performance, higher maintenance parts.

I would argue providing the market with bikes that make everyday trips practical in regular clothes are as important as more infrastructure and better planning. Safe bike routes and sensible urban streets lay the groundwork for more transportation biking while a well designed bike provides the tool to make it practical. It is yet to be seen if the bike industry will make a real, long term commitment to making this a reality, but it seems clear it would be wise for them to listen to what women want.

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As a dedicated transportation cyclist and builder of city bikes, I have been pretty disappointed by what the bicycle industry has attempted to offer the U.S. market as utility or transportation bikes. The offerings have inevitably been a variation on the mountain bike or fixed/single speed bike or both. If we are wanting anyone other than the already dedicated cyclist to regularly replace car trips with trips by bike, these products leave a lot to be desired.

The Dutchess concept includes integrated lights, fenders, and rack. Image courtesy of Cartlon Reid.

The fact of the matter is that most people just want to get from point A to B in regular clothing in the cheapest, most efficient way possible. They don’t see themselves as urban warriors or racers. It is also true that the majority of trips people take are less than 5 miles from their house. It would seem like the bicycle would be a great match to this, but it has to be the right bicycle for people who happen to ride bikes (as opposed to cyclists) to use them regularly. Unfortunately, usually these folks either purchase a low quality, desposible bike from a big box store or get something performance oriented foisted upon them at the local bike shop.

On the up side, the bike industry is slowly catching on with several serious attempts at offering true transportation bikes showing up at Interbike this year. Now, BikeBiz is reporting that Cannondale is entering the fray with a concept bike called the Dutchess. Considering Cannondale’s pathetic presentation of the urban bike at this year’s Interbike, there is a lot to like here. Based on the Dutch city bike concept, Cannondale modernizes the look with brushed aluminum and integrated lights, fenders and rack. This yields a bike they say is around 30 pounds, a shockingly low weight for so much utility. Full chain guard and drum brakes are also included, a practical, low maintenance touch that is pretty universally ignored on U.S. city bikes. Curiously, this bike also has a very radically oversized bottom bracket with a huge open space in the middle. One assumes this was done as a wow factor for a concept as I know of no one actually making something like this right now.

All the functionality of a Dutch bike, but why the "sit up and beg" geometry? Image courtesy of Carlton Reid.

It’s not all good. Cannondale kept the hybrid geometry that yields the sit up and beg riding position instead of the highly comfortable fully upright, arms at the side position of a true Dutch bike. Also, the marketing material on this assumes a gender bias in the design. “Designed for women keen to express their style amongst the fast paced and ever changing urban vibe, the Dutchess brings modern lines to the environmentally conscious whilst at the same time offering longevity and low maintenance.” I know us men can be kind of bone headed, but since when is having a well functioning, nice looking city bike a women’s specific design? I know we have a North American gender prejudice on step through frames, but this gender design designation is inspired by 19th century hoop skirts, not 21th century transportation needs. When you are carrying things or in stop and go traffic, the step through is a hard design to beat as our European brethren have learned. Finally, a kickstand is curiously absent from the mix. Ever tried to load some groceries on a bike with no kickstand? Do it once, and you’ll throw all concern about Fred-dom out the window and strap one on.

Short comings aside, Cannondale’s Dutchess concept is a welcome 21st century take on the tradition Dutch city bike. When you think about the needs of an average person just wanting a bike for transportation (regular cloths, low maintenance, low physical impact, short distances, carrying stuff), the Dutch design has a lot to offer and more refinement is great to see. I’d say the biggest down side to this bike is that it is not available for sale to the public right now.

Image courtesy of Copenhagenizer.

If you’ve ever ridden a bakfiets, Xtracycle, or Madsen, you know they are great on utility and hauling things/people but some trouble when it comes to parking. The heft and storage that make them so useful can be a liability. Add to that the fact that most cargo bikes cost as much as double regular utility bikes, and you see the need for some additional accommodations.

On-Street Bicycle Parking in Portland.

One of the best things about these lockers are that they are in the shape of car and take out an on-street car parking space. Replacing automobile parking with bike parking has been done elsewhere like Portland and Edinburgh. This makes car use more difficult encouraging alternative transportation use and supporting cycling. It also highlights the importance put on bikes as equal players on the road. If we are going to get serious as a city in reducing carbon emissions from transportation, we need to be actively making using a car expensive and inconvenient while doing the opposite for cycling, walk, and transit. We can wait for gas prices to go back up to do it for us or take control of our community and do it now while we have a choice.

Image Courtesy of Bike Portland.

BikePortland recently reported on a study published in Environmental Health that aggregated the results of 23 recent English language reports on bicycle crash data. In contrast to what some (including the [update] former Dallas Bike Coordinator) say, the report found that bicycle infrastructure such as bike lanes and bike paths were safer for cyclists than riding on the road in traffic. Most interesting, riding on sidewalks or multi-use paths was found to be more dangerous than riding on the road in traffic, especially when going opposite the traffic flow.

So called vehicular cyclists have claimed there is no need for bicycle infrastructure since it is just as safe to ride on the road. This report appears to contradict that assumption. The other issue I’ve had with the vehicular cycling theory is that it ignores one of the top concerns of the casual or potential transportation cyclists: fear of traffic. These type of riders if they make it out on the road at all will tend to move to the sidewalks any time they start feeling uncomfortable. These are just the sort of riders we need to attract to the bicycle if we are going to get fewer people driving cars for all their errands. This study would seem to point to the idea that we are making the roads more dangerous to all users by not including good bicycle infrastructure.

Also noted in the report was the lack of number of bicycle infrastructure studies compared to the number of studies on helmet use when researching safety. Missing as well was studies of newer infrastructure devices such as bike boxes, sharrows, and traffic calming. The fact that we have an entire industry making money selling us hard shell mop tops has nothing to do with this discrepancy at all, I’m sure.

The study co-author Meghan Winters said, “One of the major advantages of infrastructure-based improvements, compared to personal protective devices such as helmets, is that safe infrastructure provides population-wide protection for all cyclists.”

Or to quote BikeSnobNYC, “in Europe…their governments put the safety all around cyclists in the form of a bicycle infrastructure instead of concentrating it in tiny pieces of styrofoam and forcing riders to put it on their heads.”