irwin7638

I think the study completed here in Kalamazoo Mi deserves to be shared with the rest of the community.

Marc

berner

Cycling infrastructure in many communities is coming to pass, not as rapidly as we might hope, but it is happening. We just need to keep the pressure on by our support of advocacy efforts.

Doug64

The bike boulevard concept seems to work well in other cities.
Minneapolis, MN

B. Carfree

I've seen a similar plan locally. The net result has been that since the inception of the plan, we have lost 43% of our cyclists and 30% of our walkers (US Census American Community Survey, looks only at longest mode used to commute to work).

Bottom line for me: Will there be real and meaningful follow-up to measure success/failure and will the plan be modified if it does not achieve its desired outcome? Mostly these things just gather dust on a shelf when it's found that the cycling numbers are largely independent of them.

I'd sure love to see a city do what Davis did in the 1970s and implement zero-tolerance traffic law enforcement. It worked wonders until it was halted in the '80s (which was followed by a cycling collapse).

Also, the notion that there should be discreet cycling routes but that cars have the entire grid seems doomed to failure. What we should be doing is corralling the cars and giving cyclists, walkers and buses unfettered access. I've always said, only partly in jest, that if motorists had to deal with the inconveniences that cyclists do then no one would drive.

irwin7638

As I mentioned in the post, the source of the study is also the gatekeeper for all the Federal money spent on transportation in the area. Whenever a local jurisdiction wants to make improvements they will have to consider these recommendations before applying for a Federal grant. That's what is encouraging about this.

Marc

salcedo

I think bike boulevards are great, in cities with a good cycling culture and good cycling-driving relations. Otherwise, warring the road can be disastrous.

I personally didn't know what sharrows mean until I started cycling to work, and I'm sure most of my non-cyclist friends don't know hat they mean.

Sullalto

You blamed that in another post on a dangerous homeless population.

Doug64

You make a good point; it is an educational issue. I'm very lucky. I love in Oregon.

jon c. 

Why do you think this plan dramatically decreased cycling? What were the changes in infrastructure and why was it better before?

KD5NRH

Depends on locations, AFAICT. For example, the local MUP is currently a 1.25 mile alternative to a .3 mile straight line ride. It's flatter, and only one road crossing, but that's it.

The plan is currently, by the end of the year, to extend it another ~2 miles, which will provide access from a new apartment complex and an older neighborhood to downtown and the city park, as well as the college's farm on the outskirts of town. That will at least make it useful to ~3-4x as many people as it is now.

Over the next 3-5 years, they plan to extend it about another 2 miles to include a couple of other neighborhoods likely to generate a lot more traffic, but I have to say I'm not impressed with the planning that makes it sound like pulling teeth to pour a simple 10' wide sidewalk: they're not doing major reinforcements to the river bank it follows, as evidenced by the panicked rush to put in the reinforcements when an existing section was undercut by at least the fourth "500 year flood" I've seen in my lifetime.