(Not So) Cycle Friendly Seattle
As someone who cycles to work 60% or more of the time, this article in the Seattle Weekly about the state of cycling in the Seattle area was fairly interesting.
...suddenly you're noticing all those people who are commuting to work on their bikes these days—and it seems that there are a lot more of them. And you notice that a lot of them nowadays are just normal schlubs like yourself.I'm quite fortunate in that I live just 2 blocks from the Burke-Gilman / Sammamish River trail, and my work is less than a mile off the trail, making my 13.6 mile commute roughly 90% trail. Whenever I ride other places though, I do find myself wondering how Seattle ever got a reputation for being "cycle friendly." Are other cities just absolutely awful for cycling, or does the Burke-Gilman trail all by itself make us deserving of the title?
Suddenly, riding a bike to work seems to make a lot of sense.
After all, Seattle has a national reputation as a bike-friendly city. It should be fun and easy, right?
Well, um . . . yes and no.
...
In other words, the Seattle area's oft-touted bicycling system is actually a happenstance, an often broken network that doesn't function particularly well, especially when it comes to providing a complete infrastructure that could encourage people to take up bike commuting.
Andrew Galbraith, who moved here last year from the San Francisco Bay Area—where he also used to commute by bike—has found, in his year of commuting from Fremont to Pioneer Square, that Seattle's bike-friendly reputation isn't everything it's cracked up to be. "I think that it probably got that reputation because people look at things like the Burke- Gilman trail or Green Lake and think, 'Oh, there's bike paths,' because that's what the city is promoting, but the reality of actually commuting is different," he says. "It's one thing for people like myself who are avid bicyclists, but certainly somebody who doesn't bike much and thinks it might be a new way to commute, they might find it frightening. Especially downtown."
This bit of the article also quite amused me:
"The challenge we have is convincing people," says Kirste Johnson, a transportation planner for the Puget Sound Regional Council (PSRC), "because we see these really small percentages of commute trips from census data [the average in King County has for years been about 2 percent to 3 percent]. When it comes to divvying up pots of money for transportation projects, it's like, 'Why should we spend any more than, say, 3 percent? Why should we put more money towards this when nobody's doing it?'Let's apply that same logic to, say... transit. Maybe 10% of commute trips are on transit, so why spend more than 10% of transportation revenue on transit? I can't locate actual figures (if anyone reading this knows where to get such numbers, please let me know), but I've got a feeling that more than 10% of transportation dollars are spent on busses, rail, and ferrys. If there are people making such an argument against spending money for bicycle improvements, it's bogus. More trails & dedicated bike lanes = more bicycles on the road. More bicycles on the road = less cars, less smog, and more money in the pocket of the cyclists that aren't paying through the teeth for gasoline. Sounds like a win-win situation to me.
(David Neiwert, Seattle Weekly, 07.26.2006)
8 comments:
Bicycles will never become more popular in Seattle than the 2% or so (that's probably generous) of commuters that currently use them. Why? Here's why. Firstly, it rains in Seattle quite a bit. Yes, they make raingear, but it is expensive and a pain to wear. Not to mention you look like a dork in it. Secondly, there are few precious hours of daylight during much of the year. It is dangerous, headlamps and reflectors notwithstanding, to ride to and from work in darkness, especially if your family loves you and depends on you. Thirdly, you must pack a change of clothing, and shower when you reach work. (This is assuming your work has a shower, which is probably unlikely for most workplaces.) This probably isn't a big deal for most guys, but have you ever noticed that there are few women among cycle commuters? Women would need to also pack a hair dryer and cosmetics, or need a place to store them at work. (Most of them also need more time to get ready, which cuts into work time.) Fourth, it is difficult to pick up the kids or a gallon of milk and a bag of dog food on the way home. Not impossible, but difficult. Note that none of these reasons have too much to do with how many bike lanes/paths there are in Seattle.
My workplace does have quite a few bike commuters, and I find they fit into one of two groups. There are the under-30 cycle enthusiasts, for which eating, sleeping and work are just a distraction from cycling. They go on 100-mile rides for fun. More power to them for riding to work---they will probably bounce if they ever hit the pavement and walk it off. The other group are aging baby boomers that want to prove they are still young. They will not bounce if they ever hit the pavement. They often show up to their first morning meeting in their spandex. Oh, how fun it is to give an early-morning presentation when you have an older gentleman in spandex sitting in your audience. Since most of the general public does not fit into one of these two groups, cycling to work will never be popular and should not be subsidized too much.
Anonymous,
How nice of you to make sweeping declarations of "fact" ("cycling to work will never be popular") based on your limited perception of people who ride to work.
Not that it matters to you, but at my place of employment I can think of four people other than myself that cycle to work (there are a lot more, those are just the ones that I have worked directly with), and none of us fit into your two convenient groups. One is a girl, two of them are over thirty, and 90% of the cycling they do is to and from work, and the other one is just like me, a guy with an electrically-assisted bike that just got tired of driving.
Howdy, The Tim and biliruben! Maybe I erred in bringing up anecdotal evidence at the end of my post, since you both went ballistic, responded with your own anecdotal evidence and largely ignored my earlier points. My overall idea that cycling will never become popular was not based solely on my stories of the men in spandex that I work with. I presented four logical reasons why people don't ride bikes to work and aren't likely to in the future that have nothing to do with the state of trails or bike lanes. (And yes, if I can show with reason and/or fact that most people will not choose to ride a bike to work, I can make the "sweeping" leap of logic that it will never become popular.)
I am constantly amazed by public officials and citizens that think that only, if only, our public transit system were just a little more gold-plated, throngs of people would use it. They dismiss study after study that says that the only public transit people want is very flexible, reliable, and leaves from their house every 5 minutes. In other words, they want a car. And they need a car, in many cases. Not to beat a dead horse, but back to my 4th point, you cannot "plan" for every errand, biliruben. After you pick up child #1, #2 and #3 at school or daycare after work, child #1 needs to go to soccer practice, #2 gets dropped off at a sleepover, and #3 suddenly informs you that they need to pick up something at the store for school tomorrow. And tomorrow's schedule will be completely different and just as unpredictable. How do you suggest doing this on bikes or on the bus? Since people need cars, why don't we either try to make cars work, or make buses more like cars? (Trains are probably too inflexible to ever be like a car.) Why don't we improve our already good bus sytem with a BRT system? Why don't we bring our 1989-era freeway system at least up to 1999 or so? Why don't we change the hours of all government offices so that their employees work from, say, 6 to 2, or 10 to 7 instead of 9 to 5? (No one can go to the DOL or the Post Office from 9 to 5 anyway, because they are at work.)
My intention is not to broaden the scope of the discussion quite that far, but there are so many options to correct our transportation problems other than forcing everyone to get on a bike or live where they don't want to. And it will do us no good to throw money at things that people don't want to do and still won't want to do even if it's a "little nicer." It's wasteful of taxpayer dollars and inefficient. Our goal should be to move the most people around as efficiently as possible. Period. It will be a lot easier to accomplish this if we work with inertia (what people want) and not against it. So, if you want to respond to my arguments with logic, I await your comments.
P.S. biliruben---how are you helping to eliminate congestion if you only bike during the summer? Traffic is (relatively) much better during the summer. If everyone who bikes during the summer goes right back to their car for fall/winter/spring, their biking is doing nothing, nada, zero to reduce congestion. And I don't want to sit next to you at a meeting, even if you've "only" biked 4 miles. :>
cycling will never become popular
Actually I don't think either Biliruben or I have tried to argue that improving conditions for cycling will make it "popular." I'm assuming here that to meet your definition of popular, some significant percentage of the population would have to be riding, like 20% or more? I don't think anyone is arguing that improving the cycling infrastructure would result in 20% of people choosing to ride to work. Rather, we're just saying that 3-4 times more people may ride than do right now, if only the infrastructure was there.
I presented four logical reasons why people don't ride bikes to work and aren't likely to in the future that have nothing to do with the state of trails or bike lanes.
And yet, it is a demonstrable fact that some people do choose to ride bikes to work. If your four logical reasons were completely solid, no one would ride, ever. Obviously that's not true. So we see that there's a hole in your argument. I'm saying that if trails and bike lanes were plentiful and in good condition, many more people would ride than do today. Your four logical reasons do nothing to disprove that assertion.
...there are so many options to correct our transportation problems other than forcing everyone to get on a bike...
That's an excellent use of hyperbole, as well as a valiant attempt at setting up a straw man. Nobody is trying to say that we should "force" anyone to get on a bike. But there are people that would willingly get on a bike if the conditions were more favorable. Why shouldn't we improve the situation so that they do?
And it will do us no good to throw money at things that people don't want to do and still won't want to do even if it's a "little nicer."
So, is your position that we should not spend transportation dollars on anything other than cars and roads (and possibly BRT)? If the percentage of the population that chooses some alternate method is small enough, they should just be ignored? I'm just trying to understand your point.
Obviously there's a point at which spending on alternate transportation methods becomes wasteful ($40 per ride, anyone?). But should we really just say "to heck with you" to everyone who is choosing not to drive their cars, and throw all our money into the roads? I think there can be a happy median.
You are setting up the straw man, The Tim, not I. It is blindingly obvious that I know that a few people ride bikes to work. I brought up the guys in spandex, remember? Of course I was speaking in generalities when I said that "people" (in general) do not ride their bikes to work. And then I proceeded to lay out the reasons why (most) people do not ride to work, will never choose to ride a bike to work, and how it is actually quite logical that they choose other options. Prove to me (and all other taxpayers), through reason and/or fact that you would get a 3-4 fold increase in ridership by making a commute-friendly bike transit system. I don't think you will because there are so many other reasons not to ride a bike, especially in Seattle. Until you answer those arguments, spending money only on a hope that there will be more riders is almost guaranteed to be a waste of people's hard earned money. (Again, I mean "people" in general. :>) After the monorail fiasco (and other transit fiascos in this area), the people of this region need guaranteed results, not some pie-in-the-sky hopes. I want to spend money on transit that works. It should get people (and goods---ever tried to deliver a fridge on a bike?) around the area effiiciently, yet retain as much flexiblility as possible. Period. Right now, that looks like buses and cars.
I am new to the site. I found this site in my efforts to understand more about what is being done to better the current alternatives for commuting across 520 (Seattle to Microsoft). I am concerned about the future of our environment and I am concerned about the future of our economy partially based on peak oil.
I believe that investments in non-oil consuming or reduced oil consuming transportation alternatives need to be aggressively investigated and pursued.
IMHO, which is very humble since I have very little facts to base them upon, I would like to see Seattle and the Eastside become more Moped friendly.
As for biking to work: I consider myself to be fit but given the length of my commute, the weather and the lack of daylight, riding a bike is not an option.
As per the bus: I require more flexibility than the bus offers. I start my day very early (4am) and the bus is not available or timely enough.
Riding a motorcycle across 520: I do not want to be one of the many motorcycle riders I see on 520 every evening. I think that riding a motorcycle surrounded by motorists coming from a long day of work and fighting grid lock is a recipe for bad things.
So there it is. I would like to see inverstments in infrastructure to encourage commuters to drive small electric vehicles or mopeds that travel no faster than 25mph. Did you know that Seattle has the most mopeds per capita than any other city in the US? And still the top 2 dealers in the city sell only a combined 450 units per year.
The fuel source is important, but without the infrastructure in place to allow a relatively safe way to ride a moped or drive a tiny electric car these alternatives are dead in the water (no pun intended)
I think every man should cycle to work and in SPANDEX, there's nothing better to get everyone revving for day than seeing a nice flopping willy. If you've got it then show it. Get out of your SUV's and live a little ~ be primal it's good for you! :)
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