Tag: advocacy

Dealing with the four-wheeled foe

February 23, 2012 / / 0 Comments

My comment on the Streetfilms post. 

First, Streetfilms’s Clarence Eckerson posts a video showing Mazda’s support for the movie “Lorax”, which is based on the Dr. Seuss book about destroying the environment.

Then, I commented on Bikes Belong’s partnership with Volkswagen that was announced almost a month ago but I had just found the news yesterday.

It’s about as crappy as Bikes Belong partnering with Volkswagen.
In January 2012 they announced a “two-year partnership to help develop biking-friendly communities, foster healthy lifestyles and create a cleaner environment.”
I thought Volkswagen’s job was to market its cars, but it seems now it will market its goodwill which must have a calculable impact on increased car sales.

Bike Portland and road.cc both wrote about it. One commenter, Hart Noecker, wrote on Bike Portland:

Agreed. They recognize their oncoming irrelevance and are trying to re-image their brand while still promoting unsustainable automobiles that incentivize McStripmall sprawl.

And “9watts” replied:

As someone who has long felt that VW offered some of the most fuel efficient cars available, and was therefore to be lauded, patronized, etc. I’m inclined to agree with Hart. VW is really good at selling cars, and their commitment to fuel economy (which is a far cry from what we need now: a phaseout of car-dom, which isn’t going to come from the car industry anymore than a phaseout of coal consumption is going to come from the electric utilities) is only skin deep.

Crumbs for bikes, and a slick PR move that might even help them sell more cars. Never underestimate the middle class’s eagerness to swallow feel-good nostrums.

Today it seems the pact is getting attention again, brought to the forefront by the Mazda + Lorax (Universal films) deal – at least among a few people I follow on Twitter. Hopefully for its inanity. Car manufacturers, the bull in the china shop as Mikael of Copenhagenize talks about it, have been shutting down bicycles as a mode of transportation for decades. They’ve even thrown support behind making jaywalking criminal.

The Volkswagen deal with Bikes Belong is nothing more than buying goodwill. If there was a store for companies looking to improve their environmentally friendly image, partnerships with cycling advocacy organizations would be in aisle one.

As they are a company interested in making money by selling cars, I’d like someone to help me understand if there are any other reasons they should promote cycling (which they admit reduces congestion and lowers a traveler’s impact on the environment). Maybe they want to start selling bikes?

Car culture is carnage culture. The way out is a balanced transportation system that focuses the highest investments into sustainable and efficient modes, and one that educates system users on the costs and benefits of each mode, for every trip. Photo by ATOMIC Hot Links.

Too much talking, not enough documenting

November 18, 2011 / / 0 Comments

I took this photo for several reasons: to show a sidewalk reconstruction project that forces people to walk in the street; to show that people bicycling will advance from where I took this photo to the location across Grand Avenue to get a “head start” on cycling across Halsted Street to Milwaukee Avenue. 

Or doing.

I talk to a lot of people about cycling in Chicago and they’ve good stories to share. Stories about positive experiences they’ve had, about negative experiences, or of problems they’ve seen others encounter. I always encourage people to do something about this experience. My advice almost always involves them documenting it in some way; things like reporting a bike crash to the police, even afterwards, or taking a photo of a major pothole. I might suggest they write down their thoughts to share privately with close friends. Or it might be as simple as calling 311 to report an abandoned bike.*

There are lots of things that we want to change. Keeping track of what they are can help focus energy on making that change happen. (That’s why I carry my camera with me at all times outside my home.) One way I’ve started to document and share is by writing about the good and “needs improvement” parts of Chicago transportation on my new blog, Grid Chicago.

If you cycle in Chicago, I implore you to attend the Streets for Cycling planning meetings – the first one is December 10th – so you can express your concerns and desires. There are one hundred other ways to be involved in supporting a change in Chicago, and I might be able to link you one you’re interested in.

Note: The CTA has started several online efforts to collect feedback from and communicate with customers, but they’ve always collected feedback through their email address, feedback@transitchicago.com, where they always respond. These new efforts are Facebook, Budget Ideas, and Twitter.

Let’s do this for bike crashes: I guess I’ll start a bike crash documentation project right now (January 5, 2012). Write up a report and share me a link, or leave a comment on one of these pages:

Another person bicycles across Grand Avenue to get that head start. 

*These are all things I do, but I encourage everyone to think creatively and do what interests them.

Lawyer Jim’s bike light recommendation

July 27, 2011 / / 0 Comments

At Monday’s Moving Design meeting, Lawyer Jim Freeman spoke about bicycling, bike crashes, and the law.

“Be conspicuous” is half his motto. (I forgot the other half.)

During Q&A, I asked Jim, “If I had $20 to buy a bike light, which one should I buy?”

Jim had no trouble answering that bicyclists should have something at least as capable as the Planet Bike Beamer 3. I agree. It has three LEDs, comes with batteries, has a flashing mode, is easy to mount on your handlebars, and really costs just $20. Ride legally at night in the State of Illinois with it!

I’m a huge fan of Planet Bike products, as you’ll see on my bicycle product reviews page.

More information

Bike to work week now, but what about next week?

June 14, 2011 / / 0 Comments

Groupon mentioned on its blog that 126 employees rode to their Chicago office Monday.

Since the city has a goal of having 5% of trips under 5 miles by bicycle*, how do we ensure those same 126 employees ride their bike next week? Or tomorrow even!

With more of this:

A protected bike lane on Kinzie Street. These have been shown to reduce the number of crashes as well as slow down car traffic.

And some of this:

A family riding their bikes on Prospect Park West in Brooklyn, New York City. This bikeway is unique because it has both directions and is protected from traffic by parked cars. Photo by Elizabeth Press.

We’ll also need some left turn bays for bicyclists:

This will help cyclists make safer left turns across intersections. As seen in Amsterdam, The Netherlands.

Then we’ll see this:

Happy people riding together in our neighborhoods. With lights at night, for sure.

Oh, we’ll probably need additional bike parking, like this station at Amsterdam Zuid station (think Chicago’s Union Station or New York City’s Penn Station):

Free, underground, double-decker bike parking.

*We’re probably somewhere between 0.5% and 1.5% (of trips under 5 miles by bike). No data’s actually available on this; not for the baseline year of 2006 and most likely will not be available for the goal year, 2015.

Let’s keep talking about protected bike lanes

May 27, 2011 / / 0 Comments

Rahm Emanuel was sworn in as mayor on May 16th, 2011.

On page 36 of the Chicago 2011 Transition Report (PDF) is a 100-day deadline for IDENTIFYING the first two miles of protected bike lanes.

That 100-day deadline is August 24, 2011.

You’ve read about my thoughts on CDOT’s plan for a Stony Island cycle track, my list of 13 locations for protected bike lanes (like Clybourn and Grand Avenues), and now Alderman Moreno’s F-bomb about parking preventing a protected bike lane on Milwaukee Avenue through Wicker Park.

And the latest news comes from Alderman Maldonado and the 26th Ward offices’s partnership with Humboldt Park Advisory Council, the Healthy Kids, Healthy Communities, and the Active Transportation Alliance. At this meeting on Wednesday night, the consultant, Sam Schwartz Engineering (SSE), presented its proposals to make the street network in and surrounding the park safer, mainly by creating pedestrian refuge islands, protected bike lanes, and slowing car traffic.  I never blogged about the Chicago Department of Transportation’s plan to calm traffic on the north-south Humboldt Drive, but John Greenfield discussed this road diet. To the disappointment of some residents, including myself, the road diet will not include any bike facilities, especially not this two-way cycle track I designed.

SSE displayed proposals for protected bike lanes and a road diet on a future version of Humboldt Drive from Palmer Square to Augusta Boulevard, and on Division Street between California Avenue and Central Park Avenue. I asked if they will share their slideshow online.

This is how some people voted. There were four identical poster boards. It’s up to SSE to count the votes. As you can see, because of the differing dollar amounts, votes are weighted. I put $50 on one and $30 on another ($20+$10).


This design will not be happening, nor will any bikeway appear on this street because “it doesn’t connect with the bikeway network.” But there’s a bike lane on Augusta Boulevard just two blocks south of Division Street! It’s a bad excuse. People ride on streets without bikeways all the time.

WE HAVE TO KEEP TALKING ABOUT THIS ISSUE.