Tag: Dutch

Tucson has every kind of bikeway

March 18, 2010 / / 0 Comments

A bicyclist rides north on the “Highland Avenue” separated bike path on the University of Arizona campus in Tucson, Arizona.

(This is the second post about Tucson, and the fifth about my December 2009 trip to Arizona.)

I had heard that Tucson was a bicycle friendly town. I didn’t know just how friendly until my dad and I rode our bikes around town and  happened onto one of the many bike-only separated paths. You can see the campus bike map (PDF).

There are probably 10 different names for this kind of path. It’s not a separated path because there’s no adjacent roadway accessible to automobiles. You could call it a multi-use trail, but it’s not really a trail. The path is part of the city’s street grid; some streets “dead end” into the entrance so bicyclists don’t have to turn onto another street to go straight, they simply enter this bicycle only path. In some places, the path is grade separated and travels under a shared street.

I like this kind of bikeway a lot. I know they are standard fare in the Netherlands, and it’s nice to know they are standard fare somewhere in North America.

See the full photoset of bikeways in Tucson.

Riding under Speedway Boulevard on the “Warren Avenue” bike path.

Fietsen in Nederland (bicycling in the Netherlands)

September 27, 2009 / / 0 Comments

If you and I have chatted about bicycling in the past six months, I’ve probably mentioned the Dutch in our conversation.

Why?

I want a Dutch bicycle. Explaining this one will take another blog post – compiling all my reasons takes a long time. But in addition to cool bikes, here’re a couple other things they do:

  • They (the Dutch) make bicycling better (safer and easier). More people ride their bikes than drive cars for a majority of trips. They have the lowest cycling injury and fatality rate.
  • They build bicycling infrastructure beyond what I can imagine. Bike highways connect small towns and big cities. 4,000 space parking garages.

I started reading a blog called “A view from the cycle path” written by Briton David Hembrow living in The Netherlands. He writes about bicycling history in the country, posts ridership statistics, discusses his commute, and sends readers to more information about it all.

I also read Marc van Woudenberg’s blog, Amsterdamize. I found it either via Flickr, or via web search, when I looked for other WorkCycles Fr8 owners and users. I want the Fr8 bike (pictured below). I can get one from the local WorkCycles (build their own bikes and sell other manufacturers’) dealer, Dutch Bike Chicago.

Remind me to post my paper and presentation about the past, present and future of bicycle planning in The Netherlands I will submit for my Sustainable Development Techniques class at UIC.