Illustration by Danny Hellman
Also in this issue:
>>10 things Bay Area cyclists should know
>>Don't Stop: Bike lessons from Idaho
There's a strange dichotomy facing bicycling in San Francisco, and it's spelled out in the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency's "2007 Citywide Bicycle Counts Report," which features a cover photo of Mayor Gavin Newsom and me pedaling up Market Street together on Bike to Work Day two years ago.
That photo, its context, and the information contained in the report tell the story of a city that at one time set the pace for facilitating bicycling as a viable alternative to the automobile. But that city has been passed up since then by cities such as Chicago, New York, Washington DC, Seattle, and Portland, Ore.
San Francisco still has a higher per-capita rate of bicycle use than any major city in the United States, and that number has been steadily rising in recent years, even as construction of new bike facilities has stalled. The report's survey found a 15 percent increase since the first official bicycle count was conducted in 2006.
"This increase is especially significant when viewed in light of the injunction against the City's Bicycle Plan. This injunction has stopped the City from installing any new bicycle facilities since June 2006. Despite a lack of improvement or additions to the City's bicycle route network, cycling use in San Francisco appears to be increasing," the report read.
It'll take at least another year for city officials to wrap up the environmental studies on the 56 proposed bike projects and get Judge Peter Busch to lift the injunction (see "Stationary biking," 5/16/07). But it's still an open question whether San Francisco's three-year hiatus will be followed by the rapid installation of new bike lanes and other facilities.
City officials express confidence, and there are some hopeful signs. Newsom has been focused on environmental initiatives, the MTA has beefed up its bike staff from six full-time slots to nine, advocacy groups like San Francisco Bicycle Coalition are at the peak of their numbers and influence, and all involved say promoting bicycling is a cheap, effective way of reducing greenhouse gas emissions, air pollution, and traffic congestion.
"I'd be very surprised if, within six months after the injunction being lifted, we don't see a record number of bike lanes striped," said MTA spokesperson Judson True.
Yet there are still political barriers to overcome in a city where cars are the dominant transportation option — and the first barrier is Mayor Newsom. He has yet to show a willingness to back his green rhetoric with policies that actually take space from cars, which many of the bike lane projects will entail.
"I think we have seen this mayor talk big on some environmental problems, but I've been disappointed that on transportation, that thinking hasn't been turned into action yet," ...
Cyclists need to build political power that is independent of the SFBC and their dependent relationship with MTA staff which is capable of calling paid activists and city staff on their poor choices and lack of effectiveness.
CA Law requires a bike plan every 5 years. This is the 2002 Bike Plan Update. We should have finalized the 2007 bike plan already and be working on the 2012 bike plan. Yet we are still trying to push through the 1997 Bike Plan network. The MTA Bike program needs to adapt a parallel
Seriously, over the past 7 years, cyclists would have had better outcomes had we flipped a coin to determine which path forward. Either we can continue forward following failure or we can learn and adapt to external impediments. That cannot happen so long as we're constrained by internal stuctural impediments and folks who are leading us down dead ends continue to get paid to do so.
-marc
The MTA Bike program needs to adapt a parallel planning process where they can have three plans in various stages of development, wrapping one up, in the middle of the second and starting on the third. Carving a plan in granite and putting a nice cloth over it and sitting on it until it passes is not a save or viable strategy. We're seeing a fixation on the 1997 network while intersections and street segments that are dangerous remain addressed. This is not acceptable.
-marc
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