The start of some good news

I looked at this site and saw that there is a person with the title of "Anti-Sprawl Program Coordinator" by the name of Yaakov Garb. A further Google search finds that the only references are to this guy. Wish there were a few more.

Congress Calls On President To Act on Bicycle Problem

From the BOB-List

(AP) Citing the steeply rising cost of high quality bicycle gruppos, Congress called on the president to take action to bring down the cost of high quality bicycles for ordinary Americans. "The cost of bicycles for the American public is an issue of national security", Senator Charles Schumer stated. "What we have not heard from the President is a clear plan to make sure reasonably priced bicycles are affordable to all Americans." President Bush issued an order to immediately halt the federal stockpiling of vintage bicycle parts for the Strategic Bicycle Reserve. Experts believe this will have only a minimal impact on the cost of good bicycles for the average commuter.

Bicycle Statistics from around the world.

Interesting juxtaposition of statistics. Confirms my impressions.

From Portland, with some thing for all of us.

Actually, this comes from Washington, D.C. but it originates with Senator Ron Wyden of Oregon. It would allow "an incentive created in the Transportation Equity Act for the 21st Century that enables their employers to pay for their bus or subway ride". The article also notes that "car parking can also treated as a tax-free benefit for employees, so this bill is especially important".

In Missouri, we can take note of this and email our own Senators Bond and Talent in support of this measure. Kansans should contact Senators Pat Roberts and Sam Brownback.

Why we invented the Dope Slap!!

Proving once again that Graham Parker was right when he said, "Some people are in charge of pens that shouldn't be in charge of brooms."

Anyone know a minister who rides?

Let's get this going here. Of course, my bike doesn't need a blessing. It IS a blessing.

Great Commuter Advice

From a true cycling hero, the holder of the single-speed record for the Great Divide Mountain Bike Race, the Commuting Program Director for the Bicycle Alliance of Washington. While we're at it check out this from one of my favorite cycling magazines, Dirt Rag.

Brunei, Chile, Costa Rica, Cuba (!), Denmark, Kuwait, Portugal, and Slovenia.

What do these countries have in common with the US? They all tied for 27th in the World Health Organization's 2005 world health report.

These countries ranked ahead of the US: Andorra, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Cyprus, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Iceland, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, Malta, Monaco, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, San Marino, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom.

Thanks to Todd Kuzma at Tullio's Blog for this bit.

Bike lanes slowly emerging

Looks like a little bit of BikeKC is becoming visible. I've seen three short segments of striped/signed bike lane three places. Anyone spot any others?

1. Pennsylvannia Street between 12th and 14th, in Downtown on Quality Hill.
2. NW Barry Road, between I-29 and NW Prairie View, in front of Zona Rosa.
3. North Congress Ave., south of Barry Rd. and near Park Hill High School.

The latter two are scheduled for more road construction, so we should see the bike lanes extended.

Accused of taking ourselves too seriously...

Can we get Screenland to show this?

When the Streets Attack

Local cyclist Dustin recently spent an afternoon in the ER after falling victim to a bad drainage grate on Broadway Boulevard at Truman Road. The grate at fault used to have crossbars, and Dustin notes another grate nearby that is starting to fail. He has reported the hazard to the city's Action Center, but be careful on Broadway for now.

Dustin's story (PDF).

KCMO and MoDOT will reimburse a motorist if they can prove that their car was damaged by a pothole. I wonder if a cyclist could file a similar claim for bike damage and/or medical bills incurred by a road hazard?

Biking in Copenhagen

Great 20-minute documentary on Copenhagen, Denmark's bike policy. The statistics there are amazing, but they note that it the current situation is the result of 50 or even 100 years of work.

Video and city bike plan info

• 30% of trips to work occur on a bike, with a goal of 40% in the future
  
• 25% of the city's transportation budget is spent on bike facilities
  
• 90% of residents own bikes

Thats What We're Talking About!!

I wonder if there's anyone here in KC holding public office with that kind of vision.

"In "honor" of the upcoming, dreaded Tax Day (April 15), Sunday's Road Crew column will examine an oft-neglected group of commuters -- those traveling to and from work by bicycle -- and whether proposals to give them a tax break have any merit. Mentioned in the column is a Washington Twp. man who, every so often, cycles the 50-mile round trip between his office in Somerville. Kind of puts the rest of us to shame."

Proof that the rest of the world is ahead of us

Paseo Bridge--the next step

We have been working on a new metro-wide policy for bike/ped access on major river crossings.

This was all brought to pass by the planned construction of a new Paseo bridge over the Missouri River.

Bicycle & pedestrian advocates and planners in the region realized that this will be the only chance within perhaps the next 50 years to create a bike/ped friendly crossing of the Missouri River anywhere near downtown Kansas City.

The River Crossings Policy task force is moving forward with the general region-wide policy.

Now the next step is moving forward on the Paseo bridge project.

Open houses scheduled for May 9 at NKC Community Center and May 11 at Garrison Community Center in Columbus Park.

Even a few people showing up at these meetings to speak for bicycle and pedestrian accommodation would make a huge impact on the whole process. Please plan to be there if you can.

Comments on the Draft EIS will be accepted through May 22, 2006 and may be submitted to the FHWA and MoDOT through the following means:

- Via mail to: I-29/I-35 Draft EIS, c/o HNTB, 715 Kirk Drive, KCMO 64105

- Via e-mail to: i29i35EIS@hntb.com

Even a simple statement via email is helpful: "I support bicycle and pedestrian access across the Missouri River and on all local roads crossing the proposed Paseo project."


Relevant excerpts from the EIS:

16. Plans for suitable pedestrian and bicycle access upon streets crossing I-29/35 and
I-35/70 will be considered during the design of the interchanges and bridges where
warranted by land use.

17. MoDOT will support the future creation of a bicycle and pedestrian connection across
the Missouri River on the Heart of America Bridge, M-9, in conjunction with local master
plans. This project may be funded by local or regional transportation sources."

More info at these web sites:

http://www.downtownkc.org/content.aspx?pgID=894
http://www.modot.org/kansascity/major_projects/documents/A_Summary.pdf

[Thanks to Eric for the tip.]

As we were saying...

Reporter Karen Dillon, in this morning's KC Star points out that, as a city, we are unprepared for higher gas prices at the level of $4-6 per gallon. 11 cities in the 50 largest were ranked worse.

Even Mell Henderson, director of transportation with MARC stated, "I think right now in our community we sort of assume people have a car, and it is sort of laid out in a way that it only makes sense if you have a car,” Henderson said. “We have to rethink how our community is constructed so there are more places that we can get to either by foot or on bicycle.”

The story on the study is available at SustainLane which seems another great resource to which I will put a link on this blog.

Transit in Denver vs. KC

All transit operators in the Kansas City area combined carry about 45,000 passengers per day.

In Denver it is 265,000 per day.

So what's up? Is the Denver metro area six times bigger?

Not exactly. The Denver metro area is 2.2 million while KC is 1.8 million.

Maybe they are just six times smarter?