Change.gov is a new website set up by the the Obama transition team to “begin in the earnest work of making sure that the world we leave to our children is just a little bit better than the one we inhabit today.” You’ll find a link on the top menu called “American Moment.” Click that. Then click “Share Your Vision.”
I can’t tell you what to write. But I’ll tell you what I wrote: I proposed that the United States begin building an active transportation infrastructure similar to the one the Dutch enjoy — one that demonstrates that cycling and walking are superior modes of transportation compared to automobiles. My reasoning: 1) Better for the environment, 2) Better for our health, and 3) Sustainable. I also threw in that such a system is a bit more civilized than the one we have now. And, not that I’m trying to be David Hembrow’s North American PR agent, I did list his website as a resource.
Do you have a vision for America?
I’d love it if Carbon Trace readers would post something about bicycle commuting.
Will this do any good? Is this nothing more than a feel-good gesture? I have no idea. But it’s worth a shot.
UPDATE: Commute Orlando reports that “Oregon’s Earl Blumenaur and Minnesota’s Jim Oberstar are on the short list for US Secretary of Transportation. Both are avid cyclists and long-time proponents of federal cycling programs.”
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You and I both understand that a lot has to be changed culturally to a sustainable lifestyle. Unless we wait for exurbs and suburbs to turn into slums and people to realize that those are the unsustainable means of living, we wont be able to bring about any drastic change.
I appreciate your proposal and you know I agree whole heartedly with it. I also think it is very difficult to achieve in Obama’s first term.
Mine would be to quadruple, if not tenfold the rail infrastructure: commuter and long distance. That will create a domino effect of attractive transit oriented development and reduce the want to own that single family home with a 2 car garage.
You should be being David Hembrow’s North American PR. I know you understand the cultural differences between the Dutch/Danes and North Americans but you must also realize the difference in the geographies of the two countries.
Posted 07 Nov 2008 at 1:47 pm ¶Shek… Yes. A lot has to happen first. And re: rail infrastructure — interesting and excellent point. What I’m suggesting needs to be a bit of a whole new culture/infrastructure. Where do we begin? Perhaps with the big items, e.g. rail. I’m thinking that infrastructure such as they have in the Netherlands will have to be translated to an American context, which includes consideration of geography. And consideration of geography also must include the geography of land ownership.
As to when we might see anything like an effective public/active transportation system, well, let’s just say I hope to live to see it
Posted 07 Nov 2008 at 2:37 pm ¶Thanks for nice words !
You may be interested to know how much integration there is over here between public transport and bicycles. According to the railway company, 40% of train passengers nationwide arrive at the railway station by train:
http://hembrow.blogspot.com/2008/09/train-facts.html
The land ownership issues have had to be dealt with here too. I’m not sure what the Dutch call it, but in the UK there is “compulsory purchase” by which means the government can buy land from people, even their house, compulsorily if something “important” such as a motorway or runway extension has to be built.
The same concept exists in the Netherlands, and here it also applies to building cycle paths. So, if a cycle path is needed, the government can in theory make you an offer you can’t refuse to buy a stretch of your front garden. It’s for the public good, and you get paid for your loss.
Posted 08 Nov 2008 at 2:30 pm ¶Andy,
Did you know that there is a petition being circulated (at least it’s supposed to be at all the bike shops in town) asking the city to create more bike lanes? Not sure who’s behind it, but I suspect it might be Springbike’s advocacy committee.
I signed it this morning.
Posted 08 Nov 2008 at 3:31 pm ¶Tracy… I don’t think it’s from the committee. I’m an unofficial member (I attend as a member of SpringBike), and I don’t recall any discussion of a petition. It could have transpired before I started attending four months ago.
Interesting. I going to look into that. More lanes would be fine with me as long as they are intelligently designed.
Posted 09 Nov 2008 at 1:22 pm ¶For the cost of several miles of bike lane, you could have lots of sharrows, a hell of a “coexist” campaign, do some law enforcement, educate a lot of confident cyclists and create a culture of tolerance and cooperation that would open the entire transportation grid.
Give a man a bike lane, you make him FEEL safe on that road. Teach him to ride with confidence and you give him access to the world. Throw in a little civility and you might actually have a recipe for creating honest mode share.
Bike lanes create more problems than they solve. It’s time for cycling advocates to think outside the lines.
http://commuteorlando.com/advocacy/cfc.html
Posted 10 Nov 2008 at 8:21 pm ¶Keri,
In the US, cycle journeys are around 1% of the total journeys made, while here in the Netherlands they approach 30%.
In the US, 5.8 cyclists are killed per 100 M km cycled, while in the Netherlands the equivalent figure is 1.1.
In the US, 37.5 cyclists are injured per 10 M km cycled, while in the Netherlands the equivalent figure is 1.4.
It’s not only about feeling safe, but genuinely being safe too.
The population of this small country makes more cycle journeys each year than the much larger population of the USA. They do more touring and more racing as well as more shopping and commuting by bike.
Here where there are more cycle paths and lanes than anywhere else in the world we have the highest numbers of cyclists and also the safest cyclists in the world.
It’s not only young, fit adults. Children here have a remarkably degree of freedom too. They ride 10s of kilometres from home on their own, without having to wait for the parents to drive them. Over 65s make 24% of their journeys by bicycle. Also, this is the only country in which women cycle more often than men.
What’s more, the cycle path network is often referred to as having fiscal benefits. It’s much cheaper to build the network than not to build it, as expansion of roads to provide for ever more motorised traffic is far more disruptive and far more expensive than building cyclepaths.
What’s more, it has been calculated that the investment pays back its price many times over in improved health, and therefore reduced medical bills. For instance, obesity is very much less common here than in the US, and all the expense of dealing with such diseases is eliminated.
The only places in the world where there is mass cycling are those where there is good infrastructure for cycling. The safest places in the world to cycle are also those where there is good infrastructure for cycling.
There is an English language meme which encourages cyclists to believe that they are always better off on the roads. For decades, cyclists in English speaking countries have been thinking “outside the lanes” and the decline in cycling in every one of those countries has been very sharp indeed.
The thinking on your website is very confused. Cycle facilities here lead to shorter, more direct routes for cyclists with fewer reasons to stop (traffic lights etc.) than you would have on the road. Design here is for cyclists to have faster journeys than motorists and in this country children still do play on the streets.
It’s quite the reverse here from what you write. The infrastructure here removes motorists from the most direct routes in order to benefit the same people when they are cyclists. There is consensus that this is the correct thing to do. Motorists here don’t grumble because the majority of them are also cyclists.
Posted 11 Nov 2008 at 1:39 am ¶David writes: “The thinking on your website is very confused.”
No David, it’s reality-based. It reflects the reality of the cultural attitudes and land-use patterns of the place I live. A place which is fairly typical of a post-WWII American city.
Our metro area is huge, it sprawls over 4 counties. It’s thousands of miles of roads, many of which are perfectly accommodating of cyclists, and some of which could use a little help.
If we spent billions of dollars to create parallel infrastructure to our system of roads in an effort to make some amygdala-driven, would-be cyclists feel safe, they still would not ride because it would be too hot, too cold, too dark, too many hills, too far… and just so much more convenient to get in the car. I’d rather not play Whack-a-Mole with my tax dollars.
Northern European culture and land use and transit support cycling in a million ways that North America does not. We can’t retrofit our cities with your infrastructure and expect the same result.
Posted 11 Nov 2008 at 2:40 pm ¶@Shek: “I know you understand the cultural differences between the Dutch/Danes and North Americans but you must also realize the difference in the geographies of the two countries.”
It’s not just us Dutch and Danes, Shek. Bern in Switzerland (not particularly flat) and many other ‘geographically challenging’ countries/cities have considerate or even similar biking percentages. You have to agree with me that in most US urban areas, cities big and small, there are ways of implementing bike accommodations.
Similarly, many people disregard the fact that almost 50% of all trips in the US are less than 5 miles long.
Nobody is saying that they need to be replicas of the Dutch or Danish templates, but there are plenty of clues. I wish more people would approach the opportunities in a pragmatic way, instead of dismissing them or bitching about all the supposed obstacles, based on misconceptions or blurring objectives. (not saying that you are one of them)
Posted 11 Nov 2008 at 4:25 pm ¶Keri,
The UK has very comparable density to the Netherlands, but US style car based infrastructure.
The result is that it also has US style car based life-styles.
I believe the opposite result follows from adopting infrastructure which puts cycling first.
It’s quite logical.
It makes not sense to argue that much of it is “perfectly accommodating” to cyclists when virtually everyone doesn’t cycle. If it were so accommodating, people would be out there cycling in much larger numbers.
Posted 11 Nov 2008 at 4:29 pm ¶Amster et. al. …Any system we might create based on European models would have to be translated to an American context. I’d like to be in on the translating. I hope to see the real thing for myself within a year or so
Posted 11 Nov 2008 at 4:47 pm ¶Andy, you know where to find me if you need help with that
Posted 11 Nov 2008 at 5:20 pm ¶