The TDM Professional

World Bikesharing Leader Paris Aims for Carsharing Lead Too

In a story out of the Associated Press this week (Paris Eyes Electric Car Sharing Plan, July 28, 2008, by Gaelle Faure) we learn that Paris Mayor Bertrand Delanoe, who brought the wildly successful 16,000 count, 200,000 member Velib' bikesharing service to his City, wants to bring carsharing to his City too. And he wants to start with 4,000 electric vehicles no less. Program start in 2009/10. We love this guy!

And the name? Autolib' of course. The service will be run by the City. The plan has it's critics who don't want to see any car use encouraged. But we know that studies show that carsharing actually cuts car use, increases the use of options like transit and encourages people to get rid of cars or forgo buying them altogether. That's exactly what program advocates want - to discourage Parisians who don't have vehicles from even thinking of buying one.

This is one mayor who knows how to fight traffic and pollution.

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Chris Hamilton is the Commuter Services Chief for Arlington County, manager of CommuterPageBlog and The TDM Professional blog and is a biking/Metrorail commuter from Alexandria, Virginia just outside of Washington, D.C.

Can Other Cities Have What Portland Has?

That's the question posed to Mia Birk, Portland's first Bike Coordinator by CBS Sunday Morning reporter Serena Altschul after spending some time there. Says Birk:

"I'll just challenge your viewers to think about substituting one trip a week that they normally take by car, try it on a bike," Birk said. "Try a short trip that's 2 miles or less." According to a recent federal study, that's 40% of all urban trips in America. "See how much easier it is than you think it is," Birk said. "Just try it."

The excellent 10-minute plus story spends some time with Portland's Mayor-elect Sam Adams, who is said to have "rode to victory on a bicycle platform." In the last ten years the number of trips made by bike in Portland is up 150% and is now six percent of all trip. "And it makes me proud because, you know, imagine all the smog we're not producing with these bikes trips. Imagine all the health improvements" says the Mayor-elect.

Can any city catch up with Portland?

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Chris Hamilton is the Commuter Services Chief for Arlington County, manager of CommuterPageBlog and The TDM Professional blog and is a biking/Metrorail commuter from Alexandria, Virginia just outside of Washington, D.C.

Online Directions for Bikes, Peds and Transit Coming Soon?

A few articles/posts last week bring us information that with the high cost of gasoline, and more people looking for options to driving, that people are looking for 'how to get there from here' map information for walking, biking and transit just like they've been getting for driving for years.

On Yahoo a story out of Philadelphia (Bikers, Pedestrians Seeking Better Better Web Maps, July 25, 2008, by Patrick Walters, AP), which also appeared in this morning's Express, says that Google, MapQuest and others are experimenting and working with groups or cities to solve the technical issues with overlaying detailed information for biking and walking onto existing map systems. Apparently not always that easy. Walkers and bikers can go places cars can't and this complicates matters. Therefore mapmakers are more reliant on community knowledge than they've been with driving directions.

Over at the Google Maps 'Bike There' blog, whose mission is to prod the Google Maps team to work on adding bike directions, we find a Beta "Ride The City" (NYC) site that tries to help bicyclists get riding directions using Google maps data.

The Google Lat Long Blog says that beginning on July 22 Google Maps lets you tell it that you want walking directions (Pound the Pavement, July 22, 2008). This is a Beta version and I couldn't get either the Directions by Public Transit or Walking when I put in local information. But it is working in Seattle. Figures.

Google Transit is coming to more and more cities, but still isn't in our area. Despite strong interest by the Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation, WMATA, and some local agencies it seems that the hold-up is the agreements between Google and these folks. Google wants to make it clear to the public that the information they supply is only as good as the data they get from the transit agencies. For some reason this gives the agencies pause. Meanwhile the traveling public waits. Come on guys lets get this going!

Bottom line, "The easier you make it for people...the more they're going to do it" says Joe Minott, Executive Director of Philly's Clean Air Council in reference to why these new maps are needed. I couldn't have said it better. Maybe in a couple years when you go to Google Maps or MapQuest, and you ask for directions, it will automatically ask you if you'd like walking, biking and transit directions as well as by car. Let's hope this day comes soon.

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Chris Hamilton is the Commuter Services Chief for Arlington County, manager of CommuterPageBlog and The TDM Professional blog and is a biking/Metrorail commuter from Alexandria, Virginia just outside of Washington, D.C.

The Portland Affect: More Bicycling is Coming

The mainstream media is catching on. Now can any other city catch up to Portland, Oregon?

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Chris Hamilton is the Commuter Services Chief for Arlington County, manager of CommuterPageBlog and The TDM Professional blog and is a biking/Metrorail commuter from Alexandria, Virginia just outside of Washington, D.C.

Biking, Hungarian Style

We love it. From the CarFreeUSA blog we find this Hungarian Bike To Work ad that somehow reminds me of an old Love, American Style skit (I date myself I know). The CarFreeUSA people say the ad roughly translates to "Honey, why don't you bike to work?" In any language the point is easy to understand. Enjoy.

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Chris Hamilton is the Commuter Services Chief for Arlington County, manager of CommuterPageBlog and The TDM Professional blog and is a biking/Metrorail commuter from Alexandria, Virginia just outside of Washington, D.C.

Hope for Change on Bikes as Transportation

From the Carfree USA Blog we learn that bicycle advocates are gaining respect with the federal government in a story from Congressional Quarterly's CQ Politics (Bicycle Campaign Gears Up for Campaign Cycle, By Colby Itkowitz, July 1, 2008). Two items seem to give bike proponents cause for optimism that bicycling will gain expanded federal funding in the future.

The first is Presidential Candidate Barack Obama's commitment to bicyclists. Says Executive Director of the Bikes Belong Coalition  Tim Blumenthal of a recent meeting Mr. Obama had with him and other bike advocacy groups:

“It was an important coming-out moment for the bike industry in terms of political sophistication,” said Blumenthal, the executive director of the Bikes Belong Coalition, a nonprofit advocacy group based in Boulder, Colo. “Never in my memory has a biking event with a presidential candidate happened.”

The presidential candidate told the group he doesn't usually make promises, but that they could count on his support. The second item for hope says Congressional Quarterly is:

“Next year, Congress is slated to write a new highway bill, which is already being touted as embodying the greatest overhaul of federal transportation policy since President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed the Interstate Highway Act into law half a century ago. Bicycling advocates are hoping to build on a significant set of wins in the current highway law, written in 2005 — including new initiatives to fund “complete streets,” the term for new road projects outfitted with dedicated bike lanes — and arguing to step up federal funding to encourage bike commuting.”

With the potential for change in Washington with this year's elections and the rewriting of the next federal transportation bill slated for next year, bicycle advocates are hoping that their time has come to be taken seriously as a transportation option. Bike fans will want to read the entire article. Enjoy!

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Chris Hamilton is the Commuter Services Chief for Arlington County, manager of CommuterPageBlog and The TDM Professional blog and is a biking/Metrorail commuter from Alexandria, Virginia just outside of Washington, D.C.

Real Estate Agents Discover Walk Score

I was in one of my most favorite walkable cities on vacation last week, Portland, no not that Portland but the one in Maine, and I came across this article (Walk-Friendly Neighborhoods Gain Appeal, by Patricia V. Rivera, June 20, 2008*) in the Portland Press Harold Sunday Real Estate Section that rang true. The thrust of the article is that to have greater access to exercise options and to reduce one's reliance on driving a car, more and more homeowners and renters place a high value on the "walkability" of where they choose to live.

The article goes on to say that the Google enabled WalkScore.com web site (How Walkable Is Your Neighborhood?, July 18, 2007) has become a popular place for consumers and now Real Estate agents in helping them figure out a home's walkability. Walk Score co-creator Matt Lerner is quoted as saying of the site, which receives 100,000 visits a day, "Increasingly, it's a tool for real estate agents. We hope to see more listings that read 2 bedrooms, 1 bathroom, 1,200 square feet, Walk Score 90," he says.

We've been discussing these ideas for some time and we're happy to see that the mainstream media is picking up these themes too. It shows that increasingly people are looking at more than curb appeal and the bottom line when choosing where to live and are taking into account the ability to walk places rather than hop in a car to get everywhere. And that's a good thing for all of us.

* Note the article in the link is for the same article printed a couple of weeks earlier in Seattle. Thus a different title, but the exact same article.

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Chris Hamilton is the Commuter Services Chief for Arlington County, manager of CommuterPageBlog and The TDM Professional blog and is a biking/Metrorail commuter from Alexandria, Virginia just outside of Washington, D.C.

Ciclovia Comes To North America

Ciclovia, that wonderful concept we've shared about before (Ciclovia en Bogota, March 19, 2008; Could Bogota's Example Lead to Ciclovia: Metro Washington, D.C.?, December 8, 2007; Another Car-Free Idea From Mexico City, August 2, 2007), where local governments close down the streets to cars and open them up to bikes and pedestrians, has just had a very successful debut in North America. Guess where? Portland, Oregon of course. Monday's front page story in the Oregonian says it all (For Six Hours on Sunday, Cars are Banned on Six Miles of North Portland's Streets, Leaving Them to Walkers, Cyclists, Joggers and In-line Skates, by Dylan Rivera, June 23, 2008).

We learned from our own Diane Stanton Kean (No Car Zone...In NYC?!, June 19, 2008) last week that New York City is doing something similar later this summer (Where the Streets Have No Cars, June 18, 2008, Wall Street Journal) and San Francisco is also planning to do the same (Proposal Would Turn Streets into Recreational Spaces, May 12, 2008, Examiner). Shouldn't our area do the same?

Ciclovia seems like something that could bring our region together and encourage people to try biking and walking more. We need to become a world-wide leader in options to driving alone. This kind of program could build upon the good walk and bike facilities we have and lead to even more good things. Is 2009 to early for our first Ciclovia?

Thanks to CarFreeUSA blog for the tip.

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Chris Hamilton is the Commuter Services Chief for Arlington County, manager of CommuterPageBlog and The TDM Professional blog and is a biking/Metrorail commuter from Alexandria, Virginia just outside of Washington, D.C.

The Carbon Emissions of Biking vs. Driving

Just in time for Bike To Work Day this Friday, May 16, the Sierra Club's Answer Guy Hey Mr. Green puts to rest the silly notion that fueling a bike (by feeding a person food that has been grown with fossil fuel inputs and transported to the consumer) is worse for the environment than fueling a car (Is Driving Better Than Cycling, April 29, 2008). Says Hey Mr. Green:

"Of course it takes some energy to make and propel a bike, but nowhere near what's required to make and propel cars that weigh 70 or 80 times as much and demand vastly greater energy for maintenance, from oil changes to tires to new fenders and grilles when they get banged up."

Now that we've cleared that up, we hope to see you out on the trails on the 16th. I'll be riding to the Rosslyn pit stop. With 26 pit stops in all, there should be one close to your home or office. Its not too late to sign up to participate. See you on Friday!

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Chris Hamilton is the Commuter Services Chief for Arlington County, manager of CommuterPageBlog and The TDM Professional blog and is a biking/Metrorail commuter from Alexandria, Virginia just outside of Washington, D.C.

London's Two-Wheel Transformation

In an article titled "City's two-wheel transformation" of the UK's The Guardian, London's mayor, Ken Livingstone, is quoted saying, "We want nothing short of a cycling transformation in London. We are announcing the biggest investment in cycling in London's history, which will mean that thousands more Londoners can cycle in confidence, on routes that take them quickly and safely to where they want to go." This investment in cycling includes $800M for the conversion of existing city streets into dedicated bicycle "super-cycleways" with the goal of increasing bicycling by 400% by 2025.

According to the article, the super-cycleways will link residential areas to the city center. The routes that have been selected "are based on a 12-month study of the most popular roads already used by cyclists and will have continuous, wide cycle lanes, dedicated junctions and clear signs."

"Planners hope the changes will encourage a 'critical mass' of cyclists to use the routes, creating a safe and accessible environment as well as cutting congestion and pollution across London."

Imagine Arlington with bicycle super-cycleways. These bike facilities wouldn't just be for fast riding, but for all cyclists and would accommodate people enjoying the day with a slow bike ride, running errands, and children riding to school. I'm sure more people would bike in Arlington with dedicated bike streets, where there were fewer potential conflicts with motorists. Afterall, safety is key and dedicated bikeways are the best way to ensure this.

by Paul DeMaio, BikeArlington

In an article titled "City's two-wheel transformation" of the UK's The Guardian, London's mayor, Ken Livingstone, is quoted saying, "We want nothing short of a cycling transformation in London. We are announcing the biggest investment in cycling in London's history, which will mean that thousands more Londoners can cycle in confidence, on routes that take them quickly and safely to where they want to go." This investment in cycling includes $800M for the conversion of existing city streets into dedicated bicycle "super-cycleways" with the goal of increasing bicycling by 400% by 2025.

According to the article, the super-cycleways will link residential areas to the city center. The routes that have been selected "are based on a 12-month study of the most popular roads already used by cyclists and will have continuous, wide cycle lanes, dedicated junctions and clear signs."

"Planners hope the changes will encourage a 'critical mass' of cyclists to use the routes, creating a safe and accessible environment as well as cutting congestion and pollution across London."

Imagine Arlington with bicycle super-cycleways. These bike facilities wouldn't just be for fast riding, but for all cyclists and would accommodate people enjoying the day with a slow bike ride, running errands, and children riding to school. I'm sure more people would bike in Arlington with dedicated bike streets, where there were fewer potential conflicts with motorists. Afterall, safety is key and dedicated bikeways are the best way to ensure this.

by Paul DeMaio, BikeArlington