When it comes to bike-oriented cities, Portland, Oregon, is the community that usually comes to mind. And rightfully so: citywide, cyclists make 6 percent of all vehicular trips. That sounds small, but it’s not. In the Rochester region, that number was about 1.1 percent in 2011, according to a survey by the Genesee Transportation Council.
- PHOTO BY JEREMY MOULE
- Earl Blumenauer speaking to the Genesee-Finger Lakes Active Transportation Summit.
It took years of effort, careful planning, and education to get Portland where it is. And city officials’ goal is to increase bicycle trips to 25 percent of all vehicular travels by 2030. (The city’s bicycle counts page is available here.)
House Representative Earl Blumenauer, whose Congressional district includes Portland, says that if his city can become a bicycling mecca, so can Rochester. And Rochester’s path to a more bikeable city may look something like Portland’s. Blumenauer says his city’s efforts began 20 years ago with a bicycle master plan and since that time, the number of people cycling has quadrupled. Blumenauer was Portland’s commissioner of public works at the time.
Rochester completed its first bicycle master plan in January 2011, and it’s been fairly aggressive in implementation. The effort helped the city earn recognition from the League of American Bicyclists as a bronze-level Bicycle Friendly Community.
The Rochester area also has a core of highly engaged cycling and active transportation advocates. In fact, Blumenauer spoke this morning at the Genesee-Finger Lakes Active Transportation Summit (GFLATS for short), which was organized by a coalition of transportation, advocacy, and health groups.
Blumenauer was the event’s keynote speaker and his address focused on two areas: why communities should stress active transportation — not just cycling, but walking and other human-powered ways of getting around — and how Rochester and other communities can increase active transportation.
But much of his address centered on the “why.” Across the country, most trips are made by automobiles carrying a single person. And there are costs associated with that, whether it’s time spent on congested roads, money spent repairing roads, or money spent repairing vehicles damaged caused by worn roads, Blumenauer said.
Portland has built 300 miles of bicycle trails and lanes for the cost of building one mile of urban freeway, he said. And people in the city drive 20 percent less than the national average, which saves the typical family $2,500 a year, he said.
The root of the problem is that people in urban areas don’t have the transportation choices that they used to, he said. He pointed out that Rochester once had a streetcar network.
“We have sentenced [residents] to burn a gallon of gas to buy a gallon of milk,” he told the crowd.
And people across the country are starting to understand the value of “a trip not taken” by automobile, he said. That’s particularly true of younger people, who choose where they live based on quality of life factors, including bikeability and walkability, he said.
This article appears in Apr 24-30, 2013.
I heartily support any/every effort to get more people out of vehicles and onto their feet/bikes. I do my darndest to bike to work as often as possible. It’s good exercise, as well as giving me time to get me head in the right place.
Anybody who’s got eyes and has been paying attention is aware of our growing obesity problem. This would help with that also.
Rochester is NOT Portland. Even though Portland gets planty of rain, and cyclists there don’t mind riding in it, they rarely get extremely cold weather or snow – unlike Rochester. Rochester can be a bike-friendly city as long as it’s kept in the perspective that people will only ride bikes about half of the year and only in good weather.
Toby, in past years, you were right – I was part of a very small group riding in Rochester in the winter, and I did not do so consistently. However, that is changing – this year I commuted to work and ran errands almost every day on my bicycle, with studded snow tires. More significantly, I saw many cyclists out on the streets along with me. Not thousands, or even hundreds, yet – but dozens.
Rochester is not Portland, as you point out. We are much more like Minneapolis and Boston, two other very active year-round cycle transportation communities, in our winter challenges. (In fact, I would claim that Rochester is between those two cities in winter cycling environment.)
It is true that for Rochester to be a more attractive year-round cycling city some changes will have to be made.
Snow removal on major cycle routes must be done to accommodate bicycles as well as automobiles. Winter storms here result in snow and ice obstructing the parts of the road that cyclists normally use; we are forced then to occupy (legally, I might add) the same narrowed lanes used by automobiles. I really don’t mind, but other cyclists may be intimidated, and automobile traffic is certainly slowed by my presence.
Traffic signals will need to be modified to be able to detect bicycles. While it is “feasible” (albeit awkward, inconvenient, and somewhat dangerous) for a cyclist to request a green light at a traffic signal by going onto the sidewalk and pushing the pedestrian cross button in the summer, it is impossible to do so in the winter when access to the pedestrian cross button is obstructed by a 6 foot wide, 4 foot high snowbank.
Bike-specific infrastructure will require winter maintenance. As with sidewalks, bicycle and multi-use paths must be plowed promptly with the intent that they be open when commuters need them.
So far I have avoided the rather cliche proverb, but I’ll say it:
There is no such thing as bad cycling weather, only bad cycling gear!
-Scott Wagner
I fall somewhere between Toby’s pessimistic myopia and Scott’s over-achieving optimism. . . but I did get to ride all 12 months this year. I will ride any day it’s going to be dry on the ground. Could be 12 or 92 degrees, as long as it’s not going to be wet/slushy – I’m pedaling.
There were definitely days this winter when a wider road would have been appreciated by both myself and the car traffic passing me (or trying to).