DC helps out area commuters with new Bike Station
October 14, 2009By Will Handsfield
 |
| 100_8726 Originally uploaded by BeyondDC and appeared in this post |
Washington D.C. took another great stride towards making bicycling easier and more attractive with the grand opening of Union Station’s BikeStation almost two weeks ago. With the opening of the stunning facility at Union Station, Washington’s most visited destination and travel hub can now connect commuters using trains, buses, cars, subway, or bikes.
(As Ray LaHood said, it’ll help address that “last mile” problem of commuting.)
The BikeStation offers a brand new option for commuting. A train or metro rider can now leave their bike at Union Station without it being stolen, stripped for parts, or damaged by weather. Thus, any commuter who can get to Union Station can now pick up their own, well-maintained bicycle and use it for commuting around Washington.
In New York City, the DOT found out that a safe and secure place to lock up bikes was the number one obstacle preventing more people from biking to work.
A joint project funded by Federal Highway Administration and District of Columbia transportation dollars, the project was built by the D.C. Department of Transportation. Bikestation, which operates 6 other facilities like this one, and Bike and Roll, which rents bikes and leads bike tours for tourists, share responsibility for operating the station.
It is a first for DC, and a totally unique structure designed by Donald Paine of KGP Design Studio to evoke both a bike wheel and helmet. The glass covered arching spine is a striking contrast to the classical Beaux Arts style of Union Station behind it.
The cost per year is $96 as an intro rate, a sum easily covered by the Bicycle Commuter Benefit (available from participating employers). According to Andrea White-Kjoss of BikeStation, they had already sold 40 annual memberships before the station opened. In the days since it opened, the station has already sold 30 annual memberships and Bike and Roll has been renting as many as 20 bicycles a day. Both figures far exceeded initial estimates.
Combined with the existing SmartBike bike sharing system, BikeStation effectively extends the radius in the region from which a citizen can commute within the region without needing to drive. A bike commuter can bike to Union Station, leave their bike, hop on a Metro train or a commuter train, and head out for points beyond without having to drive.
It’s all about increasing transportation options, and BikeStation is a great one for the city.
Republican Senator says more transit = better health
October 8, 2009By Sean Barry
Last week, an offhand comment by Republican Senator John Ensign about the link between health and transportation policy didn’t make the headlines, but it did make an interesting connection.
Ensign was wrong in asserting that the United States has the highest life expectancy among developed countries when gun and automobile accidents are ignored. But he was on target when he mentioned America’s auto-dependent ways and how that negatively impacts our health.
Compared to Europe, “we’re just a much more mobile society,” he said. “We drive our cars a lot more, they do public transportation. So you have to compare health care system with health care system.”
While misunderstanding mobility as just traveling a high number of miles, Ensign correctly implies that driving more and walking less contributes to poor health and makes us more prone to death (in a car) than our European neighbors, which the data suggests to be true. The most obese cities in the United States — Miami, Oklahoma City and Ensign’s own constituents in Las Vegas — are known for their auto-oriented sprawl.
A recent study in the Journal of Physical Activity and Health confirms a correlation between the more active walking habits of Europeans and lower obesity rates, backing up American research from earlier this decade by Smart Growth America and others showing that residents of sprawling places are more likely to be obese.
If we want to boost mobility while bringing health costs down, we need our transportation policy to create more travel options for everyone and make it safer and easier to walk and bike.
Mobility isn’t an end of itself, nor is it just about going long distances on a regular basis. Mobility is about access to destinations and opportunity. We’re spending hours in the car not because ordinary Americans think that having high “mobility” is important — we’re doing it out of necessity just to get around our increasingly spread out cities.
No one would argue that our transportation priorities are the driving force — no pun intended — behind lower health outcomes. But there is enough evidence to suggest they should be a serious part of the discussion.
The invisible benefits of public transportation
August 10, 2009By Stephen Lee Davis
Every morning in New York City, hundreds of thousands pass quickly and nearly invisibly through tunnels and a few bridges into Manhattan’s Central Business District via New York’s well-traveled transit system. Though the sidewalks are still full of walkers and the streets full of cabs, buses, and cars, the real action is happening below the surface where the number of people traveling into the CBD is almost just beyond comprehension. Michael Frumin looked at the numbers at fruminator and tried to put it in perspective:
Just to get warmed up, chew on this — from 8:00AM to 8:59 AM on an average Fall day in 2007 the NYC Subway carried 388,802 passengers into the CBD on 370 trains over 22 tracks. In other words, a train carrying 1,050 people crossed into the CBD every 6 seconds. Breathtaking if you ask me.
Over this same period, the average number of passengers in a vehicle crossing any of the East River crossings was 1.20. This means that, lacking the subway, we would need to move 324,000 additional vehicles into the CBD (never mind where they would all park).
Frumin actually takes a shot at what Manhattan might look like if you had wide enough bridges to move all those cars — and more importantly, where to park them. And in a word? Wow.
Creative Commons Photo from Michael Frumin
h/t to kottke.org
Want Congress to know what your commute is like? Take ‘em to work with you!
July 30, 2009By Stephen Lee Davis
In just a matter of days, your members of Congress will be turning off the lights in the House and Senate chambers, allowing their DC staffers to stop their 80-hour workweeks, and heading back home to your states and districts. Debates over health care and climate change will still be ringing in their ears as they meet constituents back home before returning in September.
But what about the looming transportation crisis? Will they be spending much time back at home talking about that?
This summer, as you’re stuck in traffic, squeezing into your carpool, feeling the minutes tick away as you wait for the always-late bus, or pedaling your way through dangerous intersections to put in a hard day’s work, too many legislators are unaware of what commuting each day means for their constituents.
That’s why we’re asking our elected officials to give their drivers a week off, leave their first-class tickets at home, and join our Take Your Legislator to Work Challenge!
For the Challenge, T4 America and some of our 350+ local partners will be organizing to ask your member of Congress or other prominent state leaders to leave their cars and first class flights at home for a week and ride the same carpools, trains, buses, subways, or bikes their constituents use everyday to get where they need to go. Maybe once they’ve seen what things are like on the ground and how limited your options are, they’ll be ready to talk about a truly reformed transportation bill when they come back to Washington in September.
The T4 America campaign is also going to be asking some notable leaders and individuals here in DC that aren’t going anywhere for the summer to take part in our Challenge. Check back right here on the blog for latest news on legislators that are participating or what you can do to help persuade them to join up, and hopefully, we can get a few of them to write or tweet about their experiences for us.
Help Dan. Save Traffic
May 28, 2009By Stephen Lee Davis
Dan loves traffic. But Congress could take it all away when they consider this year’s reauthorization of the federal transportation bill. Will they give us the kinds of transportation options that could suck the lifeblood right out of traffic? Or will they simply pump more money into a broken system. Dan is waiting to find out.
From the T4 America Youtube Channel.
Worldchanging: Is ‘The Old Economy of Car Dependence’ Over?
November 25, 2008By Stephen Lee Davis
If you’re not reading Worldchanging on a regular basis, you’re definitely missing one of the most positive, encouraging, and exciting daily blasts of news from the world of sustainability and innovation. Alex Steffen and his team have been tirelessly working to point the way to a brighter future for America and the world that contrasts powerfully to the most dire predictions of energy shortages and global warming if we do nothing.
Sometimes when we’re so focused on innovation, there can be a blind trust in some mystery technology, not yet created, that will solve our energy problems. This is especially apparent with regard to our automotive fleet that will “one day soon” run on banana peels or solar power. Alex and Worldchanging, to their credit, have looked around and seen obvious, ready-to-go solutions to curb our energy thirst and cut emissions, while still getting us where we need to go, outlined in a wonderful essay from a year ago, entitled “My Other Car is a Bright Green City.”
We bring up Worldchanging also to point you to a short piece written by Transportation For America communications director David Goldberg on the connection between the current housing crisis and the old development model based on inexpensive fuel.
In truth, the phenomenon of sending people ever farther into the countryside to find houses that they (barely) qualified to purchase played no small role in the current global financial crisis. The epicenter of the U.S. foreclosure crisis can be found on the metro fringes. The buyers who stretched and took on variable-rate or interest-only mortgages, along with punishing commutes, to get into houses on the edge found themselves caught in a double bind.
As gas prices and commute costs rose, their “cheap” houses became ever more costly, even as mortgage payments adjusted along with rising interest rates. But when they went to sell, they found the bottom had dropped out of that market, thanks not only to higher gas prices, but also to demographic and cultural changes that were leading more households to look for homes in more convenient locations.
Read the full article at Worldchanging, and bookmark them for return visits. Our thanks to Alex and Worldchanging for the space.
Bailout gives tax break to bicycle commuters
October 9, 2008By Andrew Bielak
Through a provision in the $700 billion bailout package, people who commute to work on two wheels will become eligable to receive a $20 tax-free reimbursement each month. (San Francisco Chronicle — Rachel Gordon)
Don’t Build Parking, And They’ll Come–Without Cars
October 6, 2008By Andrew Bielak
Washington DC’s planning commission considers reducing or eliminating parking requirements in the city, giving people and businesses more options for using space in their neighborhoods. (Washington Post — Marc Fisher)
On Your Bike
September 30, 2008By Andrew Bielak
The Economist looks at the recent success of Giant, the world’s largest bike manufacturer, which is capitalizing on a growing interest in cycling as an antidote to obesity and high transportation costs.
Lance Armstrong: Secret Weapon to Fight Global Warming?
September 19, 2008By Andrew Bielak
A writer at the New York Times‘ Freakonomics blog wonders if Lance Armstrong’s comeback from retirement could push even more people to strap on a helmet and pedal their way to work.
-
- U.S. Transportation Department makes good on promise to ensure our streets are made safer
March 16, 2010 - Obama’s livability programs help rural America too
March 16, 2010 - Transit grants out the federal door, but what about the cuts?
March 8, 2010 - Transit riders in Atlanta face massive cuts, “wholesale restructuring” of service
March 5, 2010 - Opposition to Senate extension results in looming shutdown of federal transportation programs
February 26, 2010
- U.S. Transportation Department makes good on promise to ensure our streets are made safer
The United States of Transit Cutbacks
Driving is down and transit ridership is at record highs. Yet transit agencies across the country are considering layoffs, service cuts and fare hikes. Find out more and learn what you can do to help at t4america.org/transitcuts
Transportation: In your eyes
Send us your transportation-related photos.
