How I respond to “Atlanta is a car town, not a cycling and transit town” criticisms

A commenter on a recent post of mine mentioned a couple of pretty common criticisms about expectations for growth in cycling and transit in Atlanta. The sentiments were from the “Atlanta is a car town and it always will be” school of thought. I don’t believe this is true. Here’s my response to these criticisms.

Getting more Atlantans on bikes

First, I’ll address the commenter’s criticism in terms of cycling growth:

“I am still skeptical that there will ever be a significant number of bicyclists riding to and from jobs here in Atlanta. Why? Well, number one, the weather! It rains far too often, and it is too hot far too often for most people to be dependent on a bike to get them to and from work.”

Yes, Atlanta will never be Amsterdam with its percentage of trips taken on bike, but there’s a place between the status quo and “Amsterdam” we can occupy. Focus on gains, not on an idealized utopia, and don’t let perfect be the enemy of good. We can make a lot of progress.

Look at New York City. It has more rainy days per year than Atlanta, and it gets really hot and really cold as well, but they have much, much more cycling than we have. According to a NYT article this year: “New York now has more bike commuters than any other American city, according to an analysis of census data by the League of American Bicyclists.”

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This is the reverse traffic pyramid. It gives extra weight to the most sustainable of mobility types – with human-powered transportation on top. I found it by way of a tweet from Vancouver city planner Brent Toderian.

As Brent points out, achieving a transportation structure that emphasizes walking, cycling and public transit above personal cars will require a rehaul of the built environment in most places.

If you’ve been planning your urban places specifically around cars for decades – as we’ve done in Atlanta – all other transportation modes are at a great disadvantage for catching up and gaining ground due to the way the physical environment is weighted so heavily toward cars.

We’re making progress in spots, but the process is slow. Recent news that exurban sprawl is cranking up again in the edges of the Atlanta region should give us pause. No matter how well we build small parts of our urban place for pedestrian and cycling, if many of the people in the region have no option to reach them except by personal car, thanks to their car-centric places, we’ll still be struggling.

This is particularly true of spots with a lot of office buildings. Despite the structural walkability of the streets in Downtown and Midtown Atlanta, the interstate ramps, one way arterial roads and parking structures all work together to prevent the places from being as safe for pedestrians and cyclists as they could be.

I'm very excited to see progress such as the two-way bike lane that opened today downtown. That's an infrastructure change for the better. But unless it coincides with a push to build more family-friendly, multi-family housing in and around downtown, in a format that is attractive to a wide range of people, those cyclists will be competing with an ever growing number of personal cars for road space in the business districts.

ATLANTA CYCLING FESTIVAL 2015

The week-long Atlanta Cycling Festival kicks off today with more than 40 scheduled events. See the full schedule here. I attended some of the events from last year’s edition and was really impressed. It’s a good way to engage with other cyclists and learn about things that are happening in Atlanta from advocates. 

Several moths ago, I got to have a nice talk with Jeffrey Wisard, the man behind the festival. He’s very committed to helping the cycling community grow in Atlanta beyond the core group of advocates, and growing the ranks of everyday riders of all types  -- generally the kind of person we’re lucky to have in the city. 

Here’s what he had to say this week to a couple of questions about local cycling issues:

Q: Cycling on Atlanta streets can be an intimidating prospect for some. Can a festival like this help average Atlantans get tools & info that could promote more cycling in the city?

Wisard: “Most assuredly, yes. Every person on the Atlanta Cycling Festival Team remembers their first “group ride” or group biking event. 

“Getting on your bike for the first time can be intimidating, for sure, as well as attending any event where there are cyclists that are, “faster than me” or “have better bikes than me” or “will leave me behind.” Thus, we make sure that the ACF has built into it low-access to barrier events - you show up with your bike, bring a smile, meet cool people and have fun. No judgement, no glaring looks. 

“Our goal is to help you fall in love with biking and to fall in love with the biking community (and maybe, you know, just fall in love. #BikeBabiesIn9Months). We think by doing this, each new biker will get all the info and tools they need to really enjoy cycling in our great city, Atlanta.”

Q: With this festival, plus Streets Alive, plus new bike lanes getting put on streets all the time, is the Atlanta bike community changing in noticeable ways?

Wisard: “My completely biased opinion: You bet your sweet bippy yes. My more thoughtful answer: I moved to Atlanta in 2006 and really didn’t see any infrastructure at all and the cycling community seemed segmented and VERY intimidating. Then, in 2010, this weird idea called, “The BeltLine” started to get some steam. 

“At the same time, Atlanta Bicycle Coalition was working their magic and doing what they do best - darn great advocacy. Cirde de 2012/13 there was this seemingly huge pop of new infrastructure and everyone in the cycling community took notice. 

“From there, you saw all different types of riders come out to ride - no longer was it the just road-hardened commuter or the punk-hipster in uber-skinny-mini pants, but you started to see families, girls in dresses and dudes in suits. AKA - The everyday rider. And all of these people were/are 100% approachable and friendly. Yes, the bike community is changing in very positive and very wonderful ways.”

Photo: a 2014 festival event at Atlanta Beltline Bicycle

Where bike commutes could potentially rise in Atlanta region

There’s a pretty incredible mapping tool from Deloitte that shows projections for bike commuting and ride sharing across the US. I was particularly interested in the bike commuting maps -- the one above shows the level of bike commuting possible by people in the Atlanta region who work 5 miles or less from their homes. View the full map here.

The map accompanies an equally fascinating study: “Smart mobility: Reducing congestion and fostering faster, greener, and cheaper transportation options.“

The study made a model of projected bike commuting built around the idea that “anyone who works five or fewer miles from home could reasonably commute by bike.” Importantly, they note that year round bike commuting is not a reasonable expectation, so the model was adjusted:

Even with that conservative adjustment to bike commuting, the model showed that US cities stand to gain $2.6 billion per year “in indirect savings based on lower road construction costs, reduced accidents, and lower carbon dioxide emissions.” For a region like Atlanta’s that is constantly struggling to address traffic congestion and infrastructure costs, there could be a huge benefit to taking cars off the road this way.

For the entire Atlanta region, the projected new bike commuters at different commute distances work out to these numbers:

1 mile: 96,880 2 miles: 237,509 3 miles: 352,896 4 miles: 457,075 5 miles: 556,630

As the study notes, this is all very pie-in-the-sky number crunching without the proper infrastructure. It would require a complete network of protected bike lanes, along with other safety & convenience measures, to accomplish these numbers. But it’s useful to see what kind of possibilities there are for improving transportation in the region.

Handlebars & motorcars: the growth of cycling in Atlanta causes a rough ride

Atlanta Magazine has a great article on the inevitable conflicts that pop up when bicycling & bike infrastructure blossom in a city that has been dominated by car commuting for many years.

Can Atlanta, a city built for cars, make room for bikes? As more cyclists arrive, the city is trying to accomodate them

Despite that boost in cycling activity, the city only has 60 miles of on-street bike lanes currently. And, as the article points out, adding new lanes is sometimes a struggle in a culture that’s become used to accommodating cars first.

The piece includes this cool illustration of the different ways that cars and bikes can share streets:

One of the most visible signs of the stand-off between bicyclists and cars: automobiles parked in bike lanes. 

As has happened in many other US cities, Atlanta is having a significant problem with cars and delivery trucks using its new bike lanes as free parking spaces. This is a problem in great need of attention if we’re going make use of a growing network of cycling infrastructure — AND if we’re going to make the most out of the upcoming bike share program.

Here’s a photo I took recently of the scene on the Auburn Avenue bike lane, where you can regularly find 10 or 12 cars parked on Sunday morning. (The morning I snapped this pic, the cars were thankfully all getting ticketed by a police officer.)

You can read a good piece on this bike-lane-parking problem, penned by Rebecca Serna of the Atlanta Bicycle Coalition, here: Stop parking in bike lanes, Atlanta I don’t park my bike in the middle of Edgewoood Avenue. So why do you block our lane?

Serna writes: “Parking in bike lanes renders the point of the bike lane moot. People start to ask, why have bike lanes in the first place if they’re not going to be respected?” She goes on to make a good argument for adding a physical barrier, such as a curb or bollards, to protect the lanes. I remember seeing barriers like that on the streets of Paris when we visited a few years ago — how great it would be to have those here.

And if you’re up for some video footage of people being confronted about parking in bike lanes, here’s a local reporter covering the problem.

EDIT: Regarding the above photo of cars parked in a bike lane, a Downtown neighbor noticed that one car is also parked illegally at a bus stop — in front of a senior residence! It’s a case of car parking, sadly, dominating multiple modes of transportation at once. Good catch. 

Biking on paths & mixed streets in Atlanta: a culture shock

I took a nice 8-mile bike ride through the city this weekend. That's not terribly far for hardcore cyclists, I know. But for an out-of-shape guy on a small-wheeled folding bike with only one speed, it's a haul -- particularly on hilly terrain and in the heat and humidity of summer weather that's overstaying its welcome

I got a chance to experience various degrees of bike infrastructure during the ride. There were streets with wide sharrow lanes, ones with proper bike lanes, ones with no bike lanes but quiet enough to travel safely, and ones without any level of cycling safety -- where I cowardly rode on the sidewalk (as long as no pedestrians were on it) to avoid a pedaling panic attack. 

And then there were the ped/bike paths: the Atlanta Beltline and the PATH trail. With no cars in the mix, these are safe places to ride and walk. And though a I appreciate them greatly, particularly in the way that they allow new cyclists to practice riding in a danger-free zone, there's a significant culture-shock type of experience that comes from shifting between these paths and mixed-traffic streets. 

The path experience is a calm, peaceful ride (slightly less so during the weekend-afternoon crush) that lets you take in the view. Above, notice the serene setting of the Northeast Beltline, top, and the tree-lined entrance to the PATH at Boulevard, bottom left. The other pic shows a new access point between Edgewood Avenue and an in-construction extension of the Beltline below. 

As soon as you exit a path and hit the street, though, your brain is on high alert, watching for fast cars and always thinking of the next move a few yards ahead. Dangers present themselves constantly in the form of cars entering the road from driveways and parking lots, and from doors opening on parallel-parked cars. And with the regular presence of cars illegally parked in the new bike lanes on Auburn & Edgewood Avenues, high alert mode pays off. 

Could it be possible to correct the disadvantaged status of bikes on Atlanta's streets a bit? Perhaps by removing some of the advantages given to cars?

In an excellent piece on the relationship between cheap automobile parking and alternative transit use, Matthew Garbett recently wrote: "parking lots and the built environment they create...will not simply disappear because the BeltLine is completed and transit in the city is expanded."

This is true. Cycling activity is working its way into intown streets that are often dominated by cars, even when the neighborhoods have all the hallmarks of a walkable urban place. Most of those cars zooming by are on their way to easy parking, making the mobility choice an easy one for drivers.

Think about the proposed transit-oriented, mixed-use developments that will be adjacent to MARTA stations. The developers of these TODs are mandated by law to construct (at great expense) the same number of automobile parking spaces necessary for similar projects in transit-lacking neighborhoods on the fringes -- significantly undercutting the potential for these to be havens of transit and cycling mobility.

This is the world we're cycling into. And though those safe paths make for a smooth ride part of the way, eventually we'll need to make the connecting, mixed-traffic streets significantly more inviting for cyclists, and that will require making it harder to provide those easy parking spots for the cars that are blocking progress.

Streets are closing to cars this Sunday at West End in Atlanta! Come out from 2 to 6 p.m. to walk or cycle the streets as Atlanta Bicycle Coalition once again presents Streets Alive.

Read about the event here

EDIT: oops, mistakenly typed Saturday at first. Corrected to Sunday.

The benefit of Atlanta being a late-bloomer with bike shares

There’s a must-read article on the Atlanta Magazine website this week for any bicycling advocate in Atlanta: Six lessons Atlanta can learn from New York’s bikeshare woes : The benefit of being a late adopter is learning from others’ mistakes.

The first of the six is this:

Yes to this. I was able to experience the frustration of a glitch-ridden system this week during a visit to Chattanooga, where there is an extensive bike-share program with docking stations all over the center of the city.

After seeing monthly-card-holding locals ride around on the bikes, I tried to get one myself as a daily rental. I walked all around Downtown Chattanooga to six different stations with no luck as the touch screens froze up on every one half way through the process. No bike for me.

Atlanta is launching its own bike-share program in 2015. I’m glad to read that we’ll be using a different system for bike stations:

New York City’s Citi Bike program has been a runaway success when it comes to annual memberships, but it has been less successful with attracting casual, one-day riders. By coincidence or not, the system is managed by the same company, Alta, behind Chattanooga’s bike share.

Let’s hope Atlanta can learn from the mistakes made elsewhere and launch a great bike share program. I think there’s a real chance it to be popular here.

Drivers, bicyclists to share more road: intown streets allow for safer mix of traffic Atlanta Journal Constitution 11/12/13

Yes, the US vs. Europe comparisons (particularly with cities) are tiresome and unfair. Obviously, old European cities were not built for cars the way many US cities were.

But this does nicely illustrate one of the many reasons to undo the damage of US car dependency, particularly by ceasing sprawl and switching to infill growth — alternative transportation modes like cycling more easily serve compact developments than they do car-sprawl.

See the larger infographic here

Bike Lanes in Black and White | Peopleforbikes.org, 10/21/2013

Rebecca Serna, executive director of the Atlanta Bicycle Coalition

Streets Alive Wants 4 Events In '14, Including West End Route | Curbed Atlanta, 10/16/2013

The Biggest Obstacle to Cycling's Egalitarian Aspirations? Distance | Atlantic Cities, 6/5/2013

Streets Alive takes over Peachtree Street on May 19

It's less that two weeks away! On Sunday, May 19, almost three miles of the famous Peachtree Street will be closed to cars and open to human-powered transportation for Atlanta Streets Alive. This route covers most of the street's length through Midtown and Downtown and will run from 2pm-6pm.

Cyclists and pedestrians will enjoy musical entertainment and activities throughout the route. It's a great event that I've been happy to see in Atlanta the last couple of years and I'm particularly excited for it to be on a high-profile street like this.

Saporta Report has a post about the event, tying it into the push for increased pedestrian infrastructure in Midtown. Here's a quote:

Oddly, the post also points to survey results that show property owners to not place nearly as much value in cycling. Maybe seeing the cyclists on Peachtree will change some minds. As I've posted before, cyclists are great customers for local businesses.

Visualizing data from CycleAtlanta app

Poster dedwards8 shared some excellent maps of cycle routes via Reddit. According to the post, these are maps that are created from "data entered by people using the CycleAtlanta app."

The maps are a product of the "Transit Day Hack-a-Thon at Georgia Tech last week."

Read more about the CycleAtlanta smartphone app here. It records your bicycle routes with the goal of using data to make Atlanta a better place for cycling.

Click the images below to see large maps from the cycling data.

Downtown/O4W Map:

Midtown Map:

Large Atlanta Map:

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UPDATE:

You can see more map data here:

http://www.cycleatlanta.org/hack/