Gainesville.com: Money sought for bike-friendly improvements

A state study contends that more people will ditch their cars and hop on their bikes for transportation if improvements such as bike lanes, paved shoulders or off-street paths are available in populated areas. Continue to 2nd paragraph Florida’s Department of Transportation is calling for more funding for such improvements as a way to reduce car traffic, improve air quality, boost the health of residents and improve safety.

Figures show that Florida led the nation in bicyclist deaths in 2005. “Some of the (DOT) districts are already using this study to guide their prioritization on where they should put these,” said Dwight Kingsbury, DOT assistant bicycling and pedestrian coordinator. “I think Florida is getting a lot better for cycling. It is just a lot easier to get around by bike. There are more paved shoulders and bike lanes.”

The study was requested by the state Legislature in 2005 to demonstrate if bike riding will increase if such bike-friendly improvements are made, and to determine the best locations for those improvements. It wanted the results by 2007. Because of the time crunch, the first phase was not able to include an analysis of usage before and after such improvements were made, Kingsbury said. Instead, it compared 30 to 40 existing facilities such as bike lanes and off-street paths.

Some were urban and some relatively rural. Consultants compared the number of cyclists using the facilities, traffic along the road, the amount of side streets and other factors to draw conclusions about whether certain types of facilities will induce more people to ride bikes.

Among the primary factors of influence: Perceived safety and comfort. Feelings of safety among cyclists are not as strong with streets without bike lanes or paved shoulders, while cyclists’ perception of safety is best with off-street paths. The report said this confirms that bike facilities should be included in funding, planning, design and construction of new roads. Location.

Bike facilities that are in areas where people work, do errands and recreate are more likely to be used by bicyclists. “If there is a lot of population and also employment density at the same time in that immediate area, that will create more (bicycle) trips,” Kingsbury said.

Building bike facilities on a single isolated road will have limited use, the study found. Overall street network. Having a street grid, in addition to a main thoroughfare, increases ridership because it gives bicyclists more options. “It showed the backbone, the main road, needs to be somewhat bicycle-friendly or people will not use it and, secondly, you need a good network of connected streets,” Kingsbury said.

However, streets with lots of driveways may discourage riding because of the danger from cars pulling out. Trip length. The shorter the trip for someone to get to work or the store, the more likely they are to ride a bike. So bike lanes or paths in those areas would likely influence more people to ride to work or on errands. The study also considered ways to encourage more youngsters to ride bikes to school and more people to ride for recreation. DOT now builds paved shoulders when it resurfaces roads to lengthen the life of the road - the crumbling tends to start from the edge from cars swerving off and on - and improve bicycling safety.

Gainesville began building bike lanes well before the state and is considered one of Florida’s leaders in having bicycling facilities and promoting the use of bicycles for transportation and recreation. Several rail trails, including the 15-mile Gainesville-Hawthorne Trail State Park, are located in Alachua County. Ewen Thomson, president of the Friends of Gainesville Hawthorne Trail, said lots of room for improvement exists. “On 13th Street, you take your life in your hands every time you ride a bike on it.

One problem with Gainesville is the lack of an east-west connector, although we are slowly fixing that,” he said. “People are obviously getting around on bicycles here. It is a cheap form of transportation.” But the prospect of more money being spent on bike facilities as a result of the state report does not sit well with some Alachua County residents.

Some believe revenue from the gas tax and other sources derived from automobile traffic should not be spent on bike paths when so many county roads need improvement. “I have nothing against people who ride bicycles, but I don’t think it is right to tax money that they collect to fix roads and then build bike lanes and whatnot,” said Winfield Boggs of Hawthorne.

“When I was a kid in Georgia, I had to have a tag for my bicycle. It cost $5 a year. As many bicyclists as we have in the county, I think they could afford to buy a tag for their bicycle to help offset the cost of all of this. I really don’t think building a bunch of separate lanes for people to walk on and ride bicycles on is going to increase the use of bicycles. I really don’t.” Florida is commonly one of the worst states in terms of bike/car crashes and deaths.

In 2005, the latest year of available federal data, Florida reported 124 cyclist deaths. Next highest was California with 115. Officials attribute the death toll in part to a climate that allows year-round cycling and a large number of bicycle riders. From 2001 to 2006 in Alachua County, 12 bicycle riders were killed in traffic accidents.

Two have been killed so far this year. Ken Bryan, director of the Florida office of the national Rails to Trails Conservancy, said he believes some of the recommendations in the state study will lead to both improved safety and increased bike use. Bryan said that benefits the state and the individual who rides.

“This is stuff that has been talked about anecdotally, but now we are trying to apply science. We are trying to measure whether it will work here, and I have every reason to believe it will,” Bryan said. “Gov. Crist is real big on climate change. For every car we can get off the road, there is less emission. You are reading about obesity and many things in the news that I think this study can go a long way toward addressing.”