Month: July 2010

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Frederick Avenue Road Diet

by Nate Evans

If you’ve pedeled Frederick Avenue lately, you may have noticed some changes.  There are some fresh layers of asphalt between Hilton and Beechfield, but its the paint that makes the difference.  The Department of Transportation is installing bike lanes from the city line to the Gwynns Falls Trail as part of the city’s first major “road diet”.  A road diet is a technique where travel lanes are reconfigured; typically converting road with 4 travel lanes to 2 travel lanes, a center-turn lane and 2 bike lanes.

 

Frederick Ave at Augusta

Other benefits of the Frederick Avenue Road Diet include:

  • Full bike lanes (not sharrows) on a major arterial road
  • Bike connection to the Gwynns Falls Trail
  • While the bike lanes end at the city line, Baltimore County and the State Highway Administration are looking at extending these lanes westward.  If done, this will make Baltimore’s bicycle network REGIONAL! 

 

Please join me in thanking DOT’s Deputy Director Jamie Kendrick for making these new bike lanes a reality!

Should it?

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What will you do with your extra year?

by washcycle

From a study that just came out

For the individuals who shift from car to bicycle, we estimated that
beneficial effects of increased physical activity are substantially
larger (3 – 14 months gained) than the potential mortality effect of
increased inhaled air pollution doses (0.8 – 40 days lost) and the
increase in traffic accidents (5 – 9 days lost). Societal benefits are
even larger due to a modest reduction in air pollution and greenhouse
gas emissions and traffic accidents.

Conclusions: On average, the estimated health benefits of cycling were
substantially larger than the risks relative to car driving for
individuals shifting mode of transport.

And this from the report itself

The societal impact of a modal switch on the number of fatal accidents largely depends on which people switch from car to bicycle. If it is the average population, the impact (including risk presented to other road users) would be practically zero (Supplement Material, Table 4), but if young car drivers would switch to the bicycle, it would decrease the number of fatal accidents.

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A bicycle for everything (video)

…
Jirsa got the bike as a 59th-birthday present last November. Then, that month, he rode it to the grocery store to pick up Thanksgiving dinner.
"I carried a turkey, sweet potatoes, potatoes, milk, pop, some bread for stuffing," he said, "plus some food for the next few days."
The groceries fit into pouches strapped across the back of the bicycle. Jirsa said he has to be smart about how he packs the food before riding home.
"It’s really amazing how much he can carry," Claudia said. "Sometimes he comes home and you forget that he didn’t take a car."
Hy-Vee South is Jirsa’s main stop for food, about a mile from his house.
"I always wanted to be able to go to the grocery store (on bike). I saw this and I thought it was a good idea," he said. "There’s me and my wife and a son living at home. I can pretty much get enough (food) for my family for a week."
…
"When we first moved here, we had two cars," Jirsa said. "My wife and I each had a car. When we moved here, I started riding my bike to work during the summers. And then I thought, ‘Gee, if I could take the bus during the wintertime, I could get rid of the other car.’ I tried it and it worked and we did."
Getting rid of one of their two cars not only saves Jirsa money on gas, maintenance and insurance, it also saves on depreciation, he laughed.
"We’re saving money by riding bicycles," he said, "which is a really good thing, I think."
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Not enough Police to enforce traffic laws? Hire mimes.

[B’ Spokes: An interesting concept form Bogota:]
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Mayor Mockus used educational group games as the main tool to establish a culture of “self-regulation,” consideration, and urban citizenship. These included:
* Cards, red on one side and white on the other, distributed among citizens and used as in football (soccer) games to show approval or disapproval of actions — particularly of car drivers
* Mimes in the streets that taught automobile drivers to respect pedestrian crossings, to use seatbelts, and to minimize the honking of horns
* Actors dressed as monks encouraging people to reflect on noise pollution
* Mass initiatives to promote tourism and proper payment of taxes
Residents of Bogota approved of these programs, giving them a rating of 7 out of 10 points. Sixty-one percent said citizen education was the administration’s most important initiative and 96% considered that these programs should continue.
…
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Air pollution ups suicide risk: Study

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While depression and anxiety had long been linked to suicidal thoughts, a new study links asthma and air pollution with this psychological problem.

Previous studies have reported that individuals suffering from at least one chronic health condition such as heart disease, diabetes, cancer, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease or mental illness are more vulnerable to committing a suicide.

According to the study published in the American Journal of Psychiatry, asthma and air pollution can increase the risk of suicide. In other words, respiratory problems may worsen an individual’s mental state.

The more severe the asthma, the greater the likelihood of suicide, the study found.

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Complaining five years later is too G** D*** Late

by Richard Layman

Washington Examiner cover shot, 7/21/2010

Today’s Examiner has a screaming cover headline about the impact of the military Base Reconsolidation and Closure process. The story, “Region braces for traffic ‘chaos’,” is about how the movement of close-in, transit-connected facilities, to farther out places lacking high quality transit connections is going to cause problems for commuters.

I wrote that 5 years ago, well, less 6 weeks, when the announcements were first made. Too bad the various newspapers (I think back then the Examiner was still the Journal Newspapers) and politicians didn’t think about that then…

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