With some sadness I bring you Maryland’s 2011 ranking:
Maryland – Bronze – Cumulative Grade C
State Rank: 10 out of 50
| Category | Grade |
|---|---|
| Legislation: | B |
| Policies & Programs: | A |
| Infrastructure: | D |
| Education & Encouragement: | A |
| Evaluation & Planning: | F |
| Enforcement: | F |
B’ Spokes: The sadness comes from all we want is an accurate assessment of where Maryland is but sadly our Director of Bicycle and Pedestrian Access only had time to throw insults and would not engage in constructive dialog.
Legislation: Mandatory bike lane use and no vulnerable user law is equal to a B? (I would give a C)
Policies: There is no doubt that Maryland has some great polices that we really need to start calling them on but policies to increase the number of trips by bicycle or CO2 reduction by more bicycle use are debatable.
Education & Encouragement: A ??? Seriously? At least now you know why I have been picking on the Driver’s Test of late. That’s right, this stuff is top notch, grade A, at least according to our Director of Bicycle and Pedestrian Access.
Evaluation & Planning: Grade F – Nice comment on our State’s 10 year old stagnate Bike Master Plan. Gee, I wounder who is the head bike guy in MDOT’s Office of Planning? Does he even know that this is a reflection of how well he is doing in his job?
What hope do we have in making improvements if the Director of Bicycle and Pedestrian Access would rather engage in personalized attacks rather then engage in constructive dialog?
To give you some idea of the kind of junk bicycle advocates have to put up with and how for yet another year the Director of Bicycle and Pedestrian Access avoided defending his position on the Bike Friendly State application by throwing smears. Do I need to point out that he has offered no proof or support of his position and in attempt to communicate with him this is what he threw back (in part.)
Tue, 5/10/11, Michael Jackson Director of Bicycle and Pedestrian Access wrote:The two evaluators [I was one of them] who replied did not meet my expectations in that regard because they:
· Made incorrect assumptions rather than asking the reason for a particular response. This includes making assumptions because they were unaware of justification for a particular survey response.
· Recommended that Maryland not get credit for questions about whether certain laws were enacted because the laws cited didn’t comport with their personal expectations, rather than if such a law was or was not enacted.
· Made assertions without providing proof to back up their assertions
· Offered rationales that were irrelevant to the question as justification for their position
· Offered as proof on-line articles without the author of those articles identified which I believe is one of the evaluators.
· Were just plain wrong about some of their recommendations.
If you are shocked as I am that a note of this tone came from a government official that is supposed to take public feedback and is supposed to represent bicycling interests, write his supervisor Donald A. Halligan, Director dhalligan@mdot.stat.md.us;
cc: bswaim-staley@mdot.state.md.us; governor@gov.state.md.us
oldId.20110523202558994