Intersections: Traffic flow and ultimate capacity determined by this feature. 
For more, go to the Internet:  http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/environment/flex/ch08.htm

Todd Heisler/The New York Times
Those who were into bike/ped issues attended...and the world is with us, later or sooner!


Midtown Cyclists Routinely Break Law, Study Finds
NYTIMES
By J. David Goodman
May 19, 2009, 12:13 pm
 
Not all cyclists on Midtown streets are as law-abiding as this one. A Hunter College study found that such violations as running red lights are common.An expanded study of bicycle behavior in Midtown Manhattan has found that “a large number of cyclists routinely disobey many traffic laws.” Thirty-seven percent rode through red lights, while 28.7 percent paused to look — then ran the light. More than 10 percent rode against traffic, and fully two-thirds were riding without a helmet.

Those were some of the less-than-stellar observations made in the research study [text, pdf] by Peter S. Tuckel, professor of sociology, and William Milczarski, professor of urban planning, both at Hunter College.

The study, based on 5,275 observations by Hunter college students of riders at 45 randomly generated intersections across Midtown from First to 10th Avenues and 14th to 59th Streets, was a rigorous and scientific version of a survey the professors conducted in November 2008. The 2008 survey saw similar bad cycling behavior, but its results could not be generalized to all riders in central Manhattan, because it was based on a “convenience sample,” the researchers said.

How bad bike behavior ought to be judged relative to bad car and pedestrian behavior is not addressed by the study, though Spokes readers have offered their own suggestions in the past and have atoned for their own bicycle sins.

The current study, based on observations at randomly generated intersections, can be broadly applied to Midtown bikers, Dr. Tuckel said in a phone interview.

“It’s an enormous sample — so we’re very confident with the results,” he said.

Yet some cycling advocates were quick to dismiss the results.

“They picked probably one of the only areas of the city that is bereft of bike lanes,” said Wiley Norvell, a spokesman for Transportation Alternatives, a transit advocacy group. According to the city’s cycling map, the area under study has about six bike lanes. Below 14th Street, there are more than a dozen.

“It makes no mention of bicycling infrastructure,” he added. “It’s like we’re talking about this in 1995 and they haven’t been paying attention for the last five years.”

A thoroughly unscientific study conducted Monday by this Spokes reporter on the corner of 40th and Broadway, where the city has recently built a protected bike lane, found that from 2:22 to 2:32 P.M., most riders used the lane (15 of the 24 observed were using it, including a huge cargo pedicab pulling a large rack with 12 more bikes).

From April 1 to 28, the students, undergraduates in the sociology department and graduate students in urban planning, recorded several variables, including: helmet use; behavior at lights; riding with traffic, on the sidewalk or in the bike lane (if available); and the use of an iPod, cellphone or other electronic device. The students also collected demographic information, including whether the riders were commercial or “general.”

However, as Mr. Norvell pointed out, the study does not specify how the students determined that a given cyclist was a commercial rider if there was no visible commercial insignia. It is therefore difficult to say how many of those riders were accurately tallied, and also whether in fact only 23.6 percent of delivery riders complied with the city law requiring helmets for delivery cyclists.

“That’s troubling, because there’s a different set of laws that apply to commerical cycling than to the general public,” Mr. Norvell said. “In the methodology, it does not state how they’re making that distinction.”

“I think that’s a major failure,” he added.

Among the riders observed in the study, 49.8 percent were general and 44.4 percent were commercial or “delivery riders.” (For about 5 percent of cyclists, the student observers were unable to determine whether the riders were commercial or general.)

Ninety-one percent of all riders in the study — and 99 percent of commercial riders — were male, though those few women who were observed by students were found to be more law-abiding, Dr. Tuckel said.

Few riders were seen holding mobile phones, but about 10 percent had some sort of electronic device like a hands-free phone or an iPod, the study said.

Lest the bike-friendly be inclined to accuse the Hunter College professors of partisanship in favor of bipeds or the four-wheeled, Dr. Tuckel assures that the study was done with general public safety in mind.

“I’m not interested in apportioning blame” among riders, drivers and pedestrians, he said. “Motorists could learn more about orienting themselves to the presence of cyclists.”

“The only agenda we have is to promote public safety,” he added. In the past, Dr. Tuckel’s students have also studied distracted drivers.

In their conclusion, the professors recommend greater enforcement of existing traffic laws and float the idea that commercial bikes be required to have license plates. (They add in a footnote that the license plate idea came from Bunny Abraham, an Upper West Sider who traded letters last fall with Transportation Alternatives in a community newspaper over bike behavior.)

The release of the Hunter College study coincides with bike month and with the unveiling of Transportation Alternatives’ new Street Code for the city’s bikers, a “major civic cycling education campaign” with the goal of establishing a pecking order, with pedestrians on top, followed by cyclists, followed by motor vehicles. On May 15, bike to work day, the group handed out 5,000 copies of the code at East River crossings and at City Hall.

“This is the kind of thing that we think is a productive and concerted way to improve bicycling behavior on New York City streets,” Mr. Norvell said.

The No. 1 rule of the new code: always yield to pedestrians.
Gas prices bringing pain to drivers here, there and everywhere;  Cost is high in the U.S., but much higher in France, Turkey, Spain ... 
DAY
By Angela Charlton,  Associated Press   
Published on 5/31/2008 

Paris - Americans are shell-shocked at $4-a-gallon gas. But consider France, where a gallon of petrol runs nearly $10. Or Turkey, where it's more than $11.

Drivers around the world are being pummeled by the effects of record gas prices. And now some are hitting back, staging strikes and protests from Europe to Indonesia to demand that governments do more to ease the pain.  It's a growing problem in a world that's increasingly mobile and more vulnerable than ever to the cost of crude oil, which is racing higher by the day and showing no signs of stopping.

”I don't know why it is, but ... it hurts,” said Marie Penucci, a violinist who was filling up her Volkswagen to the tune of $9.66 a gallon at an Esso station on the bypass that rings Paris.

As she pumped, she looked wistfully at a commuter climbing onto one of the city's cheap rental bicycles, an option not open to her since she travels long distances to perform.  As oil soars, the effect on drivers can vary widely. Taxes and subsidies that differ from nation to nation are the main reasons, along with limits in oil-refining capacity and hard-to-reach places that drive up shipping costs.

In Europe and Japan, for example, high taxes have made drivers accustomed to staggering gas prices. As a result, plenty of European adults never even bother to learn to drive, preferring cheap mass transit to getting behind the wheel.  Those who do drive are still testing new pain thresholds. And it would be worse in Europe if the strong euro weren't cushioning the blow.

On the other hand, in emerging economies such as China and India, government subsidies shield consumers. But that still means governments themselves have to find a way to afford the soaring market prices for oil.  Increasingly, people around the world are reaching the boiling point - and it's not just drivers.

Fishermen in Spain and Portugal began nationwide strikes Friday, keeping their trawlers and commercial boats docked at ports. In Madrid, demonstrators handed out 20 tons of fish in a bid to win support from the public.  In Spain, the European Union's most important producer of fish, the fishing confederation estimates fuel prices have gone up 320 percent in the past five years - so high many fishermen can no longer afford to take their boats out.

French fishermen and farmers, who need fuel for trawlers and tractors, say their livelihoods are threatened by soaring prices and have blocked oil terminals around France and shipping traffic on the English Channel to demand government help.  British and Bulgarian truckers are staging fuel protests, too.

Indonesians are staging their own protests against shrinking gasoline subsidies in a nation where nearly half the population of 235 million lives on less than $2 a day.

The world is driving more than ever: There are 887 million vehicles in the world, up from 553 million just 15 years ago, according to London consultancy Global Insight. It estimates the figure will be 1 billion four years from now.  In Europe, the high tax burden means crude prices make up a smaller part of the retail cost of gas.

”The pain of a rise in prices is much less in Europe, because we may be paying a lot more here, but the rise in a percentage sense is a lot smaller,” said Julius Walker, oil analyst at the Paris-based International Energy Agency.

The United States, with its relatively low taxes, is considered to have retail prices closer to what energy data charts call the “real cost” of gasoline - closely linked to the price of oil.  So as oil prices have soared, U.S. gas prices have soared along with them.  Prices for regular unleaded gas have risen from $1.47 a gallon in May 2003 to more than $3.96 now, a jump of nearly 170 percent. In the same period, the most popular grade of gas in France rose by just over 90 percent - a relatively gentle climb.

Americans are driving less - about 11 billion fewer miles in March 2008 than March 2007, a drop of about 4 percent, according to the Schork Report newsletter. It was the first drop in March driving in almost three decades.

In the U.S., presidential candidates John McCain and Hillary Rodham Clinton have proposed suspending the federal gas tax for the summer to give drivers some help, although it is not clear whether drivers would actually see much relief.  French President Nicolas Sarkozy has urged the EU to cut its value-added tax on fuel.

Nations that produce huge amounts of oil aren't necessarily in better shape.  Russia is the world's second leading producer of oil, but gas there comes to about $3.68 a gallon - about the same as in the United States, where workers earn about six times as much money.  Much of the Russian cost comes from taxes, which run between 60 and 70 percent. Limited refining capacity and the costs of transporting gasoline across the country's vast expanse also push up prices.

Turkey faces similar problems. It costs $11.29 a gallon there, meaning filling up the tank of a midsize car can reach nearly $200 - enough to give up on driving and buy a domestic plane ticket.

But it's not that bad everywhere.  In China, government-mandated low retail gas prices have helped farmers and China's urban poor but, in a country struggling with pollution, also have hurt conservation. The Chinese used about 5 percent more gas in the first four months of this year than last.

And in Venezuela, long-held government subsidies and bountiful supplies have made the people think of cheap fuel as a birthright. It's a veritable wonderland for gas guzzlers - 12 cents a gallon. Consumers there are snapping up SUVs.  For solutions to the oil crisis, policymakers in less oil-rich nations are looking to Brazil, where ethanol made from sugar cane is widely available to the nation's 190 million people.

Eight out of every 10 new cars sold there are flex-fuel models that run on pure ethanol, gas or any combination of the two.

Cycling group hopes to spread message in Fairfield County
Greenwich TIME
By Tim Stelloh
Published February 4 2008

On a cold day in Hartford last month, cyclists were treated to free breakfast in exchange for their car-less commute.

But bikers in lower Fairfield County can't plan on a similar deal.

The ride, sponsored by a law firm, promoted by the state Department of Environmental Protection and organized by the Central Connecticut Bicycle Association, is one of several events in Hartford this winter aimed at getting cars off the road and improving cycling conditions.

It's an extension of a similar bike-to-work program that runs from May to September at the state capitol.

But in this area, there is no such program.

"It would take a strong organization down here, and what's also missing are companies to get behind their employees to do this," said Ray Rauth, a member of the Connecticut Bicycle Coalition and head of community relations for the Sound Cyclists Bicycle Club. "The cyclists in this area are not very well organized. Most of the cycling goes on among very poor people or people who have no other means of transportation, or people who ride recreationally."

About 15 cyclists have come out for the ride every month since it began in October. The number jumps to about 100 in spring and summer, said Sandy Fry, a transportation planner with the Capital Region Council of Governments.  In Greenwich, Franklin Bloomer, head of Greenwich Safe Cycling, said he has made lots of noise for more bicycle-friendly planning but has seen few results. A bicycle plan was drawn up for the town but never implemented, he said.

"The problem we seem to have down here are the initiatives just don't go anywhere. Consequently, a critical mass of people hasn't developed," he said. "It's wonderful to see things happening in other parts of the state, but we want them to happen here."

One of the groups that got the bike-to-work program off the ground several years ago in Hartford was the Capital Region Council of Governments, said David Westcott, also a bicycle association board member.  At that agency's equivalent in lower Fairfield County -- the South Western Regional Planning Agency -- Executive Director Floyd Lapp said he hasn't heard any clamoring for a similar program.  Hartford's geography and traffic volume make it more amenable to bikes than lower Fairfield County, he said.

"The congestion levels are much lower there than they are down here," he said. "It's much more tempting to bike to work."
REGARDING SOME OTHER MODES OF TRANSPORTATION...
Gridlock State, From Budget To Roadways
By GREGORY N. STONE, Day Staff Columnist
Published on 7/20/2003

In this state of ours where you can't get there from here, transportation is one of the most urgent policy issues. Not so long ago, business leaders were forecasting a catastrophe in which Connecticut, with its clogged interstates and meager public transportation systems, would become an “economic cul-de-sac” that would drive out business. All those dreams of becoming a biotech center would go out the window. The New Age would pass Connecticut by.

But the matter faces two dangerous foes: short attention spans and the state fiscal crisis, both of which threaten to delay a $5.5 billion plan to
build a modern system for moving people around more efficiently.  The problem is a sleeper issue lurking in this summer's special budget session. A
Democratic bill before the General Assembly calls for tax increases to begin financing several of the projects proposed in the state Transportation Strategy Board's plan.

The measure gradually would increase the state tax on gasoline to an earlier level set before the legislature slashed the levy by 7 cents in the 1990s, and impose a temporary surcharge in the corporate income tax.  The money would enable the state to start on public transportation plans, including improvements to the Shoreline East and Metro North commuter lines, establishment of train service connecting New Haven, Hartford and
Springfield and transit service between New Britain and Hartford.

The bill has led to more skirmishing between the Rowland administration and the Democrats.  Rowland budget chief Marc Ryan accused House Speaker Moira Lyons last week of crafting the bill in secret and suggested she's crazy to take up the measure in the middle of a state budget crisis.  Lyons points out that she has been up front from the beginning about her views on the importance of getting to work on the strategy
board's plan now rather than later despite the state's financial difficulties.

The speaker may be somewhat challenged at collegiality, but she's also right. The principle she espouses of getting behind the strategy board's plan right away and not let it lose steam ought to be embraced as well by Gov. John G. Rowland, who along with Lyons convened the transportation group.

Lyons expressed her views on the issue clearly in January. She told the strategy board then that the state needs to begin establishing a funding source for the proposed transportation improvements and that the business community ought to share in the costs because it would be a principal beneficiary of better roads and transit services.  She was only stating an obvious and well-documented point of view when she said that correcting the state's serious highway and public transportation shortcomings is critical to the state's economic development. The gridlock on Interstate 95 and the inaccessibility of whole regions of the state by decent highways and public transportation are as serious impediments to future growth as the high costs of doing business and living in Connecticut.

She also might have pointed out they are major contributors to the continued impoverishment of the state's decaying old cities, where urban workers can't get to jobs in the suburbs and suburban industries are deprived of a substantial work force.  In fact, the state's rural northeast is at a similar loss to accommodate commuters to Hartford, Storrs and other centers of white-collar employment.

That having been said, however, even members of the strategy board agree there may be merit to taking up the matter in the next session, after the legislature presumably has dealt with balancing the two-year budget plan that's before it. Implementing a transportation plan ought to be the focus of the new session.  That would permit a more thorough and open discussion than what has taken place thus far over how to pay for the proposed transportation improvements. That would give the legislature a chance to revisit the possibility of reestablishing tolls to help pay for the  improvements.

Tolls were taken off the Connecticut Turnpike when they were cumbersome and unsafe. But technological advances in the methods of collecting highway tolls make this a very attractive alternative today. Waiting this short period of time would also allow a more thorough airing of the timing of projects. And by next year, it should be clearer what Congress intends to do regarding federal transportation funding.

Meantime the governor and speaker ought to have a joint press conference to reawaken the public (and the press, which also has a short attention span) to the issue rather than take potshots at one another over the timing.  They should make it clear that the question is not whether or not to do all this stuff but when to implement the transportation strategy board's plan and how best to pay for it. Lyons is right in her effort to keep this issue from slipping through the cracks.

I don't know what roads Marc Ryan takes. But driving home from New York earlier this summer, I noticed the gridlock on Interstate 95 hasn't let up out of consideration for the budget crisis. 

 

New Mission Statement from CBC
Date: 9/26/2001 1:02:19 PM Eastern Daylight Time

The Board of Directors of the Connecticut Bicycle Coalition has changed the "mission" of the organization..

The new mission statement is: "The Connecticut Bicycle Coalition promotes bicycling and walking through advocacy and education."  What has changed most importantly the broadening of CBC's constituency to include pedestrians.  The new wording implies:

"What works for pedestrians works for cyclists; what works for cyclists works for pedestrians.  We further belive that good facilities for cyclists and pedestrians depend
on the existence of good communities. Good communities look after the environment and promote wise land use. Good communities provide open space and recreation opportunities. Good communities have good facilities such as libraries, schools, and parks. Good communities are built around people, not the automobile.

In short we are for that which creates livable communities because these communities are, by their very nature, walkable, bikeable communities."


Subj: Bike Racks on Stamford Busses
Date: 8/24/2001 7:54:47 PM Eastern Daylight Time (rewritten by "ABOUT WESTON")

There is hopeful news for those following the Stamford, CT Bike Racks on Busses issue.

The State of Connecticut has not been in the forefront on this matter.  CT has lagged behind the nation in rack deployment on it's bus fleets.  Last year $50,000 was committed to outfit all of CT Transit's Stamford busses with racks.  Racks offer those individuals who encounter the "last mile" obstacle to transit use an alternative to walking and enhance the flexibility of the transportation system.

Making the connections between types of transportation used has always been a problem in achieving good intermodal access.  The Stamford project is an opportunity and its success will help to ensure similar actions elsewhere in the State.  Connecticut Bike Coalition (CBC) commends CT Transit and ConnDOT for their leadership on this issue and we are looking forward working with all of the parties involved on this and many other projects.

CBC met Wednesday, August 22 with CT Transit to discuss the marketing plan and the kick-off activities.  Two routes are to be completely equipped for the inauguration of the program by mid-September and all of the racks will thus be installed and in service by the first week of November.  Stay tuned for more
information from the CBS on-line.


The Connecticut Bicycle Coalition to Kick Off Statewide Bicycle &Pedestrian Safety Initiative
For Immediate Release: Thursday, June 14, 2001
Contact: David Hiller, (860) 527-5200

In 1999, the year of the Columbine massacre, 28 students nationwide were killed in schools; that same year, 840 children were killed when struck by cars as they walked, often to school.

Though school shootings spark a national outcry and tremendous prevention efforts, street-crossing deaths draw no notice and little action.  With street crossing accidents a leading cause of injury and accidental death for school age children, the Connecticut Bicycle Coalition, with support from the Hartford Courant Foundation and the Daphne Seybolt Culpeper Memorial Foundation, is kicking off a major statewide safety initiative.

Safe Routes to School is a new program of the Connecticut Bicycle Coalition (CBC). Its goal is to improve the environment for children walking or bicycling to school, reducing injuries, fatalities and accidents while encouraging more walking and bicycling.

We've always supported safety programs for children, said CBC President Ken Krayeske. But, the focus was usually on modifying the behavior of the victim.  Teaching the Rules of the Road and promoting helmet use only solves half of the problem.  Until our neighborhood streets are redesigned to enforce acceptable vehicle speeds and allow safe crossings, we will continue to lose lives.

The hazards that contribute to these accidents are wide streets that promote unsafe vehicle speeds and poorly designed or inadequate crossing areas. CBC's Safe Routes to School program works by bringing together concerned stakeholders, including parents, planners, police and school officials to identify traffic hazards and poorly designed streets.  Through a series of workshops, routes to schools are mapped, hazards are identified and traffic calming plans are adopted to improve the environment for bicycling and walking.

At Connecticut SAFEKIDS, we take this issue very seriously. As a vital part of the communities we serve, Connecticut Safe Kids wants to make sure that our children and motorists understand the importance of pedestrian safety, said Eileen Henzy, Director of Connecticut SAFE KIDS, a program designed to reduce unintentional injuries in children.  Keeping children safe while walking or bicycling to a school, playground or just around the corner should be a priority for everyone.

Traffic calming is a set of street designs and traffic rules that slow and reduce traffic while encouraging walking and bicycling. Behind traffic calming is the belief that streets are valuable public spaces that should be shared equally by all users. Traffic calming devices are simple, inexpensive, self-enforcing and easily accommodate emergency vehicles, garbage trucks and buses.

Street design and traffic calming workshops will be conducted by Francesco Gomes, an expert in community planning.  Mr. Gomes holds Masters degrees in Regional Planning and Landscape Architecture from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, and is the author of The Urban Street: Defining, Planning and Designing Successful Urban Streets.

Applications and information about the program will be mailed out to all of Connecticut's public schools during the month of June.  Applicants will be screened for need and finalists will be subject to a site audit and interview.  Funding is limited, and in some cases geographically restricted.  A sliding scale will be used to determine the degree to which schools receive financial assistance.

-end-

The Connecticut Bicycle Coalition was formed in 1977 to promote bicycling and walking through public education, advocacy and programs.  CBC is at the forefront of debates on smart growth, traffic calming and livable communities in Connecticut.