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Investigating the effects of bike lanes in Minneapolis

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Re: Investigating the effects of bike lanes in Minneapolis

#211

Post by drewcoo »

rayiner wrote: post #134
stephen_g wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There’s actually some interesting history about how over decades and decades the oil and car companies have done a lot of things beyond just strongly lobbying for planning laws that were extremely good for car drivers and not good for other modes of transport, but even did stuff many years ago like buying up trolly bus and streetcar lines in many cities, ripping up the rails and wires and replacing them with diesel b…

That's the one example people always trot out, and even that one is questionable: https://la.curbed.com/2017/9/20/16340038/los-angeles-streetc... . The streetcar system was already in dire financial straits when those companies bought it. > But Bianco points out that this plan wouldn’t have been feasible if the streetcar companies National City Lines purchased weren’t already struggling. > By the 1930s, LA’s streetca…

Social benefit and profit are different things. Profit is actually private benefit, usually at society's expense, both in subsidies and in externalized costs.

And a for-profit system that's not pulling in enough money will let its service, sanitation, and safety degrade, causing a downward spiral of profitability and ridership.

Re: Investigating the effects of bike lanes in Minneapolis

#213

Post by Paianni »

willio58 wrote: post #177
diordiderot wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They built their cycle infrastructure through the 60s and 70s tho so that would make sense

Yep, they started doing the same dumb car-centric infrastructure as the US around the 50s but unlike us they stopped when they saw how it was negatively affecting life for their people.

Is it not a wee bit short-sighted to label everything car-centric undertaken in the 50s and 60s 'dumb' when the planners and engineers of the day were learning just as they are today?

Re: Investigating the effects of bike lanes in Minneapolis

#214

Post by NovemberWhiskey »

belligeront wrote: post #147
dionidium wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We're at a bit of an impasse here because I simply don't find those self-reports credible. These folks are salty about the changes. They're not going to tell people that it's going swimmingly. Does it pass any kind of smell test that most of the traffic in these shops arrived by automobile? We don't need to ask them, anyway. I feel like it'd be pretty easy to set up a test to simply observe how people arrive at shops…

Agreed. This is one of the most transit dense areas of ny and the country. The amount of available street parking was minuscule compared to the amount of people walking/biking/transiting on 14th.

It's not just about street parking; it's also about e.g. ability to get a taxi - taxis can't ply for hire on 14th St - and also about being able to pick-up goods from out the front of stores.

e.g. https://thevillagesun.com/busway-is-a-bust-for-stores-along-...

Re: Investigating the effects of bike lanes in Minneapolis

#215

Post by NovemberWhiskey »

dionidium wrote: post #136
NovemberWhiskey wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Based on feedback from local businesses in early 2020 (pre-Covid), ~40% of food and beverage businesses reported that business had become either "worse" or "much worse" since the changes. Reports from "dry retail" businesses are slightly better and service businesses slightly worse. This is compared with https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5bc63eb90b77bd20c50c5... (page 21) Traffic also increased substantially on…

We're at a bit of an impasse here because I simply don't find those self-reports credible. These folks are salty about the changes. They're not going to tell people that it's going swimmingly. Does it pass any kind of smell test that most of the traffic in these shops arrived by automobile? We don't need to ask them, anyway. I feel like it'd be pretty easy to set up a test to simply observe how people arrive at shops…

This reads as "I don't believe it's a problem and I don't believe it when people tell me it's a problem". Why exactly do you think these merchants are salty about the changes? What reason do they have to misreport on this stuff?

Re: Investigating the effects of bike lanes in Minneapolis

#216

Post by closeparen »

snerbles wrote: post #194
closeparen wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Almost no one is actually surrounded by a natural environment. The suburbia that pervades in America is surrounded by deeply un -natural roadway, parking, gas stations, strip malls, and big box stores. For most people, any time you're outside your home you're in a thoroughly human-crafted world. The question is to what ends that craft is directed. Too many places are optimized for the convenient operation of cars abo…

It's interesting that your first assumption is suburbia and not an actually rural setting.

In a rural setting, you surroundings would normally be working farmland. Nothing particularly natural about vast rectangles of genetically engineered crops dotted with heavy equipment and industrial buildings. Better to look at landscaping designed for one's aesthetic enjoyment than for economic production.

Re: Investigating the effects of bike lanes in Minneapolis

#217

Post by rory »

gen220 wrote: post #198
astuyvenberg wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've put on about 200 miles since moving to Boston, and that observation does not align with my experience at all. So far I've ridden one very good path connecting a few suburbs to Boston (Minuteman Bike Trail, a rails to trails path). There are other paths, but they're combined with running/walking trails and generally not conducive to bicycle travel. The bike lanes of nearby Somerville and Cambridge are okay, but s…

Gotcha, that's disappointing. I think my friends were riding along the Charles River, for what it's worth. They're more occasional bike commuters (once or twice per week) than a real serious bunch, and I don't know their start/end points. Rail-to-trail appears to be how most longish (10 mile +) bike paths come into existence in the northeast, from my observations. There's a lot less "free space" to work with than oth…

I used to commute on the Charles River bike paths and esplanade. It is actually pretty great for commuting from the Allston and Harvard areas downtown, but that experience doesn't generalize to other routes around the city. And the last half mile or so to get to your actual office can be pretty perilous.

Re: Investigating the effects of bike lanes in Minneapolis

#218

Post by bombcar »

jvanderbot wrote: post #203
bombcar wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Minneapolis has the advantage of some relatively major rivers, which provide convenient areas to run bike paths along. It works decently well.

I want to call out their conversion of old railways to "greenways" though. Rail lines are straight, off the main roads, have their own bridges, and usually run into the old warehouse areas that are actually the new build-up areas with all the cool bars, student housing, etc. Really smart use of existing infra.

Rails to trails is being done in multiple areas and is a great way to reuse right-of-ways (sometimes the railroad still owns them and has the right to redevelop them in the future!) that already exist, and you can even add trails next to active lines sometimes (especially since many "active" lines are one train a day or less).

https://www.railstotrails.org

Re: Investigating the effects of bike lanes in Minneapolis

#219

Post by tablespoon »

ericmay wrote: post #11
aBioGuy wrote: post #6

If you make it pleasant to ride a bike - people will do it. Where I live, there is an off-street bike path that was completed about 10 years ago. Since then many new businesses have opened along the path. The economic impact of pulling people OUT OF A CAR and INTO THEIR environment is perhaps under-appreciated.

> The economic impact of pulling people OUT OF A CAR and INTO THEIR environment is perhaps under-appreciated. All you have to do is stop and take a look at pictures where you see lots of people riding bikes or walking near businesses and then contrast that with a 4-lane road to get an idea of how much more economic activity is generated locally for a business. If you don't have an automobile industry (and even if you…

> Requiring people to drive a car 20 miles, 40 minutes, whatever to just live their lives is so stupid it defies belief.

That's pretty misleading and tendentious framing. There's no law requiring people to drive that much: even in the most suburbanly zoned suburb, if you pick someplace close to your job, you have to drive far less than "20 miles, 40 minutes." If you have a more of a commute, it's probably due to optimizing for other priorities.

It'd be great if I could walk around the corner to the a coffee shop and a grocery store, but those businesses just wouldn't be viable at the density I also want to live in.

Re: Investigating the effects of bike lanes in Minneapolis

#220

Post by nashashmi »

nashashmi wrote: post #5

Fair question: Are dedicated bike lanes near pedestrian friendly paths a safe transportation environment? I feel that bikes and electric scooters are more dangerous than cars.

For those wondering, I stepped into a bike path where an electric scooter at speed ran into me. I got thrown back a couple of feet onto the ground and it hurt. Had the scooter braked, he would have been thrown forward into me.
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