MyWHaT

Oprah's hitting distracted drivers, who's talking about the global issue of distracted people? (photo: Gary L Howe)

• Distracted drivers are the buzz, but what about the walkers? Bicycle commuters?
• TART blog discusses helmet use
• While naked riders get busted for lack of head gear in New Zealand
• NMC students complain about parking walking (demand free Segways, joking)
• TC moves ahead with Division St. Process (we remain hopeful)
• Want to increase bus use, make it free
  
• Boise Vulnerable User Law, making necessary adjustments
  
• It’s not just bike commuters rolling through stop signs (video of Philly intersection)
• The rise of the Chinese E-BIke (I’ve never seen grandmas go so fast!)
• E-Bikes might help reduce health problems related vehicle exhaust
• If exhaust doesn’t get you, Pavement sealer might
  
• Slow Cities looking for a foothold in the United States
• Perhaps TC? In town? Slow it Down! announced
• This author is labeled as Overwired hipster and a social problem (receives medal)
  
• but I’m not that worried as it’s found that in Portland, OR “blogs” are where all the action is to discuss & influence city government.

In that finding, the majority of active users on Portland BLOGs are advocates for pedestrians and bicycle commuters.  To the point that “The biking community is so strong that motorists sometimes feel discriminated against in Portland.”— Finding from a report authored by White Horse Consulting as reported on BikePortland.org

Did you see any eye-catching news this week?

Want to weigh in on anything yous ee here? Feel free…it’s Our Wheels…

North Traverse Heights Neighborhood Association

Mayor Chris Bzdok was in attendance at last night’s North Traverse Heights Neighborhood Association meeting to give his spiel about changing the process of implementing city projects. He’d like to see city commissioners act more like “advocates for city residents“, taking direction from them individually and from the neighborhood associations. As well as, getting city staff to look to the neighborhoods for direction at the beginning of projects instead of in the middle or near the end. Amen.

What came out last night was that the mayor had asked the 7 neighborhood association chairpersons to make a list of the most important city issues.

Vicky Springer, chair of the Oak Park Neighborhood, read a draft.

Top on the list:

• The calming & improvements of city streets. She expressed a collective interest in limiting cut-through traffic, reduction of speeds and better maintenance.
• Improvements for non-motorized traffic. There is strong interest for increased education and enforcement of traffic laws for automobile drivers, as well as more bicycle pathways and amenities. She listed several problem areas: 8th St., Garfield Ave., Woodmere Ave. and in-particular the pedestrian cross walk at Washington St. and Garfield Ave.. That cross walk has been been a failed attempt by the city at least twice in the last decade.

Other issues were access to the beach, improvement of parkland, tax increases during a time of home devaluation, festivals and improvement of BATA. On the last note, she expressed a strong interest in riding the city buses if it was more convenient.

As expected, the issue of increasing number of pedestrian and bicycle commuters was discussed with the standard complaints: running of stop signs, lack of lights, walking or riding on the wrong side of the road. What needed to be corrected was the perception that people not driving cars must be related to past drunk driving convictions or “something”. A resident quickly spoke up to say that many people are making the choice to ride for economic, environmental or lifestyle choices.

Clearly, education opportunities remain.

Over 30 people were attendance at the North Traverse Heights Neighborhood Association

Last night’s meeting, like most, began with reports from the sector patrol officer and planning and zoning department. There wasn’t anything unexpected–many citations, signage issues, and a 25-year-old male, who rides a bike, who is prime suspect number one for some recent “tagging” on garages, buildings and signs. The discussion then went into a lengthy discussion about self-protection and the use of pepper-spray. Huh?

Click here to find information about your Neighborhood Association.

Do you take part in your neighborhood meetings?

Have they been useful?

UPDATED:With photo at 11AM

The Hell Yes sprints are on! As organized by Dennis Bean-Larsen of international Fixed-gear fame.

More dates & locations listed on the Web site, but Traverse City has two coming opportunities:

• Jan. 23rd at Right Brain Brewery (This Saturday!)
• Feb. 12th at the Microbrew & Music Festival at the Grand Traverse Resort

(I participated once last year. One of the most brutal 21 seconds of my life…)

A Scene from a Traverse City event last year during the 4th International Fixed Gear Symposium.

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Do you have it in you?

What about this idea for Traverse City to set a goal for non-car commuters?

Would you support a goal to decrease car use to 50% of total commute trips by 2030?

Is it doable? Desired? Is there even a way to measure it?

There is a baseline. The Carfree Census Database uses the U.S. census to track how people are moving about and whether they own a car.  In 2000, of Traverse City’s 14, 551 residents:

• 1.76% were bike commuters
• 6.21% were pedestrian commuters
• 1.2% were public transit users
• 8.79% of households didn’t own a car.

That’s 9.17% of commuters not using a car to get around the city.

It leaves plenty of room for growth,  and is still oddly promising that almost 900 people in town simply walk as a primary means of transportation. Considering the ease of bike commuting when combined with walking and increased BATA use and the future of $20 a gallon gas, and all of a sudden 20/30/50 by 2030 seems in reach (20% pedestrian & bike commuters, 30% bus transit and 50% car use by 2030.)

To do this the city and county must encourage those with the means to choose more active modes of transportation, because in Michigan it is mainly college towns or towns with high rates of unemployment & poverty that have higher rates of non-car use.

A conscious choice

Increasing use of public space improves quality of life and is good for business. (photo: Gary L Howe)

Most Michigan cities of similar size (10,000-25,000 population) had much less non-car commuters: For example, Alpena 5.61%, Adrian 6.46% and Harrison at .76%. However, Highland Park had 24% of its commuters traveling car-free. This has more to do with the 38.3% of Highland Park’s population living below the poverty line than a conscious choice to walk, bike or ride the bus.

Marquette, a university town, has around 13%. (Ann Arbor is around 26%.)

Traverse City is unique. It’s a destination for both tourists as well as residents.  It’s also a small town that thinks of itself as a larger city. We have a relatively low poverty rate, so already many people are making an active choice to be car-free.

The question is, does the public and city/county officials support action to actively create a car-less future?

Jarrett Walker at Human Transit in a recent post looking at these numbers asks the question how cities can match the active commuter numbers of the top 50 cities in the United States:

How long will it take for a city that lacks age, poverty, or dominant universities to achieve the kind of low car ownership that these 50 demonstrate?  How soon, for example, will a city be able to create a combination of density, design, and mixture of uses that yields the same performance as an old city that naturally has those features?

People come to Northern Michigan for the quality of life. That matches recent findings of why anyone moves anywhere. In a future post, Wheels will cover some of those findings and suggest why local governments need to worry less about driving economic growth, and more simply creating, improving and maintaining desirable places to live.

As the region and the city become more populated, the numbers wanting more transportation options will continue to climb. To get there, the city needs to develop a vision, strategy, and specific goals to get it done.

What do you see in the census numbers?

What percentages would you like to set for 2030?

Previously posted: Dec. 14, 2009:

Kudos to the City of Hamtramck for involving the residents in a specific and effective way in developing the Master Plan with an interactive collaborative map.

Participants are offering visionary ideas that are more long-term and also commenting on very concrete issues like busted curbs and poor snow removal coverage.

Screen Grab of the City of Hamtramck's Online Master Plan Collaborative Map

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Can you see something like this being used in Northern Michigan?

Is there an interactive map already being used in your community?

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Multi-story parking deck for bikes park in Amsterdam. (Photo/Timothy Young)

Chris Treter & Timothy Young were passing through Amsterdam when they floated by this parking structure.  It an inspiring image of what a parking deck can be…

This is making bike commuting a priority!

Have you seen some inspiring pedestrian or bicycle infrastructure design? Send us a link or image.

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Chris & Tim, what about the bikes in Ethiopia?

“What do you want Traverse City to be? What things should we protect? Remove? Make better?”

The City of Traverse City is posing this question to a panel of luminaries:

• Derek Bailey – Tribal Chairman of the Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa Indians
• Don Coe – Managing Partner of Black Star Farms
• Michael Moore – Oscar-Winning Filmmaker and Founder of the Traverse City Film Festival
• Ed Ness – President and CEO of Munson Medical Center
• Tim Nelson – President of Northwestern Michigan College
• Marsha Smith – Executive Director of Rotary Charities

What will any of them have to say about non-motorized transportation options?

Or general street calming and traffic reduction? Perhaps Ed Ness can speak to Munson’s work on promoting its employees to walk and bike to work.

There will be opportunities for audience participation.

This is a free event and televised live on Up North 2 (Channel 97)
Monday, January 25, 2010
Time: 7:00pm – 9:00pm
Location: City Opera House

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Do you plan on attended?

Who would you put on the panel?

Orson Peck's 1906 Composite Photo of the Streetcar in Traverse City that could have been. Peck was a well-known photographer in the region known for playing with "reality".

According to Lawrence & Lucille Wakefields’ book Sail & Rail: A Narrative History of Transportation in the Traverse City Region there was a 10 year period beginning in 1897 where an electric Streetcar running along Front St.  and continuing out to Old Mission was on the agenda. The idea generated creation of a corporation to promote the idea and bring together the needed investors. The concept obtained a charter to go ahead, but each year passed without any tangible progress and was finally abandoned in 1907.

The automobile soon entered the picture and the idea disappeared.

Perhaps as Traverse City proceeds it might consider the concept once again. If we want to increase pedestrian trips around the city, we will also need to offer some quick & easy “boosts” to help navigate the city.

A streetcar could also help slow and calm traffic.

Could you imagine a use for an electric streetcar running back and forth on Front St. from Division St. to the Holiday Inn or further?

This isn’t such a crazy idea when compared to some of the ideas that the Grand Vision inspired.

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Sail & Rail: A Narrative History of Transportation in the Traverse City Region is available at the Traverse City District Library. To view more historic postcards of Traverse City, go to TC Postcards

Tonight, the Traverse City city commission will be discussing and voting on the process for redesigning Division St. to better accommodate pedestrians, bicyclists and the adjacent neighborhoods. There are some working assumptions addressed last week on the TART Blog that are a concern, namely, the assumption that the road requires 4 lanes of automobile traffic., but overall the process should include plenty of public input. 

On the Plan for TC website, Mayor Chris Bzdok laid out the three over-arching possibilitiess being explored:

1. Three-lane design with a center turn lane, bike lanes & speed reduction.
2. A four-lane divided road turn lanes, bike lanes, and enhanced pedestrian crossings that would need parkland, and a public vote.
3. An attempt to address issues within the current four-lane model and footprint

It’s expected the city commission will vote to go ahead with this process. However, they are requesting to hear more public comments, so it is worth attending the meeting and commenting.

I’d be interested to hear back from anyone who does attend tonight. I can’t make it myself and I’d be interested to hear the tone and content of the discussion.

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The more you walk, the happier you will be. Possibly.

Why? For one, at a slower pace our social exchanges increase. For example, last week I chose to walk to an afternoon meeting rather than riding or driving. The roads were slushy and I had the time. Walking also made it simpler to combine a few errands.

The walk defined the rest of the day.

I planned on being gone for 3 hours. It turned into a 7 hour excursion, that included:

• many exchanges with old friends and strangers
• sitting for a cup of coffee while going through notes and calendar
• taking a telephone call and sending emails next to the Boardman river
• eating a chili-dog
• hanging the letters on the State Theatre Marquee
• beer & ping-pong at a downtown office
• picking up dinner at a deli.
• a walk home, shared half-way with other friends.
• a quick stop at a neighbor’s house

I even managed to make the 3pm meeting, finish my errands & book two clients.

All in a day’s work.

Kilwin's Chocolates gets it, capturing downtown walkers with eye-candy slows them down and brings them in. (photo/ Gary Howe)

A recent report states the obvious: “people are happier on weekends.” What is interesting about the study is the reasons behind the increased happiness. Namely, having the freedom to do what you want and the time to build relationships.

Those are precisely two reasons I often choose to walk for town errands. I’m not confined by a machine and I’m moving at a pace that allows spontaneous stops.

It’s part of a personal urban happiness movement.

How many times have you driven by a café, seen a friend through the window and later said, “I wish I would have stopped.” Walking brings us down to street level and makes more things possible and probable.

The widely quoted average threshold for how far people will walk is 1/4 mile or 10 minutes. That’s surprising, believable and unfortunate.

How do we get people walking more?

Individually, changing our behaviors is arduous and complex. However, when large numbers start moving together we are amazingly powerful agents of change. Government can address issues of accessibility, safety, comfort, and availability of interesting en route destinations, like parks & small businesses. But, people are going to have to support the effort and there’s no better way than to start walking.

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When was the last time you walked to work or a meeting? What made it memorable?

Why don’t you walk more?

Have you ever purposefully parked farther away to include a walkable segment of your trip?