Metro's Active Transportation Plan needs your input!

Good advice lasts.  I remember hearing a talk in November of 2008 entitled "Leading Professional and Institutional Change through Subversion, Revolution and Meterology."  The speaker was Debra R. Rolison of the U. S. Naval Research Laboratory. She told us about the Rule of 18, which states that when you take a new research direction, it will take 18 months to get yourself up to speed in the [new] area.

Last week I attended an Open House Workshop about active transportation in the San Fernando Valley. I didn't study transportation planning or urban design in school, so it has taken some time to learn the ins and outs of the transit system here in Southern California.  I will try to explain some of the basics here so that you can take part in the conversation, too.

Metro is the major operator of bus and rail service in Los Angeles County, California.  Metro hosted the first round of Open House Workshops as part of the development of the Active Transportation Strategic Plan.  Active transportation refers to any form of human-powered transportation – walking, cycling, using a wheelchair, in-line skating or skateboarding. There are many ways to engage in active transportation, whether it is walking to the bus stop, or cycling to school/work.

Councils of governments (CoGs—also known as regional councils, regional commissions, regional planning commissions, and planning districts) are regional governing and/or coordinating bodies that exist throughout the United States. The Open House Workshop we attended was co-hosted by Metro and the San Fernando Valley Council of Governments (http://www.sfvcog.org/).  The SFVCoG represents parts of Los Angeles County: Burbank, Glendale, San Fernando and Santa Clarita. The Southern California Association of Governments (SCAG) is the nation's largest metropolitan planning organization, representing six counties, 191 cities and more than 18 million residents.

When we arrived at the open house, there were posters on the perimeter of the room and Metro provided copies of the posters in 8.5" x 11" format.  We scanned them and some are posted here.  The pillars of Metro's Active Transportation Strategic Plan are:

• Acess to transit
• Physical activity as an integral part of transit
• Enhancing safety
• Promoting clean transit
• Improving public health
• Nurturing equitable/sustainable communities

The objectives of the strategic plan are to (1) identify improvements to 661 Metro transit stations (2) create a regionally-integrated active transportation network (3) develop policies that support education, encouragement, enforcement, and evaluation (4) to propose a funding strategy so that local jurisdictions and community partners can work together with Metro to enhance the overall quality of the transportation network.

The "First Last Mile" concept is used to describe difficulty in getting people from a transportation hub (rail or bus) to their final destination. When people live and work in lower-density suburbs that are not within walking distance to existing public transportation options, transit use is less practical. Population density in suburban areas promotes a reliance on cars, which results in more traffic congestion, pollution, and urban sprawl.  Metro is aiming to help more people access Metro stations more safely and more conveniently, as well as making bus and light rail station improvements.

Complete Streets is a transportation policy and design approach that requires streets to be planned, designed, operated, and maintained to enable safe, convenient and comfortable travel and access for users of all ages and abilities regardless of their mode of transportation. Complete Streets allow for safe travel by those walking, bicycling, driving automobiles, riding public transportation, or delivering goods. Complete Streets offer improved safety, health, economic, and environmental outcomes for ALL roadway users.

Every subregion has its own mobility plan.  Metro's responsibility is to weave these together to maximize efficiency and reduce redundancy in planning. Measure R was a ballot measure during the November 2008 elections in Los Angeles County that levied a half-cent sales taxes increase on each dollar of taxable sales for 30 years in order to pay for transportation projects and improvements. There are currently 12 transit and 16 highway projects underway.  Also, 5 rail lines are under construction.

California Senate Bill 743 gives us an opportunity to promote sustainability, improve air quality, reduce city congestion by encouraging car owners to walk or bike instead.  Miguel Nunez emphasized the demand for a bicycle network that can attract a variety of cyclists, by creating safe routes that traverse the LA county subregion.  He noted that active transportation projects can be completed more quickly and at a lower cost than highway improvements.  Metro is looking to maximize their return on investment.  Some ideas: parklets (for pedestrians to stop and rest in the shade), and bikeshare programs (for bike-curious residents that do not currently own bicycles).

Metro has compiled 0.5 mile radius and 3 mile radius "walkshed" data.  One such compilation is shown here.  These data will be publicly available so that cities can use it when applying for grants.  After this, the workshop split into Breakout Sessions: (1) Potential Collaborations and Strategies to Overcome Barriers to Implementation of Active Transportation Plans (2) Regional Network Desire Lines.  Tham Nguyen of Metro encouraged all attendees to take an online survey and share the link. 

 http://www.metro.net/projects/ati-survey/

metro.net/walkbikeroll

Metro hopes to answer questions like:

• What are the gaps in the transit network?
• What would it take to get residents out of their cars?  

The deadline for responses has been extended to September 30, 2015 so there's still time to participate.  Please share the link with your friends, colleagues, and neighbors.

The first breakout session I went to was about barriers to implementation of active transportion infractructure.  The conclusions boiled down to (1) lack of leadership at the local level (2) lack of oversight at the local level, cities are not held accountable to make proposed changes (3) lack of community support for "road diets" (4) lack of feasability studies, there is a need for data showing that active transportation infractructure actually enhances communities (5) generalized resistance to change at the neighborhood level.  Some of the solutions proposed were: 

• educate anti-bike lane folks that we're not taking anything away, just using leftover space
• being "strategic" in the implementation of projects, doing community outreach first
• call something a "pilot program" so that if it REALLY doesn't work, you can remove it, but people are more willing to be open-minded to change if it's not going to be permanent, when they see how the change improves livability then they won't let you undo it
• get signatures from the community members (both "for" and "against" projects) compare numbers
• propose projects as a "bundle," putting cycletracks together with lighting & sidewalks so that residents either get all-or-nothing
• Metro (or their hired consultants) could attend city council meetings to present proposed projects, as a non-biased community outsider, the data showing decrease in accidents and slowdowns might be more convincing than an angry resident or crazy bike person
• designate a regional spokesperson who can attest to the improvement in safety, economic development/revitalization, and quality of life for communities with "complete streets"
• CicLAvia is one of the greatest agents of change because of its transient nature.  It's a demonstration of what protected bike lanes could look like.  It shows businesses how increasing cyclist access actually impacts their bottom line

The second breakout session I went to was about regional network desire lines.  I spoke with Mark Seinen about regional routes from Glendale to Pasadena and Claremont (East), from Glendale to Northridge and Chatsworth (NorthWest), from Glendale to Venice Beach (South), etc.  The Hyperion bridge may not go the way of cyclists, but we marked it as a "Desire Line" anyway.  We noted that certain scenic routes were better candidates for a cycletrack than other more straightforward routes.  Understanding that these plans are for the next 30 years, we heard that there may eventually be a cycletrack along the Ventura County Metrolink rail line that would be a more direct path to CSUN from Glendale.  Of course, we don't know where we'll be living by then so our input was for the greater good of residents from all corners of Los Angeles County.  In retrospect, events like CicLAvia have given us the opportunity to ride throughout the region.  Being dedicated to car-free travel, regardless of the distance, before we really learned how to use the light-rail, gave us insight into desirable regional connectors.  When you bike the landscape, you get to know the landscape.

A second round of workshops will be in Fall-Winter of 2015 and round three will be in Spring 2016.  Since this is a long-term project plan, we may not see immediate action, but it would be good to have a diverse range of community input.  Metro cannot prioritize enhancements to our neighborhoods without feedback from the residents who live and travel through them.

LA River Ride ~ Report

The LA River Ride this year was hot, literally.  Of everything I could say about the day, the heat is the most noteworthy.  According to the Weather Underground, the temperature was 97 degrees.  Although at some points on the roads, a cycling computer read well into the triple digits.

The Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition (LACBC) did a fantastic job of providing water stops.  Hollenbeck Park had restrooms and large water reservoirs (and music!).  Maywood and Dills Parks were also great!  There were small Clif bars, peanut-butter pretzels, water, electrolytes, and trail mix with nuts and rice crackers.

Hollenbeck Park

Maywood Park

Dills Park

Aquarium of the Pacific

I am extremely grateful to all the volunteers who made these rest stops possible.  I am also grateful to Wayne "Ridetime" Howard for taking us on the Metrolink Metric Century the weekend before the LA River Ride.  Riding in the heat for the majority of the day helped us prepare to successfully complete this ride without incident.

We completed 70 miles in about 7 hours, for some segments we were going 16-18 mph.  I will caution riders that the segment of the river trail around Firestone has some really nasty underpasses.  The trail zig-zags around some large curbs after going over a kind of bump and there is no visibility for riders coming under the roadway.  I'm not complaining, it's always great to have an underpass, but these ones are gnarly and we had a rider from our group collide with another rider in a head-on collision.  It's unclear who (if either of them) violated the centerline rule, and I'm not saying the trail should be removed or redesigned, but I am urging all cyclists to ride safely in this part of the course.  Riders that passed us, walking their bikes, mentioned that someone always "goes down" in this part of the ride, every year.

CicLAvia ~ Heart of LA 2014: Ride Report

The CicLAvia that went through East LA on October 5th, 2014 was so neat, but came in the middle of the semester so I didn't have time to write about it right then.  The official route is shown below.  Ten miles of closed streets with hubs at Echo Park, Mariachi Plaza, and the East LA Civic Center.

There were many iconic points along the route.  This one reminds me of the film To Live & Ride in LA (2010) about 15 minutes in where there's a nighttime race through LA that seems like it starts on this bridge with a view of downtown.

I didn't take a lot of photos, but I love the one above. We rode to the ride from our house, meeting at the library to ride with a group called Walk Bike Glendale which is a local chapter of Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition.  Our entire route is shown below.

Tallbike video here

Video for counting participants here: I counted 67 people in a 30 second window.  This extrapolates to over 50,000 people!



Awesome tunnel video here

complacent

I'm giving myself free reign today.  It's a holiday.  Technically.  So I will begin working after my #madwriting session.  I was thinking of a title for my post.  Something short that would summarize my general state.  I would say Complacent.  I typed it in to dictionary.com and got some ideas for why my brain would have come up with that particular word.

The first definition that popped up said "pleased, especially with oneself or one's merits, advantages, situation, etc., often without awareness of some potential danger or defect; self-satisfied: The voters are too complacent to change the government." With synonyms: "smug, unbothered, untroubled."

I was thinking BINGO that is how I feel about many things in my life right now.  I feel like there is a lot of noise in my headphones and it's my job to turn down the noise and turn up the signal.  This is why I've been doing #madwriting more often, but in a private journal like Julia Cameron suggests.

But sometimes, it seems, you have to focus on the noise for a minute.  Like acknowledge it during your morning pages and then it clears you out for more creativity and focus later in the day.  I've been preparing for the academic year to begin for the entire month of August it seems and classes start tomorrow!

This is a bike-centered blog so I want to share some bicycle noise with you.  I didn't make it out to some bike-related events in the area that I heard about and wanted to check out (or check-in to), but didn't want to (or couldn't afford to) spend the money, fuel, time, etc. devoting an entire weekend to a recreational pursuit.  One: Festival of Bikes, Two: Tour de Lake Arrowhead, Three: Swap Meet, Four: Public Outreach.  I guess I'm just not that into the lifestyle that I can devote a weekend to biking and forsake all other events.

Last weekend, we attended a Car Wash to raise money for John Morlock who we met through facebook.  He is a veteran who rides in events with other veterans.  He is part of an organization called Ride2Recovery that supports veterans who can be provided bicycles (with adaptations if necessary to accommodate any injury) to complete long (~600 mile) multi-day rides.  The idea inspired me to stand streetside waving a flag for an hour in Burbank, while dear husband was soaping, washing, and drying cars with a group of young marines at the American Legion.  We met another veteran Robert Kugler who also rides a Ride2Recovery-issue bike, who was there along with his wife Charlie.  Both of them are from Nebraska, like me!

I encourage anyone who understands how awesome cycling is to consider how you might support the Ride2Recovery organization or participate in their events.  I believe there is no better way to heal yourself than to train for and achieve an inspiring tour, especially if you are doing it with your friends (who become your heroes before you finally believe in yourself).  I learned in the power of group cycling by riding with the Riverside Bicycle Club.  There are scientific papers that show you can tolerate a higher level of pain when you are training in synchronization with others.

This is why I love group events, cycling or running.  I'm so stoked to do the Color Run in San Diego.  I think I'm more looking forward to it because it forces me to train (at least a little) and the actual event is all about having fun.  To me, that's what fitness has always been about.  I've spent many years punishing my body, trying to twist it into ridiculous positions and defy the laws of physics.  I've fallen down from exhaustion in a dance studio, and I've fallen off my bike a few times.  I think doing the color run will be less about competition, and more about being with my friend Sam, whether we feel like we want to walk or run to get through the course.  I'll definitely post a report when we get back.

I have to spend some time on Clitoral Mass.  I mean Critical Mass.  It's one thing that I shout in my head at cyclists that I see not wearing helmets.  It's totally silly that I shout in my head at cyclists I see with no lights on.  I never want to go on group rides in Los Angeles because I hear that everyone's taking drugs and doing dangerous things.  I heard someone always leaves in an ambulance.  What kind of ride is that?  Who wants to get together on a weekly basis and say, "hope I'm not the person who leaves in the ambulance on tonight's ride."  Or maybe they say something like, "I'll never have a manuvering error when we're hammering through a densely-populated area at night on drugs and I'm 18-years old."  I'm not that age anymore, so I just can't go on those rides.

In other bike-related news, I tuned up our old bikes to get to the Farmer's Market and the bicycle parking is off Central Ave now not on Caruso Ave.  It's great to be able to lock your bike to a solid rack in the shade right next to the security office with cameras pointed at it.  As my friend pointed out, if I were going to steal a bike, I would steal that new fixie over there.  Well I love the bikes we have, and I hope we have them for a long time more.

Also, the little shop we got Mike's shoes & pedals for the Performance, and seat for the Trek has gone to new ownership.  I love to support local bike shops, because how far do you want to have to walk if you get a flat near your house?  If you don't support your local shop, you'll have to go all the way to a big-box retailer on foot (assuming your bicycle is your main mode of transportation, but who in the US would be in that situation?) Anyway, the new owner calls the shop simply Glendale Cycles and he is very calm and unassuming.  He has a mountain bike, a road bike and a BMX bike for himself.  He's had the shop just a few months now, but don't be afraid to go there if you are ever in the area.  The phone number is 818 937 9440.

1053 words. #madwriting.

Why drop the B-bomb?

Well, I debated the name of this blog for quite some time, but I wanted biking to be in there and I have a soft spot in my heart for alliteration. First I did some on-bike brainstorming. I've been thinking about this for the past two rides at least (the Midnight Ridazz Salton Sea 2009 last weekend and then again on Riverside Ridazz Tuesday Ceilings). First, I checked to see if the domain names I had thought about were free. I realized "Bitch on a Bike" was unclaimed, although my other idea "Biking for Boobies" was already in use by some motorcyclists (but good for them!).

What really pushed me to type the phrase "Bitch on a Bike" into the Title field was that after I used the Google feature to obtain a profile of definitions for the word bitch (type in to the search field "define: bitch" to see what I mean). The original definition I had in mind was that a bitch is a person (usually but not necessarily a woman) who is thoroughly disliked. I used that *hate* and contrasted it with my love for females of the canine species, since I am the proud owner of 2 bitches (both mutts) and they are thoroughly liked by just about everyone.

The cool thing is that it can also refer to in general an unpleasant difficulty, as in "this problem is a real bitch." That relates to getting through graduate school. Additionally, bitching is a synonym for complaining, which as you will see, I tend to do quite a bit of. When things make me passionate or polarized, I blog about them. Awesomer still is that Bitch (or bitch) is a nonprofit, independent, quarterly magazine published in Portland, Oregon, that describes itself as a "Feminist response to pop culture." I might just have to start subscribing to that. And finally, to really put me over the edge, if one says "That was bitchin' " with the proper tone of voice, it means excellent!