Advocacy & Safety - Bike parking at work

Just wondering:

How many of you have bike parking in your office building?

If you didn't, would you be willing to pay for it? What if it had a shower and lockers?

One of the benefits of being a university faculty member. Lots of bike parking, gym with faculty dressing room and showers next door to my building.

Have it.

Would have been willing to pay for it.

Had it with last 3 employers.

Bargined for it with the employer before that... and got it.

I think it is seen as a typical "benny" now in So Cal... At least for saleried type positions that are competitive.

You'd probably get a few more responses in the Commuting Forum. I have indoor parking and showers at my place of work. I don't commute though. The office is only 1 mile from the house. I do pass it on the way out and back from my daily ride though.

There are many complaints about the offices and facilities in UK central government. However one area where they do excel is in cycle facilities. There isn't an office that I;ve worked in where I haven't been able to to lock my bike in very secure areas and get a shower close by. Ironically the best were when I was on contract to the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister. The Deputy PM is known in the tabloid press as Two Jags Prescott (Jaguars).

I also ride past MI5 and MI6 on the way to work every day and can assure your that our nation's ninja assasins ride bikes to work as well.

Not specifically bike parking, but I pull my bike inside and under the stairs nearest my desk. There's no threat of theft here. We could put 4 or 5 bikes under there easily, plus there are a couple more stairwells. When I was working at the building next door last year (same employer, just moved offices) I parked under an overhang (single floor building) year round, there's room for 2 bikes under there, plus I occasionally saw a bike parked between the doors there so I guess really 3. In the 3rd building there's a bike rack that I've never seen used, next to shipping, where you could park a bike if you wanted.

So while there is a bike rack, nobody uses it, and while there's no specified indoor parking, in reality there's room for a dozen or more bikes (though I'm the only regular commuter; of 600+ employees, I think apart from me there's a total of about a dozen commuter days in the company, 10 of those from just one guy).

I would be willing to pay a small amount for a good rack, lockers and showers. Provided there were enough of all of them, and provided one could have the locker for the day (and leave bike gear in there to dry).

Currently we have a small rack (but it's enough combined with other parking possibilities), showers and small, poorly ventilated lockers that can be used during showering. All these are free. Lack of proper lockers practically stops me commuting by bike during winter, as I cannot hang all my gear in my office.

--J

Was allowed to install a bike hangar in my office. Showers & locker room 40 yards down the hall. When there are meetings here (2 - 3 days a week), the caterers bring enough for everyone in the building. Commuter bliss.

I have a fairly large-sized office; real walls (not a cubicle), door, the whole nine yards. I just bring my bike in my office with me.

The students here (I work for a small university) lock their bikes around anything they can find that's close to their classes. We have some bike racks, but no one uses them 'cuz they are on the other side of the campus.

Tim.

We are a secure facility with a minimal number of employees. On nice days I leave it outside at the loading dock. If it might rain I bring it inside the chemical feed room. The other commuter brings his upstairs to a closet outside our office. When he leaves it overnight he brings it into the office. A shower is available but as a field employee I don't use it as I'll be working outside anyway. when they installed our new high security entrance they put a rack outside the fence because initially they had made no provision for a bicycle entering the grounds. We b-tched and they allowed the guard to manually open the gate for us. We card vehicles in but the bikes wouldn't trip the sensor loops to reclose the gates.

The company I worked for in the US (in SoCal) had outdoor bike racks near the employee picnic area. This was a secure location, as the only way in was by crossing the vast parking lot, and there were monitored security cameras aimed at the racks and surrounding areas. No showers though. I generally brought my bike into the office and left it in a meeting room without any worries.

We don't have bike parking per se, but I park mine in the motor control room behind my office, it's inside a secure facility and still requires a hard key to enter (no electronic passes). I never really asked if I could, but noone seems to care as my boss knows I do it. We also have showers and lockers. Pretty good set-up overall.

I'm self-employed now, but I've had bike parking at every job I held in the past. I don't think any had secure parking, though, just bike racks. If the new bike plan is approved here all workplaces and housing developments will be required to have bike racks, but there will be no requirement for facilities like showers, secure lockers, etc.

There are bike lockers in the parking garage behind our office building. There's no charge for the locker (the parking is free, too) but I had to give them a $15 deposit which I will get back when I return the keys. No showers, though.

Bike lockers must be cool.

All the different offices I visit during my week (I'm a language trainer) have either bike racks monitored by security guards, or indoor parking garages with space for bikes as well.

No showers, but I'm only at any one office for 2 hours, and I clean up what little I need to in the bathroom, bring a change of shirts, whatever I can do to be as fresh as possible.