Originally Posted by
buzzman
I hope by my post you're not thinking I see this in black and white terms either- as I said, "its not guaranteed" and there are "many factors at play".
With regards the correlation/causation argument. In true logical terms it would not be accurate to say that "separated bike infrastructure causes increases to bike ridership". It would be true to say, "that there is a correlation between added infrastructure and increased ridership". The reason being that in the causation example it is not 100% true. Simply adding bike infrastructure does not lead to increases in ridership 100% of the time. I can't dispute that.
I was beginning to think that you were finally going to let go of that yarn. I'm disappointed. That was the point of the OP. The city's that get the most press regarding their infrastructure expenditures have been overselling the correlation. By the numbers, they haven't seen much, or in the case of PDX over the past five years, any, bang for their efforts.
Labeling something as bike infrastructure doesn't necessarily make it something that people will want to ride on. Quality builds, like those that allow cyclists to get through pinch-points (bridges, freeway ramps and such) are unarguably good things that have their intended consequences. Just putting bike lanes in the door zones and turning sidewalks into mandatory-use sidepaths will, in my opinion and experience, suppress ridership. I think we agree on the first thing, but not on the second. If this were baseball, we'd have great batting averages in the game of creating agreement.
Originally Posted by
buzzman
The pertinent question then is are there times and circumstances under which adding infrastructure doescause an increase in ridership? The answer is, "yes." Those factors are:
Economics- everything from the changing distribution of wealth in this country leading to large numbers of younger, educated Americans being jobless, underemployed, in debt for education and/or underpaid to the cost of gasoline and owning and maintaining a private automobile.
Cultural Trends- fitness crazes, environmental concerns, hipness, peer pressure, media influences can shift people to ride or at least want to ride.
Convenience- traffic congestion, parking issues, fines, penalties, tolls, insurance and other car ownership issues make auto commuting unpalatable for many. As do subway and public transit crowding, breakdowns, and poor scheduling or lack of point to point availability.
If any or all of the above factors are at play in an area and there are no infrastructural accommodations specifically for bikes then the adding of infrastructure will give an outlet for potential ridership that is greater than the number of riders, who might otherwise begin bicycling for transpiration.
In that case, we are satisfying a demand not creating a demand. Deliberately creating legislation to make it even more unpalatable to drive or forcing public opinion as an objective is not something I think is a good strategy.
I very much agree with this entire segment of your comment. Regarding the satisfying demand vs creating demand: That demand is at its highest when the sheer volume of cars has so congested the public roadways that their average speed has gotten down to that of an average cyclist. Add in space constraints that make parking a time-consuming and costly endeavor, and we have a recipe for an urban bike boom. (Of course, the economic condition of our young is certainly playing a large role too.)
In many of the places I have looked, this boom started before any paint was put on the ground and didn't pick up speed with the addition of the paint. This is the problem: everything is/has been in place for a boom. Yet, we are stalling out. The stall appears to coincide with the rise of the supporters of segregation, but correlation isn't causation.
To repeat what Spare_Wheel has said, show me the city that committed to a significant build of bike infrastructure and saw an increase in the rate of increase of cycling as a result. I'd almost accept no decline in the rate of increase or even any continued increase at this point. Then, let's look at what they did and see what is going right.