oddjob2

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/...ms/2319972002/

mcours2006

'For bike commuters, safety is a top consideration,' and this is mine as well. You're not going to get many people willing to ride their bikes to work if they feel every time they mount it they're playing some kind of Russian roulette game with traffic. Regardless of what the statistics say about cycling safety, the very idea of riding a bike mere feet, and sometimes inches, next to cars moving at a much higher rate of speed is just crazy. So until that changes you're not going to convince many reasonably sane person that they should ride their bike to work.

There was a short cycling safety video running on the site as I was reading the article. I got a chuckle out of that.

Classtime 

bigbenaugust 

I won't lie, I got run over by a scooter in October and spent some time seriously considering my life choices.
In the end, I still only live 3mi from work, the bus schedule still kinda stinks, and I still won't pay for parking at the office, and we still have only one car. So back on the bike I went, but with less errands and side-trips and even more paranoia than before.

3speedslow

oddjob2

Yes is the answer for your first question, see byline.
https://www.statesmanjournal.com/sto...grows/8851355/

As to your 2nd question, you must be the only forum member not followed around by the insurance company looking for prospects that ride 55 miles a week or more.

CliffordK

I think the increase in fuel prices in the early 2000's, and the 2008 recession gave cycling quite a bump, as noted in the second article above.

As fuel prices leveled out, and the economy bumped up, the natural corollary is a decrease in cycling.

Cyclic Cycling?

One should note that in the diagram, some cities are on the rise, or at least flat, while others are falling.



Perhaps one should ask why on the West Coast, Portland is up slightly, while Seattle, SF, & Oakland are down.

What is Philadelphia doing? DC?

alan s 

surak

The numbers come from asking people what their primary mode of transportation was a week prior to the survey. I only started bike commuting last year so I don't know what changed YoY between the prior years, but the Seattle Bike Blog had some thoughts: https://www.seattlebikeblog.com/2018...ally-by-women/

Key quote:

Andy_K 

The key point I spotted in the article was what Austin, TX is doing:

That's probably the only reasonable thing that can be done, and as I understand it this fits the "European" model. The problem is that American cities aren't typically built around three mile trips. I live in a metropolitan area that I think has better than average public transportation. I could ride my bike three miles to a light rail station, light rail would get me within two miles of work, and my employer offers a shuttle from the light rail station to the office. So it would kind of work for me, though the local transit authority only claims 36 bike parking spots at the light rail station and at least half of those are taken by share-a-bikes.

Taking mixed-modal commuting out of the picture, I think my 10 mile commute to work is probably fairly typical in the U.S. I'm willing to do it and find the facilities entirely sufficient for safety and convenience, but even my co-workers who occasionally tell me that they "wish" they could bike to work aren't willing to make the kind of effort I do.

What I would really like to know is what form of transportation is replacing bike commuting. Is it single passenger car trips? If so, that's unfortunate. If not, only bike nerds really care. If I were a city planner, I'd be looking into a large fleet of self-driving small vans with software that would automatically optimize routes to take around 12-15 people where they want to go based on a phone app or something. If you started the proposal process today the technology would be ready before you had funding. More likely, Uber of Lyft will implement something like this and the cities will be stuck with whatever the corporations want to do. For the bike nerds, a significant reduction in single passenger vehicles would be better for bikes than nearly any bike infrastructure I can imagine getting funded.

Whit51 

Hoopdriver

This is likely a significant factor:
Although I wonder about the statistic: % of population who cycle-commutes. Changes in population would affect the stat without a significant change in the actual number of cyclists. I understand, too, that Seattle has had the wettest year on record - another factor.

The article describes data that excludes all cycling except that involving riding to work. I think not counting other trips misrepresents the bigger ridership picture. In my case, I retired last August so am no longer riding to work; however I am riding more for errands than ever before. Are there any similar offsets like this in the cities they use?

One more comment about:

This rings true. I stopped riding in the late 1980s because of a few scary traffic incidents and did not start again for 2 decades. While I never felt completely safe since I started back 7 years ago, I at least felt comfortable. Then in 2016 I got hit by a driver who tried to pass me as I was making a left turn. Although I suffered nothing worse than a road rash, it affected me mentally for a long time.

noglider 

@Whit51's point is worth repeating. Most trips are under 3 miles. MOST TRIPS! A large fraction of them, I would contend, don't need cars.

ussprinceton

ever since I started riding a bicycle as a young child, and until now, I haven't been hit by any moving vehicles. Knock on wood. I'm now 42 years old

JoeyBike

Some people over in Advocacy and Safety will give you a long, hard argument about this. In fact, there are a couple threads in the A&S Top 10 right now claiming that walking stairs or showering are as dangerous a cycling on a busy highway. I am not kidding.

There are many people who don't see putting their lives into the hands of every single motorist passing them as much of a risk. At first I thought it was denial, but I can't figure it out to be honest.

JoeyBike

Fewer people of the right age exist, for starters. The Baby Boomers are aging out of the equation slowly. Then younger people grew up in the "Age of Fear" or the "Kids Photos on Milk Cartons" era where parents never let their children leave the yard or house. Same with skating rinks and Rollerblades. Young people have so many indoor choices, plus team sports that parents take so much interest in forcing kids into soccer leagues and others. No one grows up skating anymore. Fewer grow up cycling anywhere but on the driveway if they are lucky. Sure, almost every kid gets a bike but they live in a cul-de-sac and can't get outside of that sterile environment without crossing a giant highway, then cycling on a giant highway.

So...smaller population to draw newbies from, a more frightened population within that smaller number, urban sprawl of super highways at every turn, every college grad in debt, and as always...our car culture simmering below the surface likely contribute. Changing climate may be a factor as well. More extremes of heat and cold in many locations must take a toll.

Baby Boomers are like the "pig in the snake" bulging along the length of the snake until it leaves the other end. They are much closer to the tail than the head of the snake now. I believe this bulge of sheer numbers moving on is a huge contributing factor.

mcours2006

Stats are stats, of course. They will tell you that every year one in xxx,xxx number of people are injured or killed doing whatever activity. They don't tell you the whole story. There are things you can do to put the odds in your favour. People who die or suffer from serious injury from slip/fall accidents, whether in a bathtub or a set of stairs, are likely elderly folks with limited mobility or some kind of physical handicap. If you are not in this category of people then you've likely decreased your odds of suffering from such a fate.

The same goes for cycling. Serious injury/death probably occur with bicycle collisions involving children, inexperienced riders, reckless riders, riders who don't ride in the dark without lights, etc. If you are not in this category, your odds are probably better.

I recognize that the biggest threat to my safety is drivers on the road. If I can take a route that exposes me to the least number of them, then all the better. If I can ride at a time when fewer are on the road, then all the better. If I make myself more visible to more drivers, then that's also good. If I ride predictably and use good sense on the road, then that's good. And if I learn from the mistakes of others on this forum then there's less chance I'll make mistake myself.

There are no guarantees in life except, as B. Franklin said, death and taxes, but you can tip the balance in your favour when it comes to cycling safety.

caloso

Team sports don't preclude riding bikes. Some kids still ride to and from practice and games. Mine do.

JoeyBike

True. But there is an incredible amount of pressure from parents, peers, teachers, and coaches to play team sports or participate in organized "Olympic" sports. You never see that kind of pressure on kinds in the USA to ride bikes for anything but utility cycling to and from "real" sports. Without the population base to draw from, and the focus on every sport except cycling for the most part, what would we expect? Less adult cyclists using commuting infrastructure is my guess.

Ever suggest your kids ride bikes AS a sport, instead of TO their sport? There are only so many hours in a day for kids to fit in recreation. Bicycling is not a priority for most households. Therefore...less cyclists.

Also, keeping kids attached to smart phones costs money. Internet connections cost money. Cable TV to watch sports costs money. Playing sports cost money. How many parents purchase a really nice bike for their growing kids? How many parents purchase phones and service for the kids? Only so much money to go around too.

StarBiker

Affluent Suburbs, high end car dealerships everywhere, expensive enough that only the moderately well healed at best can afford to live here do you think people will ride? Combined with the usual non existent cycling infrastructure.

Lot of wide ramped sidewalks and very few pedestrians, and even fewer cyclists. I am lucky if I see five cyclists a week besides myself. And I am the only one beside one other guy who rides a nicer bike (And the other cyclists is three cents short of a dollar).

None of it surprises me. America will never stop loving the car to the point of ad nauseam. And the size of this country.

(Are we really the United States? Yeah, sure)

The City is just so different. And the older I get the more I dislike the city. ANY CITY. Sorry, off topic!!!

StarBiker

Nuts are everywhere. Especially on here.

noglider 

I'm 57, and I've only been hit once. Is that a lot more than you? Well, I'm still in good enough shape to ride 3,000 miles a year. Getting hit by a motor vehicle is a scary prospect, but as weird as this sounds, it is often survivable.

no motor?

I walked to work today, and only saw 2 other people out going somewhere that didn't involve a car. They were together, 1 on foot and the other slowly riding by the first kid. Everyone else was in a car for my 2 mile trip.

bbbean 

Coincidentally, there is a rise in obesity and children prefer to play with electronics.

Darth Lefty