Using Bicycles for the First and
Last Mile of a Commute
MTI Report S- 09- 02
Using Bicycles for the First and Last Mile of a Commute September 2009
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MTI REPORT S- 09- 02
USING BICYCLES FOR THE FIRST AND LAST
MILE OF A COMMUTE
September 2009
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MTI
Bicycle ridership as a partial or total workday method of commute is increasing in popularity. With that increase
in cyclists comes challenges for transportation agencies: how can the needs of cyclists fit seamlessly with the
needs of non- cyclists, especially those utilizing light rail and commuter rail such as Caltrain?
On June 3, 2009, MTI, the Commonwealth Club of California and the United States Department of
Transportation sponsored " Using Bicycles for the First and Last Mile of a Commute" in San José. Co- sponsors
of the event included Caltrain, Bay Area Metropolitan Transportation Commission ( MTC), Silicon Valley Bicycle
Coalition, Silicon Valley Leadership Group, and Valley Transit Authority ( VTA).
Introducing keynote speaker Carl Guardino was MTI's Executive Director Rod Diridon, Sr. A panel discussion,
moderated by newspaper columnist Gary Richards included Dr. Kevin Krizek from the University of Boulder,
MTC's Sean Co; Federal Transit Administration representative Alex Smith, San Francisco Bicycle Coalition
founder Shirley Johnson, Silicon Valley Bicycling Coalition Executive Director Corinne Winter, City of San José
Bicycle and Pedestrian Program Coordinator John Brazil, and Caltrain Special Assistant to the CEO Mark
Simon.
This e- book is an edited summary of those proceedings.
Bicycle accidents, Bicycle
commuting; Bicycle lanes;
Bicycle riders; Bicycle usage
48
FHWA# CA- MTI- 2863
Using Bicycles for the First and Last Mile of a Commute
by Mineta Transportation Institute
All rights reserved
To order this publication, please contact the following:
Mineta Transportation Institute
College of Business
San José State University
San José, CA 95192- 0219
Tel ( 408) 924- 7560
Fax ( 408) 924- 7565
E- mail: mti@ mti. sjsu. edu
www. transweb. sjsu. edu
Copyright © 2009
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The Mineta Transportation Institute thanks the following individuals for their participation
in “ Using Bicycles for the First and Last Mile of a Commute,” the second national
transportation policy summit on bicycle safety.
• John Brazil, coordinator, City of San José Bicycle and Pedestrian Program
• Sean Co, transportation planner, Metropolitan Transportation Commission
• Shirley Johnson, Leader of BIKES Onboard, San Francisco Bicycle Coalition
• Kevin Krizek, associate professor of planning and design, University of Colorado
• Mark Simon, special assistant to the CEO, Caltrain
• Alexander Smith, United States Department of Transportation Federal Transit
Administration
• Corinne Winter, executive director, Silicon Valley Bicycle Coalition
Thank you to keynote speaker Carl Guardino, president and CEO, Silicon Valley
Leadership Group, and event moderators Rod Diridon, executive director, MTI, and Gary
Richards, San José Mercury News “ Mr. Roadshow” columnist and faculty member, MTI’s
Master of Science in Transportation Management at San José State University.
The event, which was sponsored by MTI, the Commonwealth Club of California, and the
United States Department of Transportation Federal Transit Administration, and
co- sponsored by organizations including the Bay Area Metropolitan Transportation
Commission, Caltrain, Silicon Valley Bicycle Coalition, Silicon Valley Leadership Group
and Valley Transportation Authority, was held on June 3, 2009, in San José, California.
MTI staff instrumental in producing the event and in production of this e- book include
MTI’s Director of Communications and ITT Donna Maurillo, Student Publications
Assistant Sahil Rahimi, and Student Webmaster and Technical Assistant Ruchi Arya.
Transcription services were provided by the Commonwealth Club of California, with
editing and publication production services by Catherine Frazier.
Mineta Transportation Institute
i
CONTENTS
FOREWORD 1
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 3
KEYNOTE SPEAKER CARL GUARDINO 5
PANEL DISCUSSION 13
QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS 37
ABBREVIATIONS AND ACRONYMS 51
ii Contents
Mineta Transportation Institute
Mineta Transportation Institute
iii
LIST OF FIGURES
1. MTI’s Executive Director Rod Diridon, Sr. 5
2. Keynote speaker Carl Guardino 8
iv List of Figures
Mineta Transportation Institute
Mineta Transportation Institute
1
FOREWORD
There is no doubt that bicycle ridership as a partial or total workday commute is on the
increase. Among the challenges faced by transportation planners is how to best meet the
needs of bicycle commuters on existing public transit modes, mostly light rail and
commuter rail such as Caltrain, while minimizing negative public perception of bicyclists.
In co- sponsoring its second bicycle summit, “ Using Bicycles for the First and Last Mile of
a Commute,” the Mineta Transportation Institute provided a public forum where
transportation policy makers and planners, bicycle commuters and other community
members can come together and discuss concerns and needs of San Francisco Bay
Area bicycle enthusiasts.
The focus of this year’s summit was exploring ways for cyclists to best integrate cycling
with existing forms of commuter transit, discussing best practices ( and current
frustrations) with bicycle access and egress from those transportation modes. What
improvements to roadways are needed to encourage cyclists to use their bikes for
transportation to existing commuter transit systems? How can surface transportation
planners serve both automobile and cyclists on streets, expressways and highways?
What facilities are needed on transit vehicles to encourage cyclists to use commuter rail,
light rail or even buses to complete their rides to and from work? Perhaps most
importantly, what can be done to foster goodwill between cyclists and non- cyclists on the
streets and when using mass transit?
A summit such as this does not provide quick and easy answers. However, it is the best
way for a dialogue to begin among stakeholders— transportation planners, cyclists, and
the various transit agencies who are being called upon to meet the needs of an
increasingly diverse transit- using population.
I would like to thank the event speakers and panelists, and offer my sincere appreciation
to the event co- sponsors. Without the efforts of each of you, important dialogues such as
this simply would not take place.
Rod Diridon, Sr.
Executive Director, MTI
2 Foreword
Mineta Transportation Institute
Mineta Transportation Institute
3
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Bicycle ridership as a partial or total workday method of commute is increasing in
popularity. With that increase in cyclists comes challenges for transportation agencies:
how can the needs of cyclists fit seamlessly with the needs of non- cyclists, especially
those utilizing light rail and commuter rail such as Caltrain?
The Mineta Transportation Institute ( MTI) has been instrumental in encouraging a
necessary dialogue between cyclists and public transit operators. This is the second
bicycle summit produced by MTI, and this year’s dialogue between cyclists, interested
members of the community and transit operators focused on ways that bicycle
commuters can best be integrated into existing systems, especially commuter rail. What
do cyclists need from transit operators in order to seamlessly integrate public
transportation into their workday commutes? What can surface transportation managers
do to encourage cycling and increase the safety of cyclists who are sharing the road with
automobiles? What facilities are needed at transit stations and aboard transit vehicles to
help commuters complete their trips to work?
On June 3, 2009, MTI, the Commonwealth Club of California and the United States
Department of Transportation sponsored “ Using Bicycles for the First and Last Mile of a
Commute” in San José, California. Co- sponsors of the event included Caltrain, Bay Area
Metropolitan Transportation Commission ( MTC), Silicon Valley Bicycle Coalition, Silicon
Valley Leadership Group, and Valley Transit Authority ( VTA).
Keynote speaker Carl Guardino, himself an avid cyclist, spoke about the needs of
cyclists and what businesses can do to encourage their employees to include the use of
a bicycle as part or all of their commute. He acknowledged the efforts of many key
advocates of cycling who are making a difference in the public, nonprofit and private
sectors. Those individuals include Silicon Valley Bicycling Coalition Executive Director
Corinne Winter, San José Mayor Chuck Reed, City of San José Office of Economic
Development Paul Krutko, Caltrans Director Will Kempton, Webcor CEO Andy Ball, VTA
Vice- Chair Sam Liccardo, and VTA General Manager Michael Burns.
Following the keynote speaker, a panel discussion was moderated by Gary Richards,
author of the “ Mr. Roadshow” column in the San José Mercury News. Invited speakers
included Dr. Kevin Krizek from the University of Boulder, who will be authoring an MTI
study analyzing the access and egress methods as issues to transit; MTC’s Sean Co,
who spoke about legitimizing the use of bicycles as a form of transportation; Federal
Transit Administration representative Alex Smith who talked about barriers to integrating
the use of bikes with existing transportation modalities; San Francisco Bicycle Coalition
founder Shirley Johnson who presented highlights from the “ Bikes on Board” project;
Silicon Valley Bicycling Coalition Executive Director Corinne Winter who spoke about
increasing the availability of bicycling facilities to encourage mass transit use by those
cyclists; City of San José Bicycle and Pedestrian Program Coordinator John Brazil who
discussed the need for cycling education, not only for cyclists, but also for motorists; and
finally Caltrain Special Assistant to the CEO Mark Simon who talked about Caltrain’s
efforts to increase bike space on its trains.
A question and answer session followed the panel presentations, with questions coming
from stakeholders in both the public transit and cycling industries.
4 Executive Summary
Mineta Transportation Institute
Mineta Transportation Institute
5
KEYNOTE SPEAKER CARL GUARDINO
ROD DIRIDON
This is the second in a sequence of national transportation policy summits on bicycle
safety; the first was a year ago. The summits have been specifically requested by the
leaders of the congressional transportation committees. The transcript of these
proceedings will be provided to those legislative leaders and will be the input device for a
study on this subject, and bicycle transportation safety in general, that’s being conducted
by the Mineta Transportation Institute.
Figure 1 MTI’s Executive Director Rod Diridon, Sr.
I’d like to proceed by introducing the keynote speaker for our morning session, Carl
Guardino. Carl is the president and CEO of the Silicon Valley Leadership Group. All of
the bios are in your packet, so we’re not going to have long introductions, but I would like
to stress that without question, Carl is the lead transportation advocate in our region, not
only for general transportation but also for alternative modes of transportation. Carl, as
the leader of the Silicon Valley Leadership Group— the organization that was founded by
David Packard in the 1970s and continues to be stronger than ever— has been identified
as one of the 10 most powerful people in the valley. He has led many transportation and
transit elections and initiatives, both in Santa Clara Valley and statewide, and we really
appreciate that guidance. He and his family live in Los Gatos.
6 Keynote Speaker Carl Guardino
Mineta Transportation Institute
CARL GUARDINO
It is such an honor to be here this morning.
I’m going to start with our mutual love of cycling. There are many reasons why people
love to cycle. The first is health and exercise. Again, with a four- and- a- half- year- old
daughter and an 18- day- old daughter, a big concern for my wife and me is sedentary
children in our society. Four out of ten kids today in the United States are overweight or
obese. We are raising a culture of children to be sitting and playing video games rather
than playing outside, riding their bikes and getting exercise. Some are motivated to cycle
from that concern.
The second motivation for some is related: diet and weight control. One out of every four
adults in the United States is overweight or obese, and those numbers are growing
almost annually. Cycling is a great way to maintain our weight and have a healthy diet.
The third is environment and climate change. In California, 41 percent of our greenhouse
gases are from our daily transportation decisions. In the Bay Area, where we’re
supposed to be so environmentally friendly, it’s higher— 50 percent. This is an easy way
to make that change.
The fourth is traffic and commute. Yes, we’ve all read recent reports from the
Metropolitan Transportation Commission and others, as reported in the San José
Mercury News, the San Francisco Chronicle and other publications, that traffic is down,
primarily because of our economy. But in almost every year out of the past 30 years in
the annual Bay Area poll, traffic congestion and commute is either the number- one or
number- two concern. Cycling is a great way to bypass that traffic and have a stress- free
commute.
For me, all those reasons are good, but mine was different. I fell in love with a triathlete
nine years ago. I knew that any chance of dating then- Leslee Coleman, meant I had
better get on a bike. She loaned me hers. It had to be cages rather than clip- ons. In
those days, I would have killed myself with clip- ons. So I took my tennis shoes, put my
feet in the cages, and tried to keep up with her for just 15 miles on Foothill Expressway. I
failed miserably. But she was cute, I was persistent, and we’ve now been married for six
years, have two children— and my love for her and my love for cycling still exist.
I think I was invited here because, like all of you, I try my best to pedal what I preach. I
ride about 10,000 miles a year. A little over 5,000 of those miles are for my commute. I
commute by bike four days a week, when I’m not on business travel, 16 miles each way
each day, from Los Gatos to downtown San José. It is a fantastic way to start and end
each workday. It also allows me to eat as much chocolate as I like.
I’ve been cycling for three years now. I started at three days a week for the first two
years. This year I made a commitment to do four days a week, and I have actually been
beating that average, doing almost four and a half days a week. It’s incredible. As the
CEO of the Leadership Group, it’s amazing. Even after 16 miles of riding, no one in my
office has ever said I smell bad. When you’re the CEO you have that advantage.
As we talk about the first and last miles of a commute by bike, there’s a role for each of
us to play. While I understand much of today’s focuswill be on the role of employers and
transit providers, I’d also like to add local and state government, cyclists and advocates
for cycling. So let me jump in first with employers. I think the work that the Silicon Valley
Mineta Transportation Institute
Keynote Speaker Carl Guardino 7
Bicycle Coalition recently did on the top concerns of people who commute to work by
cycling, and what they would like, really resonates. Let me repeat them from my
perspective.
I think the number- one concern is showers, or a place to clean up. That is key for many
people. What I think is fascinating is that it doesn’t always mean a shower. We have
access to shower facilities in our building complex, and some of my colleagues who are
cyclists take advantage of that. I just go into the men’s room and clean up a little bit.
Either way, knowing that you have a way to clean up is key.
The second thing is, of course, storage. I think we’re all concerned about a safe place to
keep our bike, whether it’s a used bike that we got on Craigslist or eBay for $ 50 or $ 100
or a racing bike, no one likes that feeling of violation or the inconvenience of having their
bicycle stolen. I wheel mine right in at the Leadership Group. Five out of 17 of our
compensated staff ride at least one day a week. It’s part of our culture. And people bring
their bikes right in to their offices, their cubicles, in our hallways at the office.
The third concern is the support of the company. That’s where a CEO’s role comes into
play in such an important way. We tried to emphasize this in a much more significant way
a few years ago, tying in to the National Bike- to- Work Week and Bike- to- Work Day in the
region. We kicked off what we call our CEO/ Celebrity Cycle- to- Work Day Challenge. It’s
pretty simple. We reached out to CEOs and local elected officials to take part in a
three- part pledge. One: ride to work themselves that day. Two: encourage their Bay
Area, if not worldwide, employees to do the same. Three: personally host a celebration
station at the worksite for those employees who participate, so that the employees can
see firsthand that biking is an accepted and valued practice in the worksite. This year,
here in the Bay Area we had nearly 60 CEOs and elected officials take that three- part
pledge, representing more than 100,000 employees. It’s pretty remarkable. First you
have to get past the mental image of seeing your CEO in spandex. That is not always the
best image. But when you get past that, the results of people coming together and
celebrating that culture of a healthy lifestyle and commuting to work by bike are pretty
amazing. When the CEO bikes, it has that cool factor, and is clearly an accepted practice
within the workplace.
Those are three roles that we believe employers can play on an everyday basis. Let me
mention some of the heroes, too. You’ve probably heard of Brocade, a company with
$ 2.6 billion annual revenue and 48 straight quarters of growth, even through this bad
economy, led by a phenomenal CEO named Mike Klayko. Well, he rides to work when
he’s not traveling two to three days a week, from Saratoga to San José, by San José’s
International Airport. He practices what he preaches. The employees appreciate it, see it
and then replicate it.
In summary, the three key things that we like to see are: ( 1) space for bikes; ( 2) policies
in place that encourage bicycle commuting; and ( 3) funding in place to make sure that
those policies can be held up.
Years ago, we were working with Byron Sher when he was an Assembly member, on a
bill called AB 434, which allowed the Bay Area Air Quality Management District to
impose a $ 4 per vehicle license fee in the nine- county Bay Area and to use those funds
for programs like bicycle commuting. For the past 10 or 12 years, VTA has taken
advantage of those funds to have the racks in the front of buses and places on the
8 Keynote Speaker Carl Guardino
Mineta Transportation Institute
light- rail trains for bikes. Some of that funding was through that funding source. Those
are the types of policies that transit providers can and have taken advantage of to make
sure there’s room for all types of commuters as we extend that first and last mile. I really
take advantage of that, especially on rainy days. I can jump on light rail near my office,
get off at the Winchester station in Campbell, and ride the rest of the way to and from my
home. That is a great amenity, made incredibly easy by the Valley Transportation
Authority, so kudos to them.
Figure 2 Keynote speaker Carl Guardino
Some of our other transit providers are having the additional burden of increased cyclist
ridership versus types of travelers. There are difficult decisions to be made with very full
trains on BART and on Caltrain how to accommodate everyone. I have ridden and used
my bike on both systems. On some systems, BART I think is a notable example, you
can’t take your bike on all trains or at all times— that’s really tough when you’re trying to
use it as a commute mode. On Caltrain, how do they deal with the dilemma of full trains
wanting to be used by both cyclists and people on foot? It’s something they’re still
struggling with. You are going to hear more this morning from Mark Simon on how
Caltrain is trying to manage this. Our key as cyclists is to try to work in a constructive way
with VTA, with Caltrain, with BART, with other transit providers, so that we all win, and
that we deal with those last- and first- mile issues.
Local and state government is key, on the planning side, on the delivery side and on the
funding side. We’re going to talk more about that later.
Mineta Transportation Institute
Keynote Speaker Carl Guardino 9
How many of us in this room are active cyclists? Keep your hands up if at least one day
a week you also cycle to work. I love this room. We’re with each other here. So about half
of us cycle to work at least one day a week.
I was thinking over the weekend, do I talk about the don’ts, or the dos? Let’s talk about
the dos. This was reinforced this morning on First and San Fernando as I was coming
here. A cycling commuter was riding toward me with no helmet, riding with one hand. He
went through a red light, right in front of a police officer, on the wrong side of the street,
and then went on the sidewalk with all the pedestrians, right after that. How does that
reflect on all of us, let alone the safety of that individual and everyone around him?
So, the dos: Do obey the law. Can you imagine if that were a car this morning? How
would we feel about a car on the wrong side of the road, running a red light, and going on
the sidewalk? Well then, why is it okay for a cyclist? It’s not okay but it happens every
day and I think we all see it every day. Second, please wear a helmet. This person was
not. But I like my brains on the inside of my skull, rather than the outside. It’s such a
simple step to take. Third, stop and yield. How many of us every day see another cyclist
roll right through a light or stop sign? We’re taking our lives in our hands, but we’re also
taking the lives of others, and the reputations of every single other cyclist, in our hands.
The next “ do” is pay attention. Don’t use your cell phone on your bike. It’s illegal and it’s
unsafe. Don’t wear your iPod earplugs while you’re cycling. You can’t hear emergency
vehicles; you can’t hear those cars around you. John Brazil will tell you if the data that
more than half of the accidents between bikes and cars are the cyclists’ fault is still
current. More than half the time we are at fault! But here’s the difference: in a crash
between a car and a cyclist, the car is dented; the cyclist often dies. This is flesh, not
metal, and it’s not worth the risk.
We advocates have a responsibility. All of us in this room, to one degree or another, are
advocates. And advocates are most successful when we pedal what we preach, obey
the law and take advantage of doing what is right. Years ago, a member of this panel and
I tried to form something in Silicon Valley called Courteous Mass, in direct response to
something done further up the road that I am critical of, that I won’t name by name,
where cyclists show that we are part of the transportation system. But if we do this in a
courteous way, we win more friends and allies on the roads, in the legislature and in city
halls than we do if we act like the roads are only ours. So as advocates, let’s make sure
we live up to that.
I’d like to end this morning with what I would like to call Golden Helmet Awards to seven
folks in our region and states who I believe are key advocates in the public, nonprofit and
private sectors.
The first awardee is on this morning’s panel. Corinne Winter took what was a very good
but sleepy organization called the Silicon Valley Bicycle Coalition and rejuvenated it into
a relevant, positive, proactive force that works on programs, policies, education and
information that has really turned cycling around in our region. Corinne Winter, you are a
recipient of our Golden Helmet Award.
The second is San José Mayor Chuck Reed. As cyclists or advocates, if you are not
supporting his Green Vision for San José and Silicon Valley, please look into it. One of
the actionable items in that Green Vision is 100 miles of bike trails and paths in San
José. Can you imagine if we had 100 miles? My commute, as I told you, is 16 miles on
10 Keynote Speaker Carl Guardino
Mineta Transportation Institute
the way in, and because of the way I have to go back, 17 miles. Ten of the 16 and 10 of
the 17 miles are on trail, then six miles are on roads. What a difference it would make, if
all 16 or 17 were on trail, not only from an enjoyment standpoint, but from a safety and
pollution and stress standpoint as well. Look into the Green Vision. In absentia, the
mayor deserves a Golden Helmet Award.
Third is Paul Krutko. He is the head of the Office of Economic Development in the city of
San José. He helps put on the Tour of California stages that have come here, that get
people excited about professional cycling, and then hopefully on a recreational and
transportation level, too. He deserves the Golden Helmet for his co- promotion with us,
for the past three years, of the Sierra Road King of the Mountain, to instill in people the
belief that cycling is good as a healthy lifestyle as well as a commute mode.
The fourth is at the state level. Will Kempton is the director of Caltrans. If you didn’t
already know, he’s not only an avid athlete, but also a huge cycling supporter. Deputy
Directive 64, the Complete Streets program, is key to his work. Directive 64 decrees that
every transportation and road improvement in California, to the best that it can, should
accommodate cyclists and pedestrians. Every time we have a California Transportation
Commission meeting, he prods me to publicly prod him on every project we review to
make sure it’s meeting DD 64. That’s the type of advocate we need at Caltrans.
Next, from the private sector is Andy Ball, the CEO of Webcor. If you don’t know Andy,
you’ve probably seen the 400+ cyclists wearing the green Webcor jerseys riding
around— they obey the traffic laws, by the way. I think Andy insists on it. What he has
done to promote women’s cycling, and cycling by all, in our region and state is
phenomenal.
Sam Liccardo is next, the vice chair of the Valley Transportation Authority and a
downtown San José City Council member. If you’re not supporting Sam’s work on better
bicycle facilities in San José that he is trying to push through the legislative process in
San José, please get on board. He needs your help; he wants to make it safer for all of
us, and he, too, is a cyclist.
The final recipient of our Golden Helmet Awards is Michael Burns, general manager of
the Valley Transportation Authority. He rides his bike in San Francisco to Caltrain, and
then down to his office in downtown San José. He doesn’t just do it once a year, on
Bike- to- Work Day, which is good by itself; he does it whenever he can. He continues to
promulgate practices at VTA to make sure that buses and light rail are friendly for cycling
commuters.
With that, I want to thank you for putting up with my sleep- deprived state. A little flu and a
bad back weren’t going to keep me from this wonderful opportunity to talk about
something that we mutually love. We can make great progress if we continue to work
together. Thank you very much for your time.
Mineta Transportation Institute
11
PANEL DISCUSSION
ROD DIRIDON
We wanted to thank two unique bicycle manufacturers for joining us today: Bo Rodgers
has the electrically powered bicycle in the foyer, and Bo is with Second River and ELV
Motors; and Marcus Hayes from PI Mobility has the streamlined red bicycle with the
different kind of form in the foyer for you to look at. Thank you for being here.
We’ll proceed now into the element of the proceedings that are very, very important for
the information we’re going to be sending to Washington. Again, let me stress that we’re
looking toward the future. What’s happened in the past isn’t useful anymore. We’re
looking for ways to accommodate more bicyclists on mass transportation vehicles, while
not inconveniencing current and future transit riders. It’s quite a dilemma right now, with
the reduced revenue for our various local transportation and community programs, it’s
our job to come up with solutions.
I’d like to introduce Gary Richards, “ Mr. Roadshow” from the Mercury News. He has the
most popular column in the Mercury News, in any paper in the region. He is a professor
in the San José State University Mineta Transportation Institute’s Master of Science and
Transportation Management program, and he is a remarkable individual. Thank you very
much for sharing your time with us, Mr. Roadshow.
GARY RICHARDS
Thank you very much, and thanks for asking me to be the moderator.
Santa Clara County is in the process right now of spending almost $ 30 million on
bicycle- pedestrian improvements. Drive the Interstate 280 sometime at night, you’ll see
the Mary Avenue bicycle and pedestrian bridge over the 280— it’s all lit up. There are two
other bicycle bridges, one over 101 and one over 237, and I’m starting to hear from
readers in two different groups that I didn’t hear very much from before. One is the
people who want to go out with their husband, wife, boyfriend, girlfriend, and bicycle on
the weekend. They want to go out for recreation. They see this bridge and think, “ I can
go north- to- south now.”
The other is the person who’s driven to work forever, and he’s now thinking, “ Maybe I can
commute to work by bicycle?” I’m hearing more and more, and I think the improvements
are ringing a bell in heads that says, “ Hey, this may be possible. When is this bicycle lane
going to open up?” That is what the readers want to know.
We will also get into what Carl talked about, protocol on the road. If one bicyclist blows a
red light, they think all bicyclists blow red lights. Well, that’s not true, but it’s not easy
trying to combat that and teach car drivers how to make a right turn when there’s a
bicyclist in that bicycle lane. And that is the one issue that bicyclists complain about most
often, with a lot of validity.
I’ll introduce the panel in reverse order. Kevin will be the last person I introduce and he’ll
be the first panelist. Our panelists will talk for no more than 15 minutes. Then we will
open up for questions.
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To my right is Mark Simon. Mark was formerly a reporter with the San Francisco
Chronicle and the Palo Alto Times. Now he works with the San Mateo Transit District and
Caltrain, so he’s gone over into a “ real job” after leaving journalism.
John Brazil will be the next speaker. I call him the bicycle guru for the city of San José.
When I have a question, he’s the man I go to. He’s been head of the bicycle- pedestrian
program since 2001.
Corinne Winter is executive director of the Silicon Valley Bicycle Coalition. I liked what
Carl had to say about how she took a sleepy organization and made it proactive. She
was a big help when I was writing stories on the I- 280/ Mary Avenue bridge, and other
bridges.
Dr. Shirley Johnson is the San Francisco Cycling Commuter of the Year. She went to
Holland a number of years ago and became an avid bicyclist. If I read your bio right, you
bicycled from Alaska down to San Francisco? Now that’s a commute.
Alex Smith is with the Federal Transit Administration.
Sean Co is with the Metropolitan Transportation Commission.
And our first panelist is Dr. Kevin Krizek. Kevin is from the University of Colorado. If you
have been to Boulder, you know how many bicycles are on the road up there, sometimes
even in the snow. Kevin is very interested in where people live and how that affects their
commute patterns.
KEVIN KRIZEK
Thank you so much, Gary. It’s an absolute pleasure to be here this morning, sharing
perspectives at the national level. I’ve now lived in Boulder for 16 months. I lived in
Minneapolis for six years previous to that. My experience is primarily as an avid cyclist,
as an avid cyclist commuter, but I am also very active in the research arena in the
academy, trying to weave together various strands of thought to come up with a cohesive
story— about how and where advocacy can learn from academia, how academia can
learn from advocacy, and forge a partnership.
At the outset though, I’d like to send kudos to the Mineta Transportation Institute for
initiating a study— a study that I am the principal investigator of— that analyzes bicycle
access and egress issues to transit. It means a lot for the Mineta Transportation Institute
to realize this is an important and under- studied issue and promote such an analysis.
Our gathering this morning is a reaction to a good thing. In many respects, we’re a victim
of our own success because transit companies— the operators— are now speaking out
because their timetables are being violated by “ too many damn bikes using transit,” and
bicyclists are getting frustrated because there’s no more room available. Five years ago,
this was a wonderful problem that we were striving for! Ten years ago, most metropolitan
areas failed to have buses that had one, much less two, bike racks. Now it’s standard
practice for all buses in most metropolitan areas to have two bike racks, but that’s not
enough. We’re stuck in that issue of how to take it to that next generation of integrating
cycling and transit. This is a good problem that we are trying to address, and we all
should be congratulated for that, including the cyclists and the transit operators.
Mineta Transportation Institute
Panel Discussion 13
Last month, the national organization for bike advocacy, Bikes Belong, gathered a dozen
researchers in Boulder, Colorado, to try to figure out how bicycling- related research
could better parlay into advocacy- related efforts and policy. This is the first time that a
national advocacy organization gathered together 12 university researchers in one
location for a day and a half to brainstorm about these related issues.
We’re increasingly seeing bicycling in advertisements, in cartoons, in TV and in film. All
you have to do is open up any magazine or watch television to see it. There are more
bikes in the movies, more bikes in the backdrops and more bikes in art these days. Walk
down the street here, and you’ll see the bike culture exhibit currently on display at San
José City Hall.
Many of us recognize David Byrne, formerly of the Talking Heads, as one of the country’s
most avant- garde musicians and artists. Well, we now have David Byrne penning his
thoughts in the New York Times about bicycling- relating parking facilities and bicycling
fashion. If anyone has picked up the New York Times over the past four or five months,
you’ll see that the Sunday Fashion articles are columns by David Byrne about how to
look cool in Manhattan riding a bike. I think that we’re at a turning point.
We like to hope that this excitement is more than flash- in- the- pan. As someone who has
followed these trends for some time now, I think that it is. And while the cycling
community needs to celebrate an increased investment and devotion to cycling, we need
deliberate on measured approaches to maximize the return on investment for the limited
resources that are available. We need to direct those resources efficiently and
productively. And that’s what the study— which is primarily why I’m here talking to you
this morning— is aimed to do: look at that combination of bicycling and transit and realize
that the way we’ve been doing it in the past may not be the best way to do it in the future,
and examine what the most cost- effective ways to pursue this are.
Primary among the reasons that we gather here is integration of bicycling with transit
services will have significant environmental, health and congestion benefits. A
successful marriage between the two— bicycling and transit— will increase the catchment
area, patronage and efficiency of transit, and increase the overall demand for cycling.
A core problem is that the predominant approach for integrating these modes—
transporting bicycles aboard the transit vehicles— runs into capacity constraints. We’re
now pushing the envelope in many transit agencies. And a further limiting factor revolves
around the limiting constraint of the transit vehicle along the trunk portion of the trip.
We could adjust the capacity of bikes in transit through incentives, one biker gets off so a
bike can get on. We could exploit technology by asking cyclists “ When are you getting on
and off?”, and trying to match that with some sort of queuing system. But the opportunity
is ripe to consider broader solutions.
These broader solutions could be along the following lines. First, rely on the standard
practice of transporting the owner’s bicycle either inside or outside the vehicle. Second,
the owner could park their bicycle at the transit access or egress location and then walk.
This option would require increasing investment around transit facilities, for
approximately a mile or two, with respect to striped lanes, parking, etcetera. Third— and
this is terribly under- studied and unexploited— think more broadly about public
bike- sharing systems, share a bicycle, which would be based at the transit access or
egress point.
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Anyone who has been following this for the past X number of months knows that there is
more than a general uptake in public bike sharing systems. We have read about the
systems in Paris and Lyon. The jury is still out on these. Largely in response to the
wonderful bike- sharing success at the Democratic and Republican National Conventions
this past year, which made bicycles available to delegates in Minneapolis and Denver,
both of these cities and others are now on the cusp of considering public bike sharing
systems.
None of the systems have really played out yet. Nor do we know the formula, the
protocol or the pattern that we need to follow for these programs to be successful. But we
do know there is more than considerable enthusiasm toward trying to figure out patterns
of success with these types of systems. Delving into that knowledge and harvesting it, for
bicycling and transit, is important. And the burgeoning work examining the
characteristics of costs of bicycle- sharing systems will directly feed into this research as
well.
The question here is: given the variety of urban- form settings— sometimes we have bike
lanes, sometimes we don’t; sometimes we have high- density, sometimes we don’t;
sometimes we have high density but without a population of bicycle commuters;
sometimes we have low density with an active population of bicycle commuters— what
are the costs of feasible alternatives that provide the most effective solution to this issue?
The Federal Highway Administration reports that over one- half of U. S. residents live less
than two miles from the closest public transportation route. That suggests that there
might be more than a compelling market out there for people to be riding their bikes to
transit. Now, which part of this market should we maximize our investment in? What is
the potential to seize this market?
We need to put our psychologist’s hat on and really think about the various issues that
cyclists have to overcome in order to make that trip. We have initial considerations: Do I
need to pick the kid up from daycare? Do I feel groggy this morning? Is it raining outside?
If any one of those are possibly a “ yes,” you know as well as I do that the likelihood of
riding a bike is going to be less.
Then we have trip barriers: Is there a lot of traffic on the trip? Is there a pinch point, a
particular bridge that we have to cross? There needs to be only one intersection to cross
to be threatening for many of what we call Type B or Type C cyclists. Removing these
different types of trip barriers, bicycling to transit being one of them, is an important thing.
Then, there are destination barriers, and these are exactly the types of things Carl was
talking about. Ideally the destination, at the employer or other site, provides a supportive
environment, through parking, increased morale or what not. Bicycling- transit really
integrates, from a psychological perspective, the latter two stages: the trip barriers as
well as the destination barriers. And only after each one of the three criteria is satisfied
do we have a successful outcome— that is, a bicycle commuter.
It requires us to think diligently about this, which is one the reasons why, as part of this
research, we are going to be conducting focus groups and case studies in a handful of
different settings, to glean information from both avid cyclists and casual cyclists about
the different types of issues that need to be overcome, and inform us about the
possibilities.
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Panel Discussion 15
In the end, this research is headed toward analyzing the cost- effectiveness, convenience
infrastructure, and benefit considerations of integrate bicycling with transit services. We
will be doing this in approximately one year’s time, and we will share some of the results
of this research with Peter Haas at the Mineta Transportation Institute. The users will be
able to benefit from those seeking guidance on the most cost- effective strategies to
maximize bicycling- transit integration, guidance that will likely reject a “ one- size- fits- all”
approach. Ultimately, we will be able to offer transit agencies informed suggestions on
how to retain and improve returns on their investments by overcoming rack capacity
limitations, and more effectively integrate bicycling and transit.
I have a lot more to say, but at this point, I want to thank you very much for the invitation
to come to San José, and for your time and attention this morning. Thank you.
GARY RICHARDS
The next speaker will be Sean Co. Sean is with the Metropolitan Transportation
Commission and will be able to offer a Bay Area- wide view. He also bicycles 18 miles a
day, roundtrip. A few weeks ago, I asked various transportation planners in the Valley
how they commute to work. I thought I’d get, I drive solo every single day. I did,
admittedly, set the bar low because I asked, One day a week, do you use an alternative
means of transport to get to work? Because that’s what we always hear as commuters: If
you can, do something else one day a week. But a vast majority of the responses
exceeded that, so I was encouraged— it wasn’t the story I expected. But the poster boy
here is Sean.
SEAN CO
Thanks, Gary. One of the reasons we’re here today is to talk about bicycles as a
legitimate mode of transit. This isn’t really a fringe activity, but it is seen as one. Bicycling
is an efficient, convenient way to get to transit, but we lack some of the data to make that
case. I’m going to talk a little bit about problems with the data.
One is that there is an undercount of cyclists in general from the sources of data we get
our numbers from, the census data, as well as, in the Bay Area, the Bay Area Travel
Survey, which basically asks people where they went and what type of trip they made.
The reason for the undercount is because the question we are really asking people is,
“ How did you get to work last week?” About 1.5 percent of people ride to work. But in the
Bay Area, work trips are only about a quarter of all bike trips in general, so we’re
disregarding this whole other host of trips that people make.
We talk about recreation trips versus commute trips, but we really don’t make that
distinction when we talk about car trips. In the Bay Area there are about 81,000
home- to- work bike trips per day, but the second- highest category is about 75,000
shopping trips, and trips to school.
The difficulty with bikes- to- transit is that it’s difficult to quantify. Since the data we collect
is self- reported, the trip can be counted as a transit or a bike trip. For example, this
morning I took my bike in the rain, rode it to the BART station and got on board. When I
leave work, I intend to ride my bike all the way home. Had I been answering the question
from the census data, I could have said I got to work this morning either by bike, or by
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Mineta Transportation Institute
transit— it’s up to me, as the person making that trip. Someone who walked to transit
might count that as a walk trip, or as a transit trip. The specifics are not tracked in the
census data or in our travel data.
Transit operators in the Bay Area do try to keep track of this; they do special studies, they
try to track mode of access to transit. They don’t ask where people are coming from but
they do ask, “ How did you get there?” They use a different methodology but they don’t
gather data at regular intervals so it’s hard to track how people are getting to transit and
by what mode.
Also in the Bay Area, we have 27 transit operators, so it’s hard to track every mode of
transport. Are people driving and parking, are they taking a bike to transit?
There’s quite a bit of evidence that bicycling is growing, as Kevin mentioned. You can
see that in your day- to- day activities, even if you ride transit or drive a car. In general,
there are more people riding bikes. For example, on this year’s Bike to Work Day, which
was just last month, it was up 36 percent over previous years. And in 2007, it was up
from 2006. A lot of people are riding their bikes. In Gary’s column, some people have
said high gas prices have forced them to look at different ways to get to work. And there’s
been a growth of bicycles on transit. Of course, Caltrain has had some challenges
accommodating all the bikes. And with other transit operators in the Bay Area, BART for
example, you’ll see a bike on board pretty much every trip you make.
Why is this important? In addition to keeping track of transit trips and bike trips, we’re
often asked, “ What is the effect of providing infrastructure or better access on transit?”
What does that get you? We do know that if you build it, they will come.
The city of Portland has tracked this pretty well over the last few years, and there is one
particular chart that all bike advocates and transportation researchers overuse, but it’s
effective nonetheless. It tracks bikeways versus the number of bridge crossings on a
particular bridge within the city. To give an example, in 1992 they had 83 miles of
bikeways and about 2,800 crossings on the bridge. In 2005, they had 259 miles of
bikeways and about 10,000 crossings, so there’s definitely a case to be made that
infrastructure affects bike trips. Whether that’s cause- and- effect or routing, we don’t
really know, but at the end of the day, there are more people riding.
To that end, I have been working with bicycle advocacy groups, and UC Berkeley and
Alta Consulting, on a national documentation project, a bicycle and pedestrian count
project which will come up with a methodology that will allow regions all across the
United States to really compare counts by collecting data in a specific way. That will
either be by counting crossings at a specific point, or by counting the number of bikes or
pedestrians in an intersection.
We did this back in 2002– 2003. We identified 100 locations in each of the nine Bay Area
counties and said, “ We are going to count there every year.” We didn’t really know what
we intended to do with the data. We’ve stopped doing that, but there’s been a big interest
in it this year and there’s going to be a lot of people collecting data. At the end of 2009, I
hope to have some numbers that we can look at, and then in future years perhaps we
can hire a consultant to track this data, as we do for our other modes of transportation:
transit and highways.
Mineta Transportation Institute
Panel Discussion 17
I now want to talk a little bit about the Complete Streets Policies, because it’s really not
just about planning for one mode, it’s about planning for access. There are some new
policies that have got agencies used to thinking about moving people instead of cars or
just trains.
In 2006, MTC had a routine accommodations policy, which is a Complete Streets Policy,
that was to consider bicycle and pedestrians in all project planning and design. The way
that’s done is via a checklist that project sponsors are required to complete. The
checklist has about 10 questions that look at current projects and check if bikes and
pedestrians are being considered, and if not, why? That policy, even though it has been
in place, was just recently applied to the new American Recovery and Reinvestment Act,
the stimulus projects for their local streets and roads. There were some limitations
because of the way the money for the project came from the federal government, but we
got all the project’s sponsors to fill out the checklist. It was really helpful. It helped people
see that bike projects and road projects are not mutually exclusive. If you have a
Complete Streets Policy, it includes everybody; and you’re talking about funding the
roadway and not a specific mode of travel.
In 2008, the California Complete Streets Act also passed, stating that city and county
general plans should accommodate all road users. It’s a new shift in thinking for
agencies around the state, and it is really getting them to think about more than just car
travel. Caltrans also has a Complete Streets Policy, called Deputy Directive 64 that was
revised along with the California Complete Streets Act. Caltrans strengthened it and
changed a bunch of “ shoulds” to “ shalls” within the department. Caltrans have the ear of
the road- building agency and they’re trying to think of transit and bicycles and
pedestrians as well.
I also want to add what we are doing as an agency. We are conducting a transit
connectivity study. We have identified 24 different transit hubs as a way of finding
real- time transit information and schedules. That’s the information piece, because there’s
not just the infrastructure portion of it, but how people can find their way to transit. That
also will address the last- mile issues, but we’re still working on it right now so there’s not
that much to report.
In addition, for a few years now we’ve had a Safe Routes to Transit Program, which
allocates $ 4 million every other year for the next five years, specifically for bike and pet
projects that go to transit stations and hubs. The call for projects just went out just this
week. It’s designed to take some of the traffic off the bridges in the Bay Area, because
it’s funded by Regional Measure 2, to alleviate congestion. We’ve had Safe Routes to
School for a while and the Safe Routes to Transit is a new way of thinking.
GARY RICHARDS
Our next panel member is Alex Smith, with the Federal Transit Administration DOT. We
have a champion here: Alex is the only male to be honored as a National Collegiate
Mountain Bike and Road Champion.
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ALEX SMITH
One question I have for us in this room is “ Can we make a difference?” There are a lot of
empty buses driving around. What do we do when we see all these empty buses driving
around, or empty bike lanes? Is this just a bunch of bureaucratic- speak, or does this
actually translate into results?
In Los Angeles, the Rapid Bus program has seen about a 30 percent increase in
ridership. If I were in charge, I’d look to something like that as a model for success.
Curitiba, Brazil, inspired Los Angeles to make those changes. They didn’t have a lot of
money, and they asked, “ How can we make a big difference and get the most bang for
the buck?” I challenge transit agencies to think in that way: How can we get the most
bang for the buck? Where’s the low- hanging fruit, so to speak?
I have worked for the Federal Transit Administration ( FTA) since 2002, and I think the
easiest way to bump up ridership and get the most results for the least amount of money
is by providing better bike access to transit. How can we do that? There are
public/ private partnerships for these bike stations, and Warm Planet in the Bay Area is a
good example.
The problem is, by their nature, high- capacity transit lines, like Bus Rapid Transit, Light
Rail Transit, Muni Metro and heavy rail like Caltrain and BART, are too expensive and too
big to have a very wide network. So we have a few major lines. How can we get to those
lines? The choices for accessing these thick lines are by neighborhood bus— I prefer the
term neighborhood bus; feeder bus turns us all into feed, so that’s not such a good
solution— or walking.
While necessary for the mobility- impaired, neighborhood buses are often slow and
expensive for agencies to operate, so I do recognize they perform a critical function but
they are not necessarily the only or the best solution in all cases.
While environmentally favorable and inexpensive, walking is slow. In studies, people
don’t like to walk more than a quarter of a mile, so that’s a problem. We can’t get BART
or Caltrain within a quarter of mile of everybody’s house, even in areas of pretty
high- density.
While fast, driving is impactful and expensive. It’s especially so when you consider the
cost of parking to the driver, and the cost of parking to agencies— it usually falls within
the requirements of a transit operator to provide a parking garage. FTA funds parking
garages, I don’t think they should, but I don’t think I should get on the record as saying
that. They’re also expensive. Parking garages provide a lot of traffic in and out, create
hotspots for CO2 emissions.
Biking, however, is inexpensive, fast and environmentally favorable. Again, it’s not for
everybody, but for an increasing number it is a good solution. We’re not looking for
50- percent mode split- out on the bike, but if we can get anywhere close to 10 percent
we’d be pretty happy in most places. In some places, like UC Davis, we have 70- percent
mode split, so it can get pretty high.
Why don’t more people take their bike to transit? Generally, bike parking is often not
secure, and sometimes, needed services are not provided. We’ve heard talk of showers
and locker room facilities. Additionally, bike commuters are discouraged on transit
because they cannot take their bike with them on board high- capacity services.
Mineta Transportation Institute
Panel Discussion 19
What solutions can we find to overcome the main obstacles: security and amenities?
What is my silver bullet here? One option is the attendant- staffed bike parking. In these
arrangements, members pay often monthly or annual dues for services that function like
a coat check: I ride my bike to the station, pick up a ticket, and then drop off the ticket
and exchange it for the bike at the end of the day. This has a lot of advantages: you have
somebody watching over your bike all day, it’s pretty safe and secure, the transit
agencies get a tenant to rent a space while the riders get a service staff that work and
can accommodate all kinds of bike configurations. Staff can provide extra services like
bike repair, maps and visitor information. The disadvantage of these staffed facilities is
that it can be quite expensive to pay for the operating cost of the attendant.
Another option would be unattended bike parking at a station like BART or Caltrain or
even a future bus rapid transit facility. This is actually, within the trademark name of
Bikestation, the highest- growth sector. In this scenario, members gain access to a room
with a key, code or proximity key and stations typically have video security. They may
have showers, restrooms, lockers and a bike workshop area. Other vending or retail
services may also be offered. These have lower costs, and there is a trade- off with a little
less security also for both the people and their bikes.
A third option is automated bike parking. I haven’t actually seen this in America, but in
Japan they have giant machines that you park a bike in and it flies up. This approach can
handle huge numbers of bikes very quickly with a low staff support. The disadvantage of
this approach is it’s very expensive to start up and only makes sense when you have a
huge number of bikes. We should be so lucky someday to be able to pay for such a
machine, but at this point, it’s not feasible.
A fourth option is to provide incentives for transit agencies to accommodate bikes on
board transit vehicles. When you have a station, whether it’s attended or not, that
presupposes that you can ride to the station, get on the train and then walk at the other
end. That’s not always feasible. Sometimes you need to ride to the station, take the bike
on, and then ride at the other end. So it depends on how far your origin is from the transit
line and how far your destination is from the transit line. Even if you could walk at one
end, you want to do a trip in the middle—“ trip chaining,” for example, you have to stop
and get a haircut halfway down— so you want your bike on the transit system. Shirley
Johnson will talk more about this, but it’s an important part of this whole equation,
because the stations will not accommodate a big chunk of peoples’ trip- making
purposes.
A fifth option is to provide commuters with the same incentives as transit commuters.
Many of us who work for public and sometimes private industries get commuter benefits
to take transit, whereas the tax break for bike commuters is recent. Similar to Don
Shoup’s Parking Cash Out Law, which made it possible to get cash in lieu of a parking
subsidy, perhaps there’s a way to get a bike cash- out where, if you’re not taking the bus,
you can get paid the same amount of money for riding your bike. It would be complicated
because it’s hard to verify if someone might expend the cash on bike commuting rather
than just keeping the money and taking their car.
If we settled on one of these options, how could we secure the funding needed to bring it
about? Currently, FTA provides 90 percent of the capital to local agencies and transit
providers to install bicycle facilities, and up to 95 percent for bicycle- related transit
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enhancement projects. Ninety to 95 percent is a higher rate than for other types of
projects. But FTA ( Federal Transit Administration) and FHWA ( Federal Highway
Administration) do not provide funds directly to anybody who might want to operate or
implement these ideas. A transit agency or local municipality would have to do that.
One important attribute of the federal funding for bicycle and pedestrian facilities is
flexibility. According to FHWA guidance, all the major funding programs can be used for
bicycle and pedestrian- related projects. All too often, local agencies, with a knee- jerk
response, go to the Transit Enhancements Program, but there are 15 or 16 different
funding programs, and most of them make bicycle and pedestrian programs eligible.
CMAC ( Congestion Mitigation Air Quality) and STP ( Surface Transportation Program)
funding are often very appropriate. A quick list of the different programs that can be used
for bicycle funding, including all federal sources, includes: the National Highway System
Program, Service Transportation Program, Highway Safety Improvement Program, Safe
Routes to School Program, Transportation Enhancements Activities, CMAC, Federal
Lands Highway Program, Scenic Byways Bridge State and Community Safety Program,
Job Access and Reverse Commute, and Recreational Trails. There are a few more, but
you get the idea. There are a lot of different pots of money out there. I have more
information, but to apply, you have to go through your agency and they probably have
this information already. If they don’t, see me!
There are some eligibility issues to keep an eye out for with bicycle and pedestrian
projects. Transportation purpose has already come up: the purpose of a bicycle facility
shall be transportation, not recreation. This is a little bit of a shaky distinction; it does not
exist for pedestrians or automobiles, and I don’t think it should exist for bicycles, but
some people are afraid of funding swerving little routes in a grassy field somewhere.
Non- construction activities, generally, are not eligible for most programs, although there
are some, including STP, TE and CMAC. Generally, federal funds are for construction,
although there are some exceptions.
There are some federal funding requirements that are streamlined for bicycle projects.
According to FHWA guidance, it makes no sense for activities such as crosswalk
striping, bicycle parking installation and bike lane marking, which usually require no
additional right- of- way and cause no environmental impact, to have the same approval
process as a multi- lane highway construction project. And the construction of bicycle
facilities is normally exempt from having to complete a project- specific NEPA ( National
Environmental Policy Act) review. I just threw that in because I know that’s an issue now
in San Francisco with the current Bicycle Master Plan.
In conclusion, there’s a lot we can do now to increase ridership of high- capacity transit. I
have pointed out what I believe to be the low- hanging fruit and best opportunities to
access these systems: attended and unattended bike parking facilities. I have also
outlined currently available funding mechanisms that are probably under- utilized and not
fully understood.
GARY RICHARDS
Our next speaker is Shirley Johnson. Shirley moved to Holland in 1987 and fell in love
with bicycling and the way of life over there, and is the founder of Bikes on Board, a great
success and a great problem for Caltrain.
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Panel Discussion 21
SHIRLEY JOHNSON
Thank you. First, I’d like to thank the organizers very much for inviting me; it’s a pleasure
to be here.
There is a handout that has a slide deck. Unfortunately we’re not able to project here, but
I would encourage you to look at the handout; it’s called “ Bike Plus Train: A Perfect
Combination.”
All the work I’m going to be presenting today is from the Bikes on Board project, which is
sponsored by the SFBC ( San Francisco Bicycle Coalition).
First, I’m going to talk about access to public transit and the benefits of bicycling. Then I
want to move on to a case study of Caltrain’s onboard bicycle service. I want to talk
about how Bikes on Board has been working with Caltrain to improve that service,
including investigating some of Caltrain’s concerns about it. Then I want to go into
Caltrain’s progress before I close, and emphasize that bike- plus- train really is a perfect
combination.
The Metropolitan Transportation Commission has done a study in the Bay Area and they
found that people living within a half mile of a transit station are three times more likely to
take transit. For a lot of people, it’s the time to transit that’s important. In 10 minutes, a
person can walk about half a mile. But in 10 minutes, that same person can bike two
miles. So what a bike does is increase the accessibility sixteen- fold to a transit station.
Access to public transit is really important. The average bike commuter can or will ride
about three miles, there have been studies that show that. A lot of people don’t live within
three miles of work, but a lot of people do live within three miles of a transit station. So
combining the bike plus train considerably extends the travel range and enables people
to commute to work by bike, which is what I do every day. I bring my bike to the station. I,
and many other cyclists then bring our bikes on board for a fast trip of many miles, and
then we bike to our destination. Caltrain is a national leader in the Bikes on Board
service. They’re able to green the first and the last mile, by allowing us to bring a bike on
board the train.
Caltrain’s Bikes on Board service is enormously popular. It offers convenience and
flexibility rivaling the automobile. In fact, 40 percent of cyclists vary their normal commute
pattern. Caltrain did a study, the 2007 Online Bike Survey, and found that the number
one reason cyclists bring their bikes on board is that flexibility. With my bike on board, I
can get off at a number of different stations and arrive at the same destination. This is
particularly helpful today because Caltrain service to some stations is once an hour, but
by using adjacent stations, riders can take trains five times an hour. Suburban stations in
particular have limited public access. With a bicycle, that’s no problem; you can just jump
off the train and ride to your destination. It’s door- to- door, and it’s often faster than the
available public transportation when there is public transportation. So it’s very useful to
have our bikes on board.
And, of course, it’s a green commute method: Sixty percent of cyclists who ride Caltrain
cited environmental concerns as the reason they bring their bikes on board.
And, we all know, biking is fun and great exercise. We really love it and we love Caltrain’s
Bikes on Board service. In fact, more than seven percent of Caltrain’s passengers bring
a bike on board today.
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What may have started years ago as perhaps a novelty has become a true, practical,
viable commute method for those of who ride our bikes to work every day using
Caltrain’s onboard bike service. It’s a fabulous system, and I think some people didn’t
expect it to have quite the success that it does today.
With that success comes some challenges. This is a photograph of cyclists who were
denied boarding, something we call “ bumped,” because there wasn’t enough space on
the train for their bikes. These cyclists all have paid tickets because of Caltrain’s proof of
payment system, the conductor stands in the doorway, and does not let the cyclists
board. The most frustrating part about this is watching that train pull away with empty
seats. Caltrain’s 2009 annual passenger count shows that every train ran the entire line
with empty seats.
Cyclists are being bumped every day. This is correspondence from the Caltrain board
meeting and it’s full of emails from cyclists who are reporting being bumped. Cyclists are
also exceeding capacity on the train. A graph in your handout shows weekday bike
boardings on the Y- axis and year boardings on the X- axis. We see that bicycle boardings
were increasing rapidly until 2006, when routine bumping began. We would have
expected bicycle boardings to continue to increase, but, in fact, they flattened out. The
chart underneath shows that from 2003 to 2006 walk- on passengers increased 16
percent and bicycle passengers increased 41 percent. From 2006 to 2008, walk- ons
increased another 16 percent, so we would logically have expected that bicycle
boardings would increase another 16 percent. Unfortunately, they increased only five
percent because of the limited bike space on trains. The sad part about this is 2008 fare
box revenue loss for Caltrain is about $ 1 million. The real tragedy is that Caltrain has a
public hearing tomorrow to declare a fiscal emergency.
But there is a bright side: Caltrain has opened a new market: Eighty percent of cyclists
rarely, if ever, ride Caltrain if they don’t bring their bike on board. So this is a brand new
market. These are people who normally would not ride the train. So there’s a fantastic
opportunity here. The question is how to resolve this issue.
This is the bike car in a train leaving San Francisco, so the train hasn’t even left the first
station, and this bike car is completely full. What that means is any cyclist down on the
line doesn’t have a chance of getting on until somebody gets off. This is that very same
train before it leaves San Francisco, and what you see is it has many, many empty seats.
The issue is a mismatched demand. There is not enough bike space, and there are too
many empty seats. The obvious solution is to add bike capacity by removing these empty
seats. Of course we’d all like to add more bike cars, but there are operational and
budgetary constraints that prohibit that.
So we formed the Bikes on Board project. It is sponsored by the SFBC, and it consists of
cyclists from all three counties that Caltrain serves. We set two goals: ( 1) increase bike
capacity onboard Caltrain’s existing trains by 2009, and ( 2) ensure recommendations for
Caltrain’s new rolling stock for electrification in 2015 meet bicyclist’s needs. In scope for
the Bikes on Board project are bikes on trains now and bikes on trains in the future. Out
of scope is bike access to stations and bike security at stations. The reason these are out
of scope for us is because Caltrain wrote an excellent bicycle access and parking plan,
so they’ve got that covered; they’ve done that very well. But while we don’t want to
diminish the importance of that— it works for some people— only one percent of Caltrain
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Panel Discussion 23
passengers actually park their bike at the station. The vast majority bring their bikes on
the train; that’s the real benefit of the service, and so that’s what Bikes on Board focuses
on.
Now, Caltrain does have some legitimate concerns about its onboard bicycle program:
The first is dwell time, the concern that cyclists may take longer to board and cause
delays. The second concern is seat removal; if you take out seats, there’s a possibility
you could lose ridership. The third concern is subsidies, because a bicycle does take the
space of one seat on the train.
I direct you to slide 11 in your handout, a graph taken directly from Caltrain’s 2007
progress report. It shows on- time performance on the Y- axis and the year on the X- axis.
If you look between 2003 and 2007, you’ll see that on- time performance was very good.
It hovered around 95 percent, which is Caltrain’s target. In that same time period, bicycle
boardings increased 43 percent. So the data just does not support bicycles cause dwell
time delays.
Caltrain has an operational policy that bicyclists must board last. When bicyclists board
last, the perception could be if there is a delay, no matter who caused it, that the bicyclist
caused it. So we recommend to Caltrain that they allow bicyclists priority boarding at the
bike car, because then walk- on passengers can go to other cars, distribute boarding
among cars, and that will reduce the dwell time.
The next concern Caltrain had was seat removal and the loss of potential ridership.
Caltrain did an excellent, though inadvertent, experimental trial on seat removal. On May
30, Caltrain removed 14 cars from service for emergency repairs. The result is a lower
seating capacity on the trains. Interestingly, ridership actually increased from five percent
from May to June, even though those cars were out of service, and no walk- on
passengers were bumped.
In your handout, on slide 13, there is a graph of that inadvertent experimental trial that
shows average weekday riders on the Y- axis, and month in 2008 on the X- axis. What
you’ll see is the typical pattern for Caltrain: ridership increases through the summer
months and then drops back down through the winter months. And we see that trend in
ridership increase is uninterrupted between May and June, even though in June there
were far fewer seats on the train. So the conclusion is pretty obvious: If you take out
empty seats, it does not impact ridership.
Estimated subsidies are shown on the next slide, and the concern here of course is that
all passengers are subsidized. In Caltrain’s case, fare box revenue covers about 40
percent of operating costs. For all passengers being subsidized, if you look at this chart
is shows that anyone who uses motorized transport is subsidized more than people who
use either walking or biking. Not only that, walking and biking are green commute
methods, greening the first and the last mile potentially, particularly with Caltrain Bikes on
Board program, so, the program has social benefits as well as financial benefits.
We’re thrilled and happy to report that Caltrain is making wonderful progress on
improving its onboard bike capacity. They are in the process of adding eight bike spaces
per bike car by the end of July 2009, a 28 percent increase. They are also converting two
existing cars to bike cars by September 2009, and considering the possible conversion
of a third. And one- third of the trains are specified to have 80 bike spaces, which is
fabulous. Unfortunately, it’s not guaranteed, but it is a step in the right direction.
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Caltrain has said this is an interim solution, which is wonderful because it’s not expected
to meet demand, it is a step in the right direction. We do need more on board bike
capacity.
After September 2009, two- thirds of the trains will vary unpredictably, with 24, 48 or 80
bikes per train. Now, when a train with 80 bike spaces pulls up, we’ll all get on. When a
train with 24 bike spaces pulls up, it’ll be a bit of a gamble and we may get bumped.
Inconsistent service drives away paying customers, and that’s something Caltrain really
can’t afford right now. So what we need is a consistent 80 bikes per train to meet
demand.
Bikes on Board continues to help Caltrain plan for success— we need better consistency
today— but just as important is planning for those specifications for the new rolling stock
for electrification. We have a real opportunity here because we can plan for the onboard
bike service, instead of trying to force fit it into an existing system. It’s a very exciting
opportunity and we’re really looking forward to working with Caltrain on this solution.
In conclusion, bike- plus- train really is a perfect combination. It’s green for the planet,
wonderful for society, convenient for commuters, which is why we all love it, and it’s cost
effective for transit agencies. So, we recommend a sustained mode shift in the future; it
makes good environmental sense and good business sense to shift from motorized
transport to walking and biking. Thank you very much.
GARY RICHARDS
Our next panel member is Corinne Winter.
CORINNE WINTER
Thanks Gary. I definitely think transit and bicycles are natural transportation partners. It’s
not rocket science, you know? How we do it is certainly a matter of debate and I think a
lot of things rest on the shift that is currently happening within public agencies. With
political will, things are currently shifting so that bicycles are more of a part of the
transportation process. There’s a lot of evidence of that; what Sean was saying in terms
of the Complete Streets Policy, the things we’re seeing coming out of the city of San
José, Caltrain working more to accommodate cyclists. So it is happening, but there are a
lot of questions— how do we do it and whom is it going to work for?
One of the really big issues is the topic of latent demand, which a couple of the panelists
touched on. There are a lot of people that might use bikes and transit if they felt it was
more possible for them. Those include people that are just on bikes, just on transit or
primarily using the auto for their trips right now. That is a big issue and there is a lot of
data that needs to be collected to target that. How many people would be using these
facilities if we did build them? Somebody had said, If we build them, they will come, and I
think there’s a lot of truth to that, but if we get data to that effect, then there will be more
political will to build these facilities for cyclists, and partner with transit.
There are a few critical topics in bike commuting right now: one, as Shirley spoke on very
well, was the onboard accommodation on transit, which I feel as well is a huge issue, and
I’m very thankful that Bikes on Board has done so much to promote that. We’ve also
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Panel Discussion 25
worked with Caltrain extensively on their capacity on the trains, and there are both
short- term and long- term issues there; they’re planning on converting their rolling stock
at some point in the next few years— it’s really uncertain now when that will happen— and
we’ve been very pleased to see them accommodate cyclists by taking out seats and
getting more bikes on board in the meantime. But in the long term, what we end up with
in this area will serve transit users for the next several decades. It is critical, and so we
look forward to hearing more dialogue and getting more public input on that.
Another issue is how do we simplify getting our bikes on board? It’s a little chaotic on the
platforms sometimes with bikes. Can we have real- time information distributed to cyclists
on the capacity for the trains? Things like that matter a lot when you’re dealing with a
train that’s trying to come into the station and pull out again as soon as possible. Then,
how do we just deal with the boarding process? As Shirley mentioned, right now
bicyclists are supposed to disembark after the non- cycling customers of Caltrain, so that
can create other issues, and we can probably work out a system whereby the boarding
process is modified in a positive way.
The second big issue is the wayside solutions. About eight or nine months ago, we called
together a roundtable of about 40 different groups— businesses and agencies, cities,
VTA, Caltrain— and we said, no matter how many bikes we get on the transit systems
here in Silicon Valley, it’s never going to be enough. We’re always going to need other
options for people. And there are some people who don’t need to have their bike with
them at all times, and those people could be served by a bike- sharing system. We need
to make sure the system is consistent, all throughout the region, all throughout the Bay
Area is the hope, so you can get your bike- share system pass and go pretty much
anywhere and be assured of having a bike to take with you wherever you need to. To me,
that sounds like heaven, so we’re working with VTA on a pilot project right now to try to
figure out what this might look like. There has been a lot of activity in San Francisco with
the MTA ( Municipal Transportation Agency) as well, so hopefully we’ll be able to
coordinate this on regional level.
We’re also trying to draw businesses into this. Here in Silicon Valley in particular, there
are a lot of businesses that are already creating bike- share systems. Google now has a
way to store bikes at the Caltrain system, so their employees can ride a Google bike from
the Caltrain platform to their headquarters. In a public bike- sharing system, we would
essentially have that for everybody, with kiosks at all the major businesses, Caltrain
stations, downtown central areas and wherever you might want to go. This is
complicated— as some of you who have visited European countries and other cities in
the United States know— it soon becomes clear when you start a system like this that
you have to do what’s called rebalancing; you have to move all the bikes around every
night because people aren’t necessarily consistent in their patterns of use. This is an
operational issue, which is why we’re getting everybody involved, talking about it right
from the get- go and hoping that we’ll be able to create a uniform system across the Bay
Area at some point.
Another wayside solution, of course, is storage improvements; again, not rocket science.
I think a lot of the agencies are working on that, but it would be great if we eventually
have a uniform storage system. Part of the reason cyclists don’t use open lockers and
storage systems more— it’s too complicated. I’ve never used them, I’ve never taken
advantage of them; I have to figure out too much about my schedule, I have to call this
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transit agency to get a locker set up here, and call that one to get a locker set up there. If
we could somehow, maybe with guidance from MTC or other regional bodies, create
some sort of a uniform system, it would be a lot easier for people to use.
Another priority is the infrastructure design around transit stations and in transit corridors.
This is something both SFBC and SVBC [ Silicon Valley Bike Coalition] work on quite a
bit— the concept of green mobility and how we make it so that people can live, work and
walk in these neighborhoods, and bike and have safe, pleasant access to transit. Right
now we’re focused on the Diridon Station area project. I don’t know how many of you are
aware of this yet, but the City of San José applied for a grant and got almost $ 1 million to
do the planning in a half- mile radius around Diridon Station. Stadium or no stadium, that’s
going to be a big project. We’re working with Greenbelt Alliance and some other
organizations to ensure that bicyclists and pedestrians are accommodated in the plans,
and that the streets are designed in a way that is really conducive to people using the
streets right around the station, and getting between the station and downtown or their
home with a bike or by foot. There is, as most people in this room know, an incredible
amount you can do there. There will be public meetings on this; if you are interested,
keep an eye out.
We’re also shifting gears a little bit and doing a lot of work with businesses. As I
mentioned before, people want to be able to ride from the train to their business, but they
also need to be able to ride from their home to their businesses, and there are a lot of
things that the businesses can do to encourage people to bike in. As Carl mentioned
earlier, our three big ticket items are: ( 1) Give people a transition space— it doesn’t need
to be a shower, but biking and working are two different activities and you need to give
people a space to make that transition; ( 2) Provide places to store bikes securely,
generally at people’s desks or in a locker room, not outside in the rain or somewhere in
the back parking lot; it’s got to be better than that; and ( 3) company messaging. If the
executives at the company say this is something we promote, employees will really
follow that.
I also want to give the City of San José some credit: John Brazil has been doing a huge
amount there. I didn’t realize until they applied for certification just how much they have
been doing. We gave them our highest rating, the Platinum Rating, and they were the
only company or workplace in the initial round that got that rating— things that go above
and beyond showers. They have bikes available for employees to use during the day.
They also have a really robust program whereby they encourage cycling events, like the
City of San José Cycling Classic.
A lot of people tell me, “ I would ride to work, but I just don’t feel safe.” So another thing
we did to remove barriers to cyclists is launch our Share the Road initiative. We are not
going to solve the problem overnight, obviously, but we’re going around talking to groups,
both cycling groups and motorist groups, giving a presentation and trying to promote
education for cyclists on proper lane position and proper traffic behavior, and trying to
generate more awareness with motorists as well. We’re also revamping our incident
report. We’ve had this for a long time on our web site. Anytime cyclists are victims of
aggressive behavior, they can give us that data. We’re going to keep that data and see if
there are patterns, specific locations with problems that we need to address, or specific
motorists; if we get license plate numbers repeatedly that’s something we can go to the
local jurisdiction with and say, what should we do about this?
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Panel Discussion 27
So we are working on a lot of things right now. In general, I think it’s mostly about a
constructive dialogue— that’s been a focus of the SVBC— to work with agencies, to work
with the public, to figure out how can we create a better situation for cyclists and make it
easier for people to bike commute.
GARY RICHARDS
Our next panel member is John Brazil, head of the Bicycle Pedestrian Program in San
José. One of the things that John has been key in getting implemented is safety classes,
in which they give away free helmets to the first 25 or so bicyclists who sign up, as a way
of telling them that there is a way that you can commute to work safely.
JOHN BRAZIL
Thank you, Gary. I’m going to talk about a few things, but there were so many interesting
points that were raised with the other panelists that I may meander a bit, so I hope you’ll
indulge and work with me if I meander a bit from regular talking points and just throw out
ideas.
What I want to talk about first, briefly, is the big picture: why should we even care about
any of this? Second I want to talk about bicycling, generally. Third, what is San José
doing? Then, fourth, bicycling in the last mile in transit. So, let’s dive in and see what kind
of chaos ensues.
The big issues: Some of the previous panelists mentioned these, but why should we
really care? We’re busy, day in and day out, what does it really matter? I would argue
that there are at least three reasons that come to mind. Yes, we’ve heard them all before,
but they’re real. Climate change, whether we want to accept it or not, is a reality. It may
not affect us, but our kids or our grandkids are surely going to be affected, so we ought to
be responsible and do something about it. As one of the previous panelists mentioned, in
the Bay Area, 50 percent of our carbon emissions come from transportation. Part of the
solution to that problem is going to be bikes.
The second really big issue is one of public health. That sounds vague, but let’s make it
personal— you may know somebody who has diabetes, and certain types of diabetes are
caused by a sedentary lifestyle, among other things, and diet. The more we can move
and exercise, the more we can solve these public health issues. Bicycling doesn’t solve
the whole problem, but this is a real crisis in the public health system, and getting people
to move a little more can help. This is “ big- picture bicycling.”
If anyone listened to the governor’s address to the Legislature last night, they know that
the state and local government budget issues are worsening. That may impact me more
directly because I work for a government agency, but it’s going to impact you as well
because cities and states don’t have enough money to do what they want to do: to pave
the roads, to provide public services. How does that relate to bicycling? A large portion of
our budget goes to simply maintaining the pavement on streets. I’m
over- simplifying— this is one of many issues— but what do you think is going to cause a
street to wear out more, a 4,000- pound car or a 25- pound bike? It’s not that simple, and
I’m not proposing we get rid of all the cars, but someone threw out a 10- percent goal, if
we have 10 percent of trips by bike instead of the current average of two percent in San
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José, that will have long- term have positive impacts, and maybe we can reduce those
millions that we need for pavement maintenance a little, save some money and pay for
other services that you want.
I’ll throw out all the bragging rights, because I have to do that and I like to do that. As
Corinne Winter, executive director of the Silicon Valley Bicycle Coalition mentioned, the
City of San José is one of the first four workplaces in Silicon Valley, and also in the
Peninsula, to receive Bicycle Friendly Workplace designation. We were the only
employer to receive it at the platinum level. That means that we’re making bicycling
easier for employees. We have fleet bikes for employees to use; if they want to make a
business trip close by that’s work related, they can check out an employee fleet bike. It’s
also acceptable to take it out for a lunch break for health and wellness. That’s part of the
philosophy behind it: health and wellness for employees. We have, of course, showers
for employees who ride to work, and we have secure bike parking and transit benefits so
our employees can get free transit passes through VTA and subsidized transit passes
through other agencies. We got our Bike Friendly Workplace reward.
We’ve been re- authorized as one of only 100 cities in the country to be designated a
Bicycle Friendly Community by the League of American Bicyclists; that’s fantastic, we’re
proud of that. Bicycling magazine, the leading bike magazine in the United States,
designated San José one of the top three Most Improved Bicycling Cities this past year,
so we’re making progress, but we have further to go. We have one of only 22 national
recreational trail designations in the country and I think we’re the only one in California to
get that designation for a great and developing trail system. We have hosted
international bike races: the Amgen Tour of California for four consecutive years. We’re
the only community in Northern California with a velodrome, which is one of those tracks
where you can race a bicycle. And we were the first city to host the North American
Handmade Bike Show, and one of only four cities to host the Livestrong Challenge, the
Lance Armstrong Foundation’s event where you raise funds toward cancer research by
getting contributions to bike or run.
What is San José like for bicycling? For those people listening that aren’t from this
community, we’re a city of approximately 1,007,000, the 10th largest city in the United
States. We have a relatively mild climate and a flat topography that are perfect for
bicycling. But, as I mentioned, we’re only slightly above average, nationally, with about
two percent of trips taken by bike, so clearly we need to do something more. What is that
something more?
Before I talk about what we’re doing, I want to talk about target audiences. A lot of times
bike and transportation planners, but particularly bike planners, preach to the choir. We
preach to that two percent that are riding a bike right now. And that’s great, but I don’t
want to just preach to two or three percent. I want to reach the “ latent bicyclist,” the
person who’s saying “ I might bike, but it’s just, I don’t know, I don’t feel right” — the
person who’s not even thinking about bicycling. I want San José to be like some
countries in Europe where 40 percent of trips are by bike. Not two percent, 40 percent.
We’re not going to get there immediately, but to get even close to that goal, we have to
preach to more than just the choir, to more than just the person who’s already riding,
feels comfortable riding in traffic, is putting on the lycra and racing on weekends. Those
things turn off the latent bicyclist.
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How do we reach that additional audience, the average person? What’s their concern,
why aren’t they bicycling now? The things I hear repeatedly are: ( 1) I don’t feel safe
riding in traffic and ( 2) it’s just not convenient; and this is going to tie into the transit link
when I get to that point.
Safety: Well, we’ve done detailed collision analysis in San José for years. We know
factually what the risks are and we know what we need to do to make things safer. To
oversimplify, one of them— it’s very challenging— is slowing cars down. But there are a
lot of things we can do, and are doing, to improve our bikeways. The perception of safety
is just as important as the factual matter of what we need to do to make the road safer. I
can sit here as a transportation planner and ask, “ Why aren’t you riding?” “ I don’t feel
safe on that road.” I’ll say, “ Well, factually, it’s safe.” They’ll say, “ I don’t care about
factually, I don’t feel safe.” Reach that audience and get more people to bike and use
transit trip links.
What we’re doing in San José is updating our bike plan. Currently, we have our old bike
plan, which is eight years old and calls for building about 300 miles of bikeways,
including about 100 miles of trails and 200 miles of on- street bikeways. To date, we’ve
built about 230 miles total: 50 miles of trails, 160 miles of bike lanes on the streets and 20
miles of bike routes. So it’s good progress, but, when we updated our bike plan, which
we’re doing now, we realized we need other things.
First, we need a bigger network of bikeways, 450 total miles of bikeways will be our goal,
because while we can ride on any street legally as a bicyclist, we may not feel
comfortable on any street.
Second, we realize that most people don’t like riding on streets. What we need to do is
form a backbone of bikeways that are off- street, that people feel more comfortable on,
and that’s our great trail network that Eve Zuti manages. We have completed about 50 of
100 miles. Just like you’d get on the freeway to get to your destination, you could get on
a trail and get to your destination. The trick is, we need the on- street bikeways, too,
because probably 99 percent of destinations are off the trail system. Trails are great; we
all want to be there, we’re going to make them a great environment, but we need to have
the on- street connections to get to transit stations or to wherever our destination is.
Third, we realize traditional bike facilities on streets aren’t enough. Half the people in the
room said that they bike, so you probably feel comfortable on a bike lane on a street with
a stripe, a sign and a little space, but the other 98 percent of people often don’t and that’s
why they don’t ride. So what we’re doing in San José is saying we want to enhance some
of the bike lanes on streets, the primary ones that go to key destinations like transit
centers. We’re looking at a variety of options to enhance basic bike lanes. It could be
providing some physical separation for traffic, it could be coloring the bike lane, it could
providing buffered space.
San José has been doing other things, too. People talk about how you may need to
shower at your destination, so for at least eight years our municipal code has required
new developments to have showers and bike parking. And we are going to continue
doing that.
These are key issues. As a lot of folks have mentioned, transit is key here. I take my bike
to work everyday, and often I link with transit. That’s wonderful and Caltrain is fantastic;
it’s been a national leader in accommodating bikes, but success creates new challenges
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and so that’s part of the discussion here. The panelists have named a variety of solutions
that I support. We’re going to need a pallet of solutions to make sure that people can get
to the station and then can have a safe option for their bike, whether it’s taking it onboard
or parking it, or renting a public bike through the bike fleet. In the short term, I applaud
the SFBC for seeking more access onboard and I also believe that in the long term, even
if we could fill the trains completely with bikes, that’s not enough; we need to have
additional options. We can learn some lessons from other communities, particularly in
Europe and Asia, that have larger bike shares and transit use shares. At some transit
stations you see not hundreds but thousands of parked bikes. It’s simply not possible for
us to get thousands of bikes on the trains. So onboard is part of the solution, but we need
to have other options. Bike shares, unstaffed bike stations, staffed bike stations,
whatever they might be.
I also want to applaud Councilmember Sam Liccardo and Mayor Chuck Reed for
pushing some of the issues about making bicycling more convenient in San José.
Councilmember Liccardo was one of the prime movers in realizing that the average
person doesn’t feel comfortable riding on the street, and that’s why they’re not riding. I
also wanted to mention our local congestion management agency and transit operator,
which is VTA [ Valley Transportation Authority]. They operate the buses and light rail that
all allow bikes. They also do the planning. Just yesterday we met with VTA, and they are
developing a pilot project for a public bike share at three transit stations in our county. So
planning is in works. We’ll need to identify funding once the plans are done, but
eventually we’ll see a public bike share pilot at the train stations here in San José, and
probably in Mountain View and Palo Alto. That’s fantastic.
I also wanted to share a notion of the most vulnerable transportation user, who is not a
person in a car, because they have 4,000 pounds of metal around them. I drive a car
once in a while, and there’s nothing wrong with driving a car, but the most vulnerable
user is a pedestrian or a bicyclist. There’s a growing notion that transportation planners
ought to put as a top priority the most vulnerable users, instead of having the top priority
being single occupant vehicles.
Another idea I wanted to mention is this: Think about other communities where bicycling
is mainstream. In European countries, the bike mode share may be 40 percent and then
you add walking, maybe 20 or 30 percent transit and an incredibly low single occupant
vehicle mode. That’s a great goal to reach. In the States, where people don’t bike, we
talk about bike culture; there’s this group, this bike culture. But if you go to a country with
40 percent bike mode share, there isn’t a bike culture, biking just is. It’s so much a part of
people’s lives that they don’t think about it. Bike culture is great— you can fit whatever
subculture you want: the body piercing, the tattoos, the tri guy, whatever you want. But
wouldn’t it be great if we got to a place where bikes were so much a part of our culture
that we didn’t think about it anymore? That’s something we should really embrace.
GARY RICHARDS
Anchoring us today is Mark Simon.
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Panel Discussion 31
MARK SIMON
I want to tout a June 20, 2009 forum in Redwood City, called the Grand Boulevard
Initiative Forum. It is relevant to this particular group, and I’ll explain why Caltrain is
involved in it in a second. The Grand Boulevard Initiative Forum is an attempt to
transform El Camino Real, from San José to Daly City, into a world- class boulevard that
is pedestrian- and bicycle- friendly, and basically embraces and exhibits all of the
concepts that we talk about: transit- oriented development, and walk- able, bike- able
communities where people can live, served by transit, with clusters of businesses rather
than the historic string of businesses that seem to be going out of business every five
years.
SamTrans ( San Mateo County Transit District), VTA and the San Francisco MTA
( Municipal Transportation Agency) are sponsors of, and partners, with Caltrain. What
does that mean? It means that Caltrain is funded by subsidies provided by those three
agencies, state and federal funds, and what we get from our fare boxes. Shirley made
reference to the meeting Caltrain is having tomorrow, the public hearing to declare a
fiscal emergency. We have managed to get our annual deficit down from $ 10 million to
about $ 2.7 million this year, and we’re going to have to make some service cuts and
increase parking fees, which of course makes bicyclists happy, and increase the cost we
charge for the GO Pass to balance the budget. But we have a structural deficit
somewhere in the neighborhood of $ 25 to $ 30 million, and this structural deficit isn’t
helped by the fact that the three agencies that fund Caltrain all have structural deficits of
their own. This year, the state Legislature zeroed out the State Transit Assistance Fund,
which is a major source of revenue for all three agencies. It has been cancelled for the
next four years, it’s what we call the state government diet: if you can survive after four
years, then that proves you didn’t really need it.
I’m glad to hear Caltrain described as the national leader in onboard bicycles. It’s one of
those things; be careful what you wish for. It isn’t something we set out to do. In 1992,
which is when Caltrain was formed as a joint power agency, we started allowing four
bikes on a few trains. By mid- 1995 we became bike accessible with 12 bikes per train on
all trains. In 1996, we doubled that to 24 bikes per train. From 2000 to 2001 we increased
our gallery cars from 24 to 32. Our Gallery train cars are the big shiny ones, the
Bombardier cars are the red and gray ones. From 2004 to 2008, we increased our
service levels from 76 trains a day to 98 trains a day, and that, by definition, increased
our bike service. Our onboard capacity at this time was 32 spaces per Gallery and 16 for
the Bombardiers.
We are now in the middle of a program, we are increasing the space on the Gallery cars
from 32 to 40. In an unfortunate, misplaced burst of enthusiasm, I emailed my mailing list
of more than 400 bicyclists who use Caltrain and told them we had finished converting all
of the Gallery cars to additional bike space. We actually still have three left to do, but they
should be done if not by the end of this week, by the end of next week. Of course, that
piece of information comes from the same people who told me the conversions were
already done, so be careful what you do with that information.
Increasing the bike slots on those cars from 32 to 40, we are also increasing the
Bombardier cars from 16 to 24. We actually proposed more, but several people in the
bicycle community, in one of those examples where it’s useful to have input, expressed
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concern that if we took all the seats out then they’d have to stand with their bike to make
sure no one stole it. We talked at the very beginning of this show about the
disappointment we’ve had when we’ve walked out— I’ve had the same experience— and
looked where our bike is supposed to be, and started thinking, “ Well, did I leave it there?
Maybe I left it somewhere else?” You don’t want to believe that someone took your bike,
but someone did. So we understand that.
We’re also committed to putting two bike cars on as many of the peak commute trains as
possible. We mentioned we are in the process of converting two other additional
Bombardier cars to bike cars, and we’re probably going to convert one more. If we do
that, then all five of the train sets that we have for Bombardiers will be two- bike- car sets.
In addition to what we expect to be able to do with the Gallery cars, we think that will help
resolve some of the consistency issues. We recognize that consistency is a critical issue.
That’s one of the things that affect all of our customers. Everything we do, we have to do
in the context of our whole system, impact on the rest of our service— on our on- time
performance, our reliability and on everybody else who also rides the trains.
It has been an interesting for us to learn how to work with the biking community. As I
said, it wasn’t something we set out to do, to become such a prominent participant as a
carrier of bicycles. In the last year and a half, we have learned that we have to regard this
as, essentially, a central part of our service. It’s not the only part of our service, certainly,
but it is something that we are in business. There was always an undercurrent of it’s
something we’re doing, we may keep doing it, but we may not. We’re going to keep doing
it, and keep working with the bicycling community to see how we can make it better. That
includes real- time information. Right now Caltrain doesn’t provide any real- time
information, not just for cyclists, but for anybody, because we don’t have the
infrastructure to do so.
The other thing that I want to dwell on a little bit is not dwell time, because we can debate
all we want to about that, but the fact that we do worry about whether or not we’re on
time and dwell time is one of the things that prevents us from being on time. Do you know
what dwell time is? It’s how long the train has to stay at the station before it gets going
again. We did do a Bicycle Access and Parking Plan that became the first full
engagement of the cycling community because someone made the mistake of referring
to it, when they first planned it, as the Bicycle Master Plan. Then, of course, the bicycling
community wanted to know why the Bicycle Master Plan wasn’t addressing bikes on
board. Well, because the plan really wasn’t supposed to be that. We got grant funding to
do the plan and study wayside facilities, which is how we allow people to access the train
station and what’s available for them once they get there. So we mislabeled the plan,
which created significant confusion. It was our own fault, and the debate ensued from
there.
The main thing is that we do think that wayside facilities are a major way of meeting the
demand for bicycles for that last mile. In this, we realize the main recommendations of
the plan include cyclist- specific customer service and marketing— a unique segment of
our customer base and we need to recognize and treat them accordingly. We have to
increase the overall bicycle parking supply. First and foremost, we have to find a way to
make the bike parking we provide safer. We have some bike lockers that people have
moved into, not with their bikes but with all their worldly possessions and that’s not really
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Panel Discussion 33
what they’re for. So we need to be more understanding of what will make using bike
lockers more appealing to people, because it will ease some of the demand onboard.
We want to work with cities to improve station bike access, I reference the Grand
Boulevard Initiative; that’s a good example of really high- level thinking about how to
transform the entire nature of a major boulevard, and get the individual cities to start
thinking more thoughtfully about how these things all interrelate. We want to study
innovative station site concepts, such as real- time bicycle capacity information, bike
sharing, and subsidies for folding bikes. And we have a Legislative request in to one of
the legislators of San Mateo County for a pilot program to subsidize a bike- sharing
program and folding bikes, because there’s more room on the train for folding bikes then
there is for ones that can’t be folded.
Where does all this lead? When we’re done with the current expansion project, we have
to assess its impact on our system. We’re going to end up spending about $ 350,000 that
we don’t really have to do this. I don’t say we don’t really have it because I want to sound
begrudging, but these are tough times for all public agencies and for transit in particular,
which doesn’t have an organized advocacy group in Sacramento. I was going to say in
Washington, but the great irony is Sacramento keeps cutting, while money for
transportation is gushing out of Washington in the form of high- speed rail money and
stuff like that. So we certainly need help advocating for transit in general, and as we can
grow transit, we can certainly grow bicycle capacity.
We have to assess the impact of and see if it’s meeting the demand. If there’s more
demand, what can and should we do, and where are we going to get the money to do it?
We are going to form a bicycle advisory committee; we have been meeting internally to
discuss it. But it’s something we’ve been very slow to get to, partly because we’re all
preoccupied with our budget issues. SamTrans is facing layoffs. I’ve been out of the
business for five years and this is one of the first times I’ve had to sit through one of
these meetings where you go from discussing, we’re going to have to lay off 10 people
to, here are the 10 people we’re going to lay off. It’s a whole different discussion when
you suddenly realize these are people you know and have lunch with.
We are going to continue to pursue the initiatives described in the Bike Access and
Parking plan; that information is on our web site, caltrain. com.
The next meaningful leap forward, really, in terms of our ability to expand capacity, is
going to be when we expand the whole capacity of the rail system. We have plans to
electrify Caltrain, in theory, by 2015, and to change to a whole new technology of rolling
stock called Electric Multiple Units. This will mean the train is no longer a heavy
locomotive that drags along a bunch of cars. Each car will have its own power, which
means it’s much more flexible and much more efficient. For example, one of our most
popular trains is the express train that goes from San José to San Francisco in under an
hour; it makes four stops. Under this new system, which we expect will be fully realized
by 2025, we’re going to make that run from San José to San Francisco in about an hour,
but with 14 stops. There’ll be so much more service. The problem now is not just that
people get bumped— that’s a problem that we’re trying to fix in the interim.
Caltrain has formed a partnership with high- speed rail. We’re still ironing out the details;
there are a number of things that high- speed rail needs to do that we need to do. There
is an economy of scale, and efficiencies, to be gained, and there’s an opportunity for us
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to make some of these changes for Caltrain using high- speed rail money, because the
changes will serve high- speed rail’s interests as well.
Again, Corinne asked me where we stood on replacing rolling stock, and the answer is
that we have to wait and see what sort of relationship we iron out with high- speed rail.
There are a number of people, especially in the central part of the peninsula, Palo Alto,
Menlo Park, Atherton, who are increasingly alarmed by high- speed rail. If you support
high- speed rail, you need to make sure people hear that point of view as well. I
understand the concerns— people are worried about the damage it might do to their
community, but we think of this as a fantastic opportunity to serve a greater number of
people in a hugely more efficient, effective and modern way, and that would certainly
include the bicycling community.
So what have we learned? We probably should have been more communicative and
more transparent from the beginning. We are adding extra service, extra capacity. Some
of the bicyclists love to be collaborative, some of them have a history of being adversarial
and that’s okay— that’s what they’re used to, that’s who they are, that’s how they get
things done, and I say that without pejorative intent. We are continuing to concern
ourselves with the system impact of all of these changes, but we recognize that the
bicycle service is here to stay and it’s a customer segment that we have to pay serious
attention to. Thank you.
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35
QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS
GARY RICHARDS
We’re going to resume here with the question and answer session.
JEFFREY OLDHAM
I ride Caltrain and I’ve been working with Bikes on Board. We’ve been talking about the
first and last mile and how bicycles are involved with that, but I want to talk about the
middle mile. The middle mile is that segment in your journey that doesn't have adequate
public transportation service. Why does this happen? Well, transit stations are not
necessarily next to each other. Famously, London and Paris have this problem. We have
this problem with BART and Amtrak in Fremont and Oakland, and we have this problem
in San Francisco. We have non- uniform scheduling. Biking between transit stations
saves me time because I can cycle faster than I can transfer. It also saves money,
because I don’t have to pay an additional fare. I can't usually just cycle faster to catch
service, so how do the proposals of parking, bike sharing, bringing my bicycle on board,
etcetera, address the uncoordinated schedule and middle- mile problem?
JOHN BRAZIL
The middle mile is the responsibility of local agencies and cities. The transit operators,
particularly fixed rail transit, have stations, and they cannot provide stops every hundred
yards. It comes down to cities creating a continuous network of bikeways and prioritizing
the development of streets and ways that encourage, rather than discourage, bicycling.
That's a whole other subject, but it's the city's job, to do that.
KEVIN KRIZEK
You’ve put your finger on a very important issue, and that is trying to articulate where
bicycling and transit is superior to bicycling versus transit. If you take a look at land use
patterns and the average bicycle trip, which is around five miles or so, you can get to
more things quicker riding a bike, as you articulated, than you can on transit. Bicycling,
for those of us who do it, provides greater accessibility and mobility than transit.
I live in Boulder, but I frequently teach and work in Denver. I’ve never had more than a
five- minute commute in my whole life, but I now have an hour commute. I’m willing to
bike 40 or 50 miles one way, but it’s time- cost prohibitive. So, I can’t bike to work
anymore. I ride my bike to the bus station and take the bus to work. There’s a certain
distance, I would say 10, 15, 12 miles, transit usurps bicycling, and that’s the market
we're really talking about. But your point regarding trips of less than 10 miles is well
taken.
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MARK SIMON
One of the things we're increasingly looking at is partnerships and how we can expand
the network. For example, In San Mateo County between Sam Trans and Caltrain, we do
a pretty good job of going north to south, but most people live east to west, so how do
you provide service to people in that direction? That's the next big challenge and it really
is, as Kevin alluded to, not just a transit challenge; it's a planning challenge. How do you
get cities to begin thinking about this, first of all, as their responsibility, whether it’s
something they have to take on directly themselves or identify partners to work with?
Then, how begin to plan their communities so that they provide services for people to get
to and from the main trunk lines? Getting to and from places that aren’t served
conveniently by the main system is something that needs a holistic approach; a
response from a whole range of communities.
JOHN BRAZIL
I’d like to mention one approach that is part of the solution, and one of the policies that
the city of San José has. For those of you familiar with transportation planning, when a
new development is built, a traditional traffic impact analysis is done that says, for
example, that if someone is going to build a high- rise office building, it will create
X- amount of car trips, and the developer has to mitigate that, usually by making the road
bigger. San José has said there are certain parts of town where we don’t want to
encourage more car traffic, so rather than that traditional business of saying, okay
developer, you need to make the road bigger for cars, we say, developer, you need to
mitigate the transportation impacts by funding improvements for pedestrians, bikes and
transportation. So, when a development happens in the middle mile, in these locations in
San José, rather than just building a bigger road we make the improvements for
pedestrians and bicyclists to get to transit. It’s part of the solution.
TIAN HARDER
My name is Tian Harder, and I’m from Mountain View. I am a green activist. I just want to
start by saying that transit is really a lot better than it used to be and I’m very grateful for
that. But I live in fear of being bumped off Caltrain, or not getting on it, and I have a
couple of suggestions: One is, could you give the conductor a pass to give people who
have been bumped so they are first in line for the next train, then less likely to be bumped
again? Also, lately I’e seen more people bringing Razor scooters, because they’re small
and you don’t need much space for them. Maybe more scooters could take the pressure
off the bike cars?
MIKE CABRILLO
My name is Mike Cabrillo. I was raised riding my bicycle on the streets of Los Angeles,
so I’m a very hardcore urban bicyclist, I don’t even consider myself part of the biking
culture, I just tuck in my pant legs and off I go on my bike. So, I’m really part of the two
percent that’s preaching to the choir. I should mention I’m also co- managing the general
plan update for the city of San José. What I’m really interested in is how we get that other
98 percent of people to ride bicycles. When I ride downtown with my fiancée, it’s not a
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problem. Downtown San José was built before the Second World War, and it’s
pedestrian- and bike- friendly, but when we leave the old urban core, my fiancée says,
“ That’s it, I’m riding on the sidewalk now, I’m not going with you unless we can ride on the
sidewalk.” Of course, one of the unattended consequences of all the ADA [ Americans
with Disabilities Act] ramps that they put in is to have facilitated riding on the sidewalks.
And I heard West Hollywood has passed a law that allows you to ride legally on the
sidewalk. I have mixed feelings about that, and I’m not saying I’m advocating for it. But I
am wondering whether, in the post- war auto- oriented parts of Silicon Valley with
expressways and major, big, six- lane arterials when you get off the Caltrain or the
light- rail station, if instead of having to ride with the quick- moving traffic on a major
arterial, which is probably factually safe, but it doesn’t feel safe, is the city looking at
opportunities to make legal riding facilities on the sidewalk? That’s my question.
MARK SIMON
I’m going to sound like a broken record, but this is a really good opportunity to once
again tout the Grand Boulevard Init