There’s a scene in Christopher Buckley’s “Thank You For Smoking” where Nick Naylor explains his job to his son Joey, and as an example starts a debate with him as to whether chocolate or vanilla ice cream is better. Nick’s response takes the argument off the rails (which was his point), but helps me to understand something about my transportation options.
Category Archives: Cycling
Convertible Cargo Bike
We want a cargo bike. It’s been something we’ve thought about for a while, especially since we got rid of our car, but the price and the bulk have always kept us from getting one. Now there’s an option that we can’t pass up: The LIFT carrier that turns your regular bike into a front-loading cargo bike. They just launched their Kickstarter campaign, and it’s one of the first Kickstarters that I jumped on early enough to score one of the super-early bird specials. (Yay for me; hurry up for you…)
Proposal to Undermine Complete Streets
There is a bill under consideration by the Honolulu City Council that will effectively undo the Complete Streets ordinance enacted by the council in 2012. Bill 84 (2015) would require any money to be spent on bikeways or complete street improvements to be specifically identified as a project in the executive capital budget ordinance. This would severely limit the options of the city for adding improvements, since many recent complete street projects have been accomplished within the existing operating budget. Since the whole point of the “Complete Streets” policy is to look for opportunities in every transportation project, this bill would negate Honolulu’s “Complete Streets” ordinance.
Are Sharrows Useful?
I had always considered Shared Lane Markings, or sharrows, a cop-out, something that localities add when they want to look like they’re doing something to enhance cycling infrastructure but don’t want to make any actual changes. My cousin recently sent me this article, which in turn was based on this study that compared ridership and injuries before and after the addition of bike lanes or sharrows. Based on data about bike commuters in Chicago, the study found that the addition of bike lanes led to an increase in ridership and a decrease in injuries, while the addition of sharrows led to minimal changes compared with roads that had no changes in markings.
This started me thinking about sharrows in a larger context, and wondering whether they could have a negative impact on cyclists. For example, Hawaii law grants a bicycle the same rights as a car on a roadway (§291C-142). However, would sharrows on some roads lead drivers to the mistaken belief that cyclists are not allowed to ride on other roads that don’t have them? After giving this some thought, I’m of the mind that sharrows can be useful when used appropriately, but we shouldn’t consider them a major infrastructure improvement.
South Street Protected Bike Lane: Right or Left Side?
An Argument for a Protected Bike Lane on the Right-Hand Side of the Road
As part of its ongoing effort to construct a minimum grid for cyclists, the City and County of Honolulu has proposed a new protected bike lane along South Street. This will be one of the first mauka/makai routes to feed into the King Street Protected Bike Lane. The original proposal for the South Street project is for the lane to be located on the ewa side of the road, which, similar to King Street, will be on the left-hand side of the one-way portion of South Street. Just as the King Street project is a two year pilot project to evaluate the utility of a protected bike lane, the South Street project should be considered a pilot project to evaluate the utility of a right-hand side protected bike lane.
Left-Side Bike Lane?
Ceremonial ribbon cutting to open the King Street Protected Bike Lane. December 6, 2014.
It’s been over a year since the City and County of Honolulu installed Hawaii’s first protected bike lane. After riding it several times a week since it was added, I’ve noticed a few things. First, after a somewhat frustrating break-in period, bicyclists and drivers have gotten better at anticipating each others actions, and both types of traffic seem to move more smoothly. However, there are still situations that require extra caution, and they are different depending on which direction you travel in the two-way bike lane.
Positive Outlooks
Two atoms are walking down the street. One turns to the other and says, “I think I’ve lost an electron.” The second one says, “Are you sure?” The first replies, “Yes, I’m positive.”
I was having a cup of coffee outside this morning, and started to think about positivity. (It’s funny how often coffee in the morning leads to positivity…) A while back Lisa had me watch a TED talk by Shawn Achor. There are a lot of entertaining TED talks, but I have to say Shawn’s was one of the funniest I’ve seen. He barely touched on the subjects of his research, but it intrigued me enough to get his book, The Happiness Advantage, where he delves into all the actions he discussed in much more detail.
Unlike getting distracted by a 12 minute video online, it’s been over a year since I read his book, so this isn’t a typical book review where I have it at my finger tips and am quoting passages from it. I almost think this is better. Rather than just relaying the highlights that grab you at the time, this is what has stuck with me over the long haul. Top of the list deals with perception. We’ve been conditioned by the entire evolutionary process to focus on threats. Ancient people who focused on the pretty bush and failed to see the wild animal hiding behind it ended up as dinner, not as our ancestor. Nowadays our threats are different, but we still focus on the negative.
We Are All Bike Ambassadors (or looking for any excuse to ride)
If you see something enough times, it becomes normal. It’s always feels a little unfortunate whenever I get a surprised, “You biked here?” when I show up someplace with helmet and gloves in hand. However, lately we’re starting to see a different reaction: “How fun–I should bike more.”
The repeatedly fortunate 88
That was the case on Tuesday, when we stopped into Wahoo’s on Ward after running a few errands. (Ironically enough, we had to get a new parking pass for our car.) The woman behind the counter didn’t ask the typical silly questions of someone wearing a bike helmet, such as “Did you bike here?” It wasn’t until Lisa commented that our order number matched her bib number from the century ride two days earlier that we started talking about cycling. The woman behind the counter looked at how we were getting around, and said she wanted to start riding her bike more, too.
That was the point we realized that one of the easiest bike advocacy activities that you can do is to just ride. When people see cyclists on the road, it starts to become normal. If everyone else is doing it, why can’t you?
Yesterday, some folks from our regional headquarters met for a pau hana happy hour at Dixie Grill in Aiea. After I finished my shift, I rode out there to meet whoever was left. My boss knows me well enough to only give a mild, “Don’t tell me you biked here” reaction, while some of the other people had a more shocked response, “Wait, you biked here? All the way from HFO?!”
One broken spoke invariably leads to more, especially if you forget to fix it.
How do I explain that the only reason I’m there is because I biked? When it looked like I couldn’t make it because of a couple broken spokes on my tire, Lisa asked if I just wanted her to pick me up after work and drive out there. However, that had no appeal to me. I realized that I wasn’t so much interested in the pau hana or socializing; instead, this was more of an excuse to ride out to a distant location.
I’m always looking for a reason to ride somewhere, but never have any interest in just riding for fun, with no destination. If you look at my Endomondo or National Bike Challenge stats, over 90% of my miles are for transportation. (The other sub-10% are from the Haleiwa and Honolulu century rides organized by HBL.) It may be a chicken-or-the-egg situation, but I consider it transportation if I ride to a restaurant, even if the only reason I’m going to the restaurant is as an excuse to bike. (Kona Brewing in Hawaii Kai is our favorite destination for some extra miles like that.)
Is there anything special about the ride out to Aiea? Absolutely not. In fact, it’s a pretty rough one. It passes through the heart of town, with lots of traffic and congestion. Part of the route has a separate bike path, part has a bike lane, and part is nothing but road. It also includes one of the only areas where I refuse to ride in the road, instead opting for the sidewalk at the Kamehameha Hwy interchange by Aloha Stadium. On top of that, it’s a real headache getting back to Dixie Grill from the Pearl Harbor Bike Path, with not even a sidewalk along the major highway, instead having to cut from parking lot to parking lot. So, why ride out there during rush hour? Well, pau hana, obviously. I’ll take any excuse for a ride.
Waialae Ave Bike Lane Celebration
Local officials gave brief remarks about how the community and government worked together to get this project finished.
This evening, a number of local organizations gathered in Kaimuki to celebrate the new Waialae Avenue bike lane. This is a project that’s been years in the making, and one that makes the ride between Manoa and Kaimuki much safer. A number of local organizations and officials gave brief remarks, but the best and most stirring were from Mayor Caldwell. He talked about the efforts of the cycling community–such as those of us at the gathering–to help push this through, and how they’ll need our help to keep going with future projects. The King Street Cycle Track is already under construction, and the best thing we can to do help future projects is to ride. Motorists aren’t going to like losing car lanes to add bike lanes, and it’ll be that much harder to push through future projects if the current ones aren’t used.
Cyclists gathering before the official inauguration of the new Wailalae Avenue bike lane.
This is something that we’ve already thought about. Once the King Street Cycle Track opens, my plan is to take a jaunt down it every day after work. It’ll be a couple extra miles, which will make my sub-3 mile commute a little more worthwhile in terms of exercise, and will help show that people are using it. In the Mayor’s vision, eventually we’ll hit a tipping point with enough protected bike lanes connecting to enough locations that people will find it better to ride than to drive. We’re certainly looking forward to that day!
A poor attempt at a panorama of the group of cyclists and local officials gathered to celebrate the completion of the Waialae Avenue bike lane.