Bike Transportation Fringe Benefit Reintroduced

Rep. Blumenauer (Democrat from Oregon's 3rd.... The Bikin' 3rd!) yesterday followed through on a promised reintroduction of the bill that would allow employers to offer a tax-free subsidy for bicycle commuting. Welcome, H.R 6495.

Here's the relevant text. It looks like it would give $50 a month for an undefined 'qualified bicycle commuting month' (as opposed to the $20 that made it through the House last time round). Additionally, it also proposes to actually fund and pay out that tax-free benefit for Federal employees, lucky ducks. It would also crank up the existing mass transit benefit cap to $200.

As always, do not get your hopes up. It just hit the House floor, and if it comes out of committee(s), who knows what it might include. I did not see any paygo provisions, which will need to be tagged on there, and often act as poison pills. And finally, it needs to tickle the tastebuds of 60 Senators (why 60, not 50?). Anyway, the tracker widget on the right has been edited.

If, unlike a majority of the readers of this blog, you are represented by a fully-empowered Senator or member of Congress, please write or email yet again, voicing your support for this bill.

Full Service!

In case you didn't catch that handsome mug on the TV, Tripp is receiving some well-deserved plaudits for administering some timely first aid in a shooting incident nearby the Adams Morgan store yesterday...

Come on in to tell him job well done, or to apply a tourniquet to any wounds incurred, or whatever. Don't worry, it's all clear.

Ghost Bike dedication for Alice Swanson

I haven't posted anything on the accident at 20th and R, because I just don't really know what to say. I think I may have met Ms. Swanson a few months back, I'm not sure. But regardless, the whole situation is quite jarring. WABA did their ghost bike unveiling and press conference last evening. Eric Gilliland's comments largely echoed their press releases on the incident, and quite appropriately, were measured and moderate in tone. The rest of the WABA staff was on hand, passing out copies of their safe cycling booklet and the pocket guide to DC bike laws.
And here's the memorial. Note the size of the crowd, lots of folks turned out. Including friends and/or family, more than a few tearful folks left flowers. I just didn't have the stomach to capture them on film, so look elsewhere for that sort of thing.

I got myself into a frightening conflagration as I soft-pedaled my way home. I was approaching a line of cars stopped at a stop sign on S street eastbound, and passed the line on the right. About a block or two down the road, an old white Chevy van with a smashed in front-end and a bad exhaust system laid on his horn, was beating on his steering wheel as he passed me, and screamed about how he was going to kill me if he ever saw me on the streets again. Because I passed him on the right? I guess? I don't know, I wasn't holding anybody up, there was plenty of room to pass.

I was pretty ragged already, and pulled over to back down from the fight and take myself out of harms way. I know this is the logical thing to do, but I'm still stewing over it. I've been yelled at plenty of times, even been threatened, but the ferocity of this guy, combined with the events of the day, scared the crap out of me. Thanks to the pedestrian who witnessed it, and asked if I was OK. Everybody be safe.

Restart the calls for a velodrome

Remember a few years back, there was a WABA-backed push for a velodrome to be included in a planned recreation area at the confluence of Crystal City, I-395, GW Pkwy, and the Mt. Vernon Trail?

Well, there's no reason to believe that any plans have changed, but the County finally worked out the land-swap deal with a developer that is allowing the Long Bridge park project to plow forward. The nice bit (for local resident me, at least) is the planned connection someday to the Mt. Vernon Trail that will run through the area. No more dodging Gravelly Point zombiedestrians. No more trying to block out the stanky porta-potties. No more near-collisions in the tunnel under the train tracks. No more of any of that, beginning.... Oh.
No schedule yet.

First batch of MPD police bikes

For many years, City Bikes has sold and serviced bicycles for DC's Metropolitan Police Department. The first lot of this year's purchase of Cannondales just went out the door. DC has been a bit ahead of the curve on bicycle patrols, I think, but others are catching on.

World Naked Bike Ride DC, thoroughly covered

It's going to be really really difficult, but I'm going to try to make this post as work-safe as possible. Tasteless, maybe, but rated G. Go here if you want to see the full flickr set of socks, cracks, thongs, creepy all-over tans, and meticulous grooming.

Anyway. Things convened in MacPherson Square around 3PM. For Erik, the obligatory folding bike pic. They're just so darned useful.
I heard rumors that MPD or NPS or somebody was threatening to arrest anybody who went all-in. Plus, DC is just a low-key city. So, lots of socks. Eavesdropped quote of the day -- "OOOO, is that moleskin?" Lots of folks like me, who just wore shorts. Like these guys:A brief debate erupted over the permissibility of miniature Crown Royal bags as conforming attire. Legal rights were asserted, case law was cited, phone calls were made....But it was all good. The Honest Tea folks, who also cosponsored Bike to Work Day, popped up to hand out free drinks to all riders, so kudos to them for their apparent liking of biking. By the way, I have no scruples -- give me free stuff, I'll talk it up.And off we go, with police escort from MPD.Down 14th to Penn...Tourists REALLY got a hoot out of the whole thing. I think. Down to the Capitol....With a stop for a minute to conduct vital business.Then back down Independence. Appropriate, because while many of us were there mostly for a fun afternoon, the point of the whole shindig was to rally against our dependence on oil.Awkward.... We were urging other cyclists, rollerbladers, skateboarders, etc. to join us as we rode. We then pulled alongside a pack of rental Segways, moving at exactly the same speed, on the sidewalk. Nobody quite knew whether they were worthy of inviting onto our little caravan.They hummed along beside us for a minute or so, each party avoiding the other's eye. The Segway ride leader in particular had his eyes locked straight ahead. Just up the block, I think we ruined this lady's vacation.We then convened in front of the White House, where middle schoolers giggled at us, a surprising number of freelance photographers took pics, Laura Bush was no doubt taken aback, and we all got sunburned. Semi-official count was 40-ish riders, which doubled last year's total, apparently.Anyway. My favorite pic, I'll just link to it, as it's pretty questionable. A man backdropped by the White House, wearing an eerily realistic fleshy stocking on his stuff, proudly standing beside his bike, the "Softride" brand prominently displayed. There's a great joke there, just beyond my reach. Suggestions?

Coast to Coast for Veterans

So, a few weeks back, I babbled on about how the Surly Long Haul Trucker was maybe a bit of pig-iron overkill for a lot of cyclists. But then, there are riders like Iris......who is stuffing DC life in an Ortlieb pannier bag, and setting out on a cross-country ride to benefit the Yellow Ribbon Fund. Iris needed a bulletproof rig that would flatten out 50-100 miles of pavement a day (here's her route) and plunked down for a nice new LHT.
She asked if we would chip in with some accessories, which we did, thanks to Serfas who is exceedingly generous in stocking our schwag bag. Iris has a noble intent -- to support the Yellow Ribbon Fund's invaluable mission to fill in the gaps in the rehabilitation efforts of troops at Walter Reed AMC and the National Naval Medical Center.

Sound familiar? You may recall a handsome young man, who is not too fond of the French and has a man-crush on Matthew McConaughey, schlepping wristbands....
Yes, the WristStrong campaign, of course. Which did not seek to appropriate the likeness to another rubber-wristband-based charitable endeavor in any way. Stephen T. Colbert raised about $172K for the Yellow Ribbon Fund, with wristbands that, paradoxically, were not yellow. Here's the very funny check presentation:


I'm sure if you click through to Iris' site, and put a few dollars down to help her top the Colbert Nation's $172K, she'll sign a 10-foot-tall novelty check too.

Even bike blogs in DC talk wonky

[Edit -- since this post, this bill did indeed stall, and has now been reintroduced, click here for the details on the new, more ambitious bill]

Both you regular readers are probably wondering, "What's that gobbledy-gook feed you plunked into your already ugly blog?" It's a status update on the Renewable Energy and Energy Conservation Tax Act of 2008, which passed in the House, and is coming up for Senate vote soon.

Who cares? Bike commuters should, because buried within the bill, is an extension of the transportation fringe benefit allowance (the reason nearly every Federal employee in the area gets those $100 in Metro cards every month that occasionally end up on eBay) to bicycle commuting. Rep. Blumenauer of Oregon (of course) has been quixotically championing this issue for years.

Obviously, it would be a great thing for the larger "us" of cycling. But for the small business "us" that pays me every two weeks, allowing companies and Government agencies (there's a few of those around here) to give a non-taxable commuting subsidy for bike commuting would probably bring quite a few people through the store doors.

What are the chances? Well, this bill has been referred to the Senate Committee on Legislative Purgatory in the past. This time round, it is tucked it into a bill that would repeal oil company tax credits, and use the savings to fund alternative fuel research. So nobody will oppose it, and it should fly right through the Senate. Yes.

By the by, Tom Davis of Virginia's 11th (Fairfax, Springfield, Potomac Millsville), Roscoe Bartlett of Maryland's 6th (northern Maryland), Frank Wolf of Virginia's (Herndon, Winchester, Sterling), and rural Virginia's voice-of-tolerance, Virgil Goode of the Charlottesville area, are among the local-ish reps who voted against it.

I'm not going to get my hopes up, but I'm also going to write a letter to my senators. Hope you'll do the same. Unless, of course, you're in DC. Like City Bikes. Disenfranchised and it feels so good.

Proposed FY09 DC Bicycle Funding From Councilman Graham

In his address to the Bike to Work Day crowd at Freedom Plaza, Ward One Councilmember Jim Graham was kind enough to proudly mention City Bikes as one of his constituents, which was nice.

But far FAR nicer was his description of his proposed FY09 appropriation for bicycling. Besides the $1.5M in recurring (not one-time grant money) appropriations, funded out of parking ticket collections, they are looking to fund a full-time staffer for the Bicycle Advisory Council.

Cross your fingers, and maybe drop a line to your councilmember's office. Here's a summary of the proposal we got our mitts on:

1) Pedestrian & Bicycle Safety and Enhancement Fund

· $1.5 million dollars to DDOT recurring each year

· Uses

i. Faster action on implementing the Bicycle Master Plan

ii. Faster action on implementing the Pedestrian Master Plan

iii. Creative solutions that can’t be done with Federal Dollars

iv. Faster responses to local bike/pedestrian safety problems

2) Bicycle / Pedestrian Safety Public Service Announcements

· $18,000 to Washington Area Bicyclists Association

· Get the message out to drivers that they must drive respectfully

· Encourage folks to ride their bikes and walk

3) Better Bicycle Parking

· $60,000 to help DDOT do bicycle parking study required by law

· Assess the quality of bicycle access and parking at all DC Gov’t facilities.

4) Bicycle Advisory Council support

· Full-time staff person to support the Bicycle Advisory Council in pushing DDOT to provide better bicycle facilities.

· This staff person will be located in the Council Policy Office to provide bicycle and pedestrian expertise to all Councilmembers

DC Most Improved biking city

Scanned by Jason, possible copyright infringement by me, Bicycling Mag named DC one of the most improved cities for cycling. Things they cite include Smartbike, the 30 miles (and growing) of bikelanes, the biking inclinations of Mayors Williams and Fenty, the Bikestation project, and the creation of the Bike Program job in DDOT. Challenges include bike lane safety issues, and frosty car/bike relations. Click the image below to see a grainy scan of the full article.

GW Parkway Trail?

Remember Bike DC? I loved it. And after an absence of 3-4 years, it very discretely snuck back onto the WABA calendar, September 27th. Good news, for sure.

My favorite was the year (2001?) when the route took us over the Roosevelt Bridge to the GW Parkway, all closed to traffic, then all the way up the Parkway to the Langley hood, and back down. It was a gorgeous ride.

Which brings us to WABA's latest call to action. With the Parkway under renovation, WABA has been stumping for inclusion of a multi-use trail that extends the Mt. Vernon Trail north beyond Rosslyn, alongside the Parkway. How nice would that be? I'd love to be able to bike with my nephews up to the Claude Moore Colonial Farm, for instance. Their email below:

Support the Mt Vernon Trail Extension

For nearly two decades, the Washington Area Bicyclist Association has been working to extend the Mt Vernon Trail from its current northern terminus near Rosslyn Circle further north toward the American Legion Bridge. To date the George Washington Memorial Parkway (GWMP) division of the National Park Service has remained opposed to putting the trail through sensitive natural areas. New plans for the rehabilitation of the Parkway offer an opportunity to construct the trail as part of the roadway reconstruction, but the GWMP has failed to include any provisions for cyclists or pedestrians in their draft environmental assessment.

WABA urges you to contact GWMP Superintendent David Vela to urge him to include the Mt Vernon Trail extension as part of any rehabilitation of the George Washington Memorial Parkway.

World Naked Bike Ride DC

June 7th, MacPherson Sq., details here.

The World Naked Bike Ride FAQ indicates that I can ride "as bare as I dare." Canadianly modest, I will be scouring eBay hoping somebody is reselling a Cipo skinsuit.It was for charity, but really, $43K for a used form-fitting skinsuit? Blech.

Whole Foods Bike to Work Day safety checks

Probably bad for revenue, but hopefully good for the karmic debits and credits, we occasionally nip down to Whole Foods at 14th & P to do safety checks on bikes, in advance of Bike to Work Day. We set up a couple of work stands this past Saturday, and thanks to DCMTB/City Bikes, had six or seven of us checking and doing simple adjustments for a few hours.Pics courtesy of Joe, here's some mo'. Huge thanks to Whole Foods (and Heather) for graciously hosting us. It's always fun to just mess around with bikes outside the confines of commerce, and we're going to see about scheduling some more dates later this year.

Two DC bike blogs I like

I'm supposed to be working right now, but I just stumbled on two blogs I enjoyed:

MyBikeLane DC -- A forum to post pics of folks who park in the bike line. This hasn't really latched on, but maybe if we can mobilize the formidable City Bikes marketing machine, we can get the network effects working against the doubleparkers.

Bikes for the Rest of Us -- No frills, he just posts up sensible bikes mostly in the sub-$1K range, and solicits feedback. We're geeks, but this qualifies as bike porn at City Bikes.

Back to the exciting task of processing payroll.

[Edit -- i misspelled "BikeLane" in the original post. I should be fired.]

A Bike Summit Visitor's Ride Guide

Apologies to District folks, I promised a couple of people who are in town for the Bike Summit that I would post up some items of interest for them to check out while in town, beyond the usual Mall-museum-meeting-meal-motel circuit one does at a DC conference. Chime in with other suggestions:

Sampling DC Bike Infrastructure -- For the big guns of advocacy who are in town, perhaps you'd like to see how our nation's capital stacks up. From the conference venue, head north on 15th St, hang a left on Pennsylvania Ave, and enjoy the best two blocks of no-car roadway in the country. Watch out for distracted administration officials, war protesters, Segway renters, and tourists squinting into viewfinders. Then, head north (right) on 17th St., through the chaos of the K St. intersection, brave Connecticut Ave (watch out for i-podded jaywalkers, u-turning cabbies, and driver-side doors), and bear right on 18th St.

Channel your inner Belgian on the horrible pavement on 18th, up the steep hill at Florida Ave., past all the restaurants and bars, and hang a right on Columbia Ave. Go 1 block, and you'll see a pretty cool bike shop. Please stop in and say hello. Keep on truckin down Columbia, straight over 16th St., where it turns into Harvard St., until you get to 14th St. Hang a right, and head down 14th. If you're pinched for time, or reluctant to venture into a slightly sketchy patch of town, just bomb straight down the intermittent bike lane on 14th, careful to take the right spoke at Thomas Circle, and you'll end up right near the conference venue.

Otherwise, go down to Q St. There's another shop at the intersection of 14th and Q, I won't invite you to visit on their behalf, but I'm sure they would love to say hello. Head left on Q St., avoid doors and double-parked construction vans on Q, and then zigzag your way over to 9th St, hang a right. Head down 9th, past our gleaming NOS condition Convention Center. Behold the bizarre 9th St combo bus/bike lane, and dodge all the cars that ignore that bus/bike restriction. Venture over to 7th St (to the left) if you want to ride it's similarly well-intentioned but largely useless northbound twin. Gawk and scoff like a jaded local at all the tourists, this is where they gather to eat. Otherwise, hang a right onto E St., and ride a nice traditional bike lane on back to your home base. Google says 6 miles in all, here's a map:

View Larger Map

This route basically gives you a good cross-section of what we've got inside the city. Some OK bike lanes, some bike lanes that just randomly start/stop, some odd good-intentions, and some major routes with no provision for bikes.

Training, Tidal Basin, and Monuments -- Maybe you'd like some exercise. Head south, to DC's closest thing to a velodrome, Haines Point. Head down 15th St, being especially careful of drivers itching to get onto the highway once you get onto Maine Ave. While trying not to hold up traffic, glance to your right, see the Tidal Basin, imagine it teeming with cherry blossom blooms and tourists. Try to negotiate a left onto Ohio Ave., which is long, flat, and hopefully your biggest danger here will be the triathletes learning to use their aerobars and ironically yelling at you to hold your line. At the turnaround, we used to have a cool statue called the Awakening, that most of us never really appreciated until it was bought, extricated, and reinstalled in a suburban fauxborfront retail complex. If being outdoors on a bicycle has you missing your rollers/trainer, use Buckeye Dr. to loop back around, and just keep doing laps of Haines Point. Similar experience.

Anyway, keep going under the 14th St. Bridge, and you'll end up on the other side of the Tidal Basin. Work your way around the Tidal Basin, and you are right in the midst of all the big National Mall attractions -- WWII memorial, Reflecting Pool, Lincoln Memorial, etc. I've plotted a route back to the Reagan building that includes Constitution Ave, which is a bit of a dragstrip. Plot an alternate route, or take to the wide sidewalks, if you're a bit leery of mixing it up with fast traffic. Again, consult the map.

Mixed-use Trails -- Finally, we've got a decent enough set of mixed use trails. I won't try to describe all of them, bikewashington.org does a much better job at that. Your best entrance onto the biggest trails is to follow the same route as described above, but don't turn onto Ohio Dr. Keep going straight, and then bear right onto Basin Dr. DON'T follow all the cars onto the bridge -- the sidewalk across the bridge is fenced off, and can't be accessed from the road. Zoom in on the map, i've tried to sketch out the proper way to go. And don't take 14th St. down to the bridge -- while it is called the 14th St Bridge, a bike can't access the bridge from 14th St. Crazy.

Anyway, once you cross the bridge, you'll loop around, and find yourself facing back toward the city (beautiful view, BTW). Go right, and you can take the Mt. Vernon Trail about 15 miles down to Mt. Vernon, going through Old Town Alexandria. Go left, proceed a few miles to the Key Bridge, cross back over into DC, and you're in Georgetown. Get a cup of coffee, gawk at how many people fearlessly pilot $80K cars in city traffic, pop into two other bike shops on M St., or head down to Water/K St., and you're at the head of the Capital Crescent Trail (CCT) and the C&O Canal towpath. To get to Water St from the Key Bridge, hang a right immediately after the bridge into a little park, go down and across the C&O canal, and then either go down a nearby staircase to Water St (then hang a right), or just go right on the gravel towpath, with intersects with the CCT after a mile or so.

The CCT 7 miles of wonderful, slightly uphill trail all the way to downtown Bethesda. It gets really crowded on nice days with joggers and baby strollers on nice days, though, so bring a bell and leave your need for speed back on Haines Point. Keep going through Bethesda, onto the Georgetown Branch Trail, where the surface becomes gravel, proceed another 1.5 miles across Connecticut Ave., and you'll arrive at our Chevy Chase location. Please stop in and say hello.

Mailbag

Aden-Francis forwarded me this petition to get Google to add a bike route function to their mapping tool. I just went in to Google maps to plot out a couple of riding routes for folks visiting for the League of American Bicyclists' Bike Summit next week, and, well, i'm convinced. Please join me in signing the petition.

In the meantime, here's a link to DDOT's bike map.

Jim Sebastian at DDOT, who oversees bicycle programs, wrote that the Union Station Bikestation project is back underway, after funding was secured to cover the higher-than-anticipated bid prices. Look how cool this place will look when completed...

And the SmartBike DC bike sharing program is now targeted to start in April.

Bike Sharing coming really soon

Here it is, the 10-station bike sharing program is off and running. $40 a year. You'll recall that we did the build on these bikes, and they are really quite nice.

Bike Rental Kiosks in DC?

Jim Sebastian and the great folks at the DDOT Bicycling Program want to start a bike-sharing network in DC (funded by, ahem, the bicycle-friendly folks at Clear Channel, who apparently like their revenue streams tinged with small traces of irony).

Anyway, DDOT needs your input, so fill out this super-short survey (and write in Adams Morgan!!).

Bike Access on the Lexus Lanes?

WABA (dang, still haven't renewed my membership) just sent out a bulletin urging folks to write in to demand bicycle facilities as a part of the planned refurb of many of the bridges over the Beltway. The impetus for the work is the plan to sell the roads to a private company, who will turn it into a volume-based variable toll road. Currently, the WO&D is about the only bike-accessible way to escape outside the Beltway on the west side of Virginia. Anyway, I've copied the full text of WABA's note further down....

....But first, it's time for a rant. People talk of a lack of accountability with government. True enough, but turning a vital piece of public infrastructure over to a company who is only accountable to the bottom line and the strict wording of a contract written by that same unaccountable government hardly seems prudent.

Here's a recent article from Business Week on the privatization of what used to be public facilities, highlighting the tremendous outlays being made to acquire things like bridges and highways. Given the amounts being paid out upfront (lease the PA Turnpike for $30B!), is there a lot of incentive to be responsive to the needs of the taxpayer, or rather, to comply as minimally necessary to keep the overseers happy?

Anyway, therein lies the importance of getting bike facilities into the contract. If it ain't in there, Fluor-Transurban sure won't be answering our emails. Bicycles reduce congestion. Revenues increase with congestion. And every little bit helps when you're laying out $913M.

Get Bikes over the Beltway

The Virginia Department of Transportation is currently negotiating with the private firms Fluor/TransUrban on all aspects of the proposed High Occupancy Toll (HOT) lanes on the Beltway in Virginia. Due to the nature of the public-private partnership under which this proposal is being considered, these negotiations are being conducted in secret. A number of the bridges along and crossing the Beltway will be reconstructed as part of the project. These bridges currently pose major barriers to bicycle travel in Northern Virginia.

Now is the chance to provide bicycle accommodations on all bridge crossings affected by the project. WABA and Fairfax Advocates for Better Bicycling urge Fairfax cyclists to contact VDOT and demand that bicycle accommodations be included in all Beltway HOT lane bridge projects. Write to Dennis Morrison, Northern Virginia District Administrator, at Dennis.Morrison@VDOT.Virginia.gov. Copy fabb@waba.org.

Consider including these points in your message:

The Fairfax County Trails Plan calls for bicycle routes on many of the Beltway crossings. The HOT Lanes project provides a once-in-a-generation opportunity to build these routes.

Providing bicycle and pedestrian access on the crossings is consistent with VDOT policy to "accommodate bicyclists and pedestrians?in the planning, funding, design, construction, operation, and maintenance of Virginia's transportation network."

Crossings on roads such as Little River Turnpike in Annandale, Chain Bridge Road in McLean, Route 7 in Tysons Corner and Gallows Road in Dunn Loring are key bicycling corridors.

Providing bicycle accommodations is critical to making bicycling a more viable transportation option and reducing traffic congestion.

For more information, visit http://www.fabb-bikes.org/.