Comments on: Pasadena Bicycle Master Plan Workshop Notes

By: Zane Selvans

Zane Selvans — Mon, 23 Feb 2009 01:29:36 +0000

I am flabergasted to discover that (again, just for scale), the Caltrans annual per capita budget is about $1,500/person, of which next year, $0.18 (or roughly 1/10,000th, or 0.01%) goes to bike projects. Amsterdam meanwhile spends a whopping $18/person/year on bike infrastructure. What would California be like if we spent 1% of our transportation dollars on bikes?

By: Nate

Nate — Sat, 21 Feb 2009 00:39:15 +0000

I was going to do a second post to fill in some gaps that were in my initial post about the meeting, but it looks like you covered nearly everything I missed. Iteris is supposed to do some of the actual "planning". Ryan made a comment that, "they get it". I suppose this means they'll be involved in leading the workshops? From what I found on their website, they also implement traffic sensing devices, for example, counting bikes or setting up bike sensitive signals.

By: Shay

Shay — Fri, 20 Feb 2009 20:30:38 +0000

Thanks for putting together such a comprehensive record of the meeting. It was really wonderful to see such tremendous interest and support coming from the community. Both Liz and I (Shay) are incredibly honored to play an integral role in the BMP update process. We definitely welcome any input that may be helpful.

By: Zane Selvans

Zane Selvans — Fri, 20 Feb 2009 09:54:08 +0000

Another person wrote up their own report of the meeting too. Sweet!

By: Torsten Zorn

Torsten Zorn — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 17:05:58 +0000

Thanks for the great summary Zane. I'll link this to the JPL bike club website.

By: Zane Selvans

Zane Selvans — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 17:04:31 +0000

I agree that Pasadena and Santa Monica are pleasant to bike in relative to many other cities in SoCal, but having lived and biked in Boulder, Denver, and Santa Cruz, and visited Portland, San Francisco, Davis, Germany, Iceland, Japan and the Netherlands by bike, I find it difficult to be enthusiastic about the experience of riding here (or in Santa Monica, though I’m less familiar with that city). It feels primarily stressful, and at least mildly antagonistic, instead of relaxing.

Certainly there are some nice routes to bike on here – but in using my bike as my only transportation in Pasadena for nearly a decade, I’ve often found that I can’t get to where I need to go using them.

I left out Iteris because I couldn’t remember what role it was that they were going to be playing in the whole process. Does anybody else remember? Hopefully they’ll get the survey up and running quickly and we can flood them with input!

By: Zane Selvans

Zane Selvans — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 16:44:35 +0000

By: Ant Sibthorpe

Ant Sibthorpe — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 15:26:15 +0000

RBF = Kari Kano (I think), but yes, she was very dull. Great write up by the way.

By: Branislav Kecman

Branislav Kecman — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 08:17:28 +0000

Hi Zane,

great notes and analysis, I would just add a few points:
- Rich promised to have an on-line survey form available in about a week on City's website.
- Ryan mentioned that another company called "Iteris" would be involved in helping him create the new plan. The woman from RBF Consulting was Kerry Cuomo (sp?).
- The permanent bike parking structure was designed by Tolkin & Associates Architecture http://www.tolkinarchitecture.com/ (go to Architecture, then Urban, then Bike Transit).

I would respectfully disagree with your assertion that Pasadena and S. Monica are not pleasant for biking. Maybe I'm being partial, having lived in both cities and knowing the scenic bike routes, or I'm just too thrilled to ride anywhere;).

Best regards,
Branislav

P.S. There is a missing word "keep" in the minutes where you say "we should try to keep them in mind".

By: Jeff

Jeff — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 08:14:04 +0000

great write up. Thanks.