Part one of two.

I’d like to change the world in profound ways, but in the near term I’ll settle for small change in just my community.

So let’s start small.

I seek to change the behavior of people who park in bike lanes. Starting small means I’ll focus my efforts on only the most egregious violators. In my opinion, the most egregious bike lane scofflaws are:
1. Those who, by parking in the bike lane, force cyclists to ride out into traffic on roads with fast moving or otherwise perilous traffic.
2. Those who, by choosing to block bike lanes, completely deprive cyclists of the lane’s use. This is different from the above type insofar as it’s not clear what happens to the displaced cyclists. Do they take an alternate route (perhaps on a dangerous road)? Do they – after chronic misappropriation of their safe route – stop cycling and turn to driving or taking the T?

All bike violations are created equal in the eyes of the law. Each makes the driver eligible for a $100 “marked lane violation” fine. But the impact of the lane-block can be markedly different depending on the greater context: violation location, time of day and other context.  Context is important.  Sometimes a blocked bike lane creates little danger to cycling and is a minor inconvenience to get past.  Elsewhere, a blocked bike lane can cause great peril for cyclists.

I’ll try to clarify through examples below:

Example 1: Atlantic Avenue in Boston heading northbound from South Station.
There are three relatively narrow (10’-11’) car lanes and a 6’ bike lane. Drivers occasionally block the bike lane, and many of those blockers don’t stay long. Some for as short as a minute (e.g., dropping off a passenger), and others longer: the taxi queue in front of the Intercontinental Hotel for example.

These drivers used to upset me greatly until I realized they pose little danger to me (granted they might make a big difference to another cyclist). This is because the roadway and lane width combine to force a certain behavior on drivers: When one motorist pulls into the bike lane blocking the curb, the rightmost road lane is effectively blocked. The roadway itself is still only 3 car lanes plus about 6’ wide. 99% of the time, I simply ride around the bike lane blocker in the remains of the right most car lane. It helps greatly that traffic on Atlantic Ave moves slowly because lights are spaced so close together, making it pretty comfortable to ride out into the vehicle travel lane to get around a bike lane blocker.

Relatively safe to pass the parked car

Example 2: No specific location. Here is the context: Driver is using the bike lane for ‘long term’ parking (I’ll define as: greater than 5 minutes). Road is 15 or so feet wide, which encourages drivers to travel at 40 MPH or greater regardless of the posted speed limit. The cyclist puts him or her self in great danger to get around the illegally parked car.

Cyclist is in great peril when passing this lawbreaker’s car

I want to target these drivers for behavioral change. These are the ones putting people in greater peril.

Part 2 will introduce how I intend to compel some behavioral change.

Earlier this month I sent input to the Sommerville Bicycle Committee in response to their March 2014 Transportation Improvement Proposal (It can be found underneath the heading “Transportation Improvement Proposals” at this link: http://www.somervillebikes.org/documents.html).  I think their proposal is excellent, but in the words of their reply “I like when residents see what the Bike Committee is asking of the city and say it is not bold enough.”  As partners with the city I suppose their proposals are tempered with political realities such as budgets and timelines of ongoing public works projects.  Me – not so much… I can just plain dream big.

So today I saw a post on Facebook that Webster Ave now has a painted bike lane.  That’s pretty awesome in itself… but it reminded me that I used Webster Ave as an example in a pitch for counter flow bike lanes in my feedback.  The entire document is linked immediately below.

Suggestion for the Somerville Bicycle Committee

As a community with a desire for safe, connected streets, we should consider converting one-way streets to two way, and where we can’t – install protected counterflow bike lanes.  Many one-way city streets are configured for one-way traffic because in the 1960s and 1970s, highway departments made them that way as a means of speeding up traffic through our neighborhoods.  What we know now and should have known then is that optimizing streets for car throughput is bad for just about everybody – including the safety of people in those cars (It’s been studied: two-way streets are good for neighborhood when compared to one-way streets).

We’ve seen a poignant example of this recently when a driver on the 3-lane highway through the Back Bay neighborhood known as Beacon Street killed two people walking on the sidewalk.  If Beacon Street was one lane each direction with center turn bays, I suspect it would have been much harder for a driver to gather enough speed to get her car airborne and flip it onto the sidewalk.

So I hope you find this educational and even a bit entertaining, and you add to your arsenal of safe streets demands – counterflow bike lanes and converting one-way streets to two-way is better for human scale mobility and community safety.

The MBTA needs to raise revenue. They have a proposal here: http://www.mbta.com/about_the_mbta/?id=23567
and are soliciting feedback.

I just sent them my thoughts via email. Anyone care to comment?

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Greetings,

For MBTA services that provide both transportation and parking (e.g., commuter rail, subway stations like Braintree, Alewife, etc.), there are two ways to increase user fee based revenue so that riders contribute to revenue. Below I make the case that it is more socially equitable to increase revenue by charging more for parking than it is by charging more for riding the train.

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Discussion:

User fees can be raised in one or both of the following ways:

1. Increase the fee for providing transportation. This is the rider fare. An increase in rider fare means **every** rider pays more for transportation services.

2. Increase the price to park at MBTA stations. An increase in this price still raises revenue from riders, but only where people “park and ride”, so again it only applies at commuter rail stations and subway stations where people tend to drive to the station.

Let’s look at the impact of raising revenue via each of these mechanisms. For simplicity, let’s use the following assumptions:
* Calculations are computed over a monthly basis. Assume an average of 20 “work days” per month.
* Assume a revenue increase of $10 per month per rider.

Discussion:
Consider two hypothetical people: Danny Driver and William Walker. Both commute to Boston from a Zone 3 commuter rail station for “nine to five weekday” jobs. Danny Driver takes his car to the commuter lot then rides the train to and from work, while William Walker walks 2 miles from home to the station and back.

Mr. Driver’s monthly cost is currently $212 (price of a Zone 3 monthly train pass), plus $80 to $140 for parking (cite: MBTA daily parking rate is $4 to $7 per day, http://www.mbta.com/riding_the_t/parking/?transittype=Subway&rn=Blue). Oh, and Danny Driver seems content to pay at least $7000 a year for a car (cite: http://newsroom.aaa.com/2013/04/cost-of-owning-and-operating-vehicle-in-u-s-increases-nearly-two-percent-according-to-aaas-2013-your-driving-costs-study/) that he leaves in a parking lot all day.

Mr. Walker, who for whatever reason is stretched thin financially, can’t afford to pay for a car that sits in a parking lot all day. He walks between home and the MBTA station. His monthly transportation cost is $212 per month, plus the cost of a new pair of shoes once in a while.

Let’s look at how different ways to raise revenue impact these two people. The current MassDOT/MBTA plan is to increase the cost of a Zone 3 monthly pass by $10. What if instead, MBTA raised the parking rate by $0.50 per day (which, at an assumed 20 workdays a month, would be a $10 per month increase)? For Mr. Driver, there is no difference whatsoever. His cost increases by $10 whether that comes from a monthly pass increase or from a parking fee increase. If Mr. Driver might balk at this transportation cost increase and “vote with his wheels”. He might not realize how costly driving truly is (it’s about $0.60 per mile, cite: https://exchange.aaa.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/Your-Driving-Costs-2013.pdf), turn his back on the commuter rail lifestyle, and start driving to work. Why not, he already has so much invested in owning a car…

In contrast, the approach you take for raising revenue makes a big difference to Mr. Walker. Mr. Walker doesn’t own a car, so does not pay to park. If revenue is generated through a parking rate increase, people like Mr. Walker get a break. And, going back to the original hypothetical – Mr. Walker is economically disadvantaged. In his budget, every penny counts. Moreover, Mr. Walker doesn’t have a car, so he can’t take to driving as a protest to the MBTA revenue increase. He has no choice but to sit there and take it.

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Loophole:

There’s a third type of person I’ve so far left out. Let’s call him Stanley Schemer. Mr. Schemer enjoys finding and exploiting loopholes. He’s the type of guy who will drive an extra 10 miles to avoid a $1 toll. Mr. Schemer presently drives to the same station as Mr. Walker and Mr. Driver. Suppose MBTA/MassDOT decide to increase the parking rate instead of the train fare. Mr. Schemer notices that he can avoid the $10 cost bump by riding his bike 6 miles to the train station instead of driving. In this case, the MBTA continues to carry a passenger (Mr. Schemer) without a raise in fare box revenue while at the same time losing parking revenue (assuming someone else does not fill in that parking spot). Sounds like a bad deal at first, but is it? I say no. First, Mr. Schemer is getting to work without adding his car to the congested highways. At the same time he is not creating traffic, and extracting wear & tear on local roads, to get to the train station. Finally, by shifting from car to bike for a substantial part of his commute, Mr. Schemer is helping MassDOT achieve its mode share shift goal (cite: http://www.massdot.state.ma.us/main/tabid/1085/ctl/detail/mid/2937/itemid/223/MassDOT-Announces-Mode-Shift-Goal-to-Triple-the-Share-of-Travel-in-Massachusetts-by-Bicycling–Transit-and-Walking-.aspx).

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Doing the math:

MBTA owns 55,000 parking spots (source: http://www.mbta.com/riding_the_t/parking/?transittype=Subway&rn=Blue)
We should assume these spots are fully utilized during work days – otherwise, MBTA should sell the unutilized land. For simplicity, let’s also assume zero occupancy on holidays and weekends. There are about 20 work days each month month, 12 months a year.
55000spots * 20days/month * 12months/year = 6.6 million spot-days. An increase of $0.50 for parking will raise $3.3 million in revenue.

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Finally…

Let’s look beyond the social equity issue for a minute and glance at simple economics. How much does it cost to provide parking, and how much revenue does it generate? Using the same math as above: 20 work days a month times 12 months times the parking rate ($4 to $7), we see max revenue per space of ~$1000-$1600 annually.

By some studies, the annual cost of operating parking is $500 to $800 per space (this cost completely ignores the cost of parking lot or structure construction (thus debt principal and interest payments) and replacement). Net revenue from parking at between $200 and $1100. If parking fees are not increased over time to keep pace with inflation, we’re in danger of netting zero – or negative dollars – from some of these spaces in the not-too distant future.

MBTA and MassDOT need to look closely at the cost of providing parking versus the opportunity and equity of using it as a source of increased revenue to ensure fair box increases don’t disproportionately impact the poor, or worse – become a de facto funding stream to subsidize private motor vehicle storage.

Briefly, my goal with this site is to share what I’ve learned about cycling as a major part of my life and as a primary means of transportation.

“Natural Cyclection” is of course an homage to “natural selection”, which when paired with  mutation is the engine of evolution.  I wanted my blog to have an evolution oriented title, as lots of things I’ve learned cycling have been evolutionary.  I’ll “mutate” my riding system, then see how it survives on the street.  If it’s successful, I’ll keep it.

Luckily, noting I’ve tried has been so unsuccessful as to lead to my injury or death – thank heavens.  But I’ve made some expensive investments that have not worked out.  I plan to share everything I’ve tried, both the successes and the failures, so that others might repeat my triumphs and avoid my blunders.

And so, back to that name.  I wanted to go with something cooler – more directly recognizable as having something to do with bikes and evolution – but all the cool cycling/evolution names have already been taken (just Google “velolution”, etc.).  So I went with this.