Ralph Buehler's talk a powerful case for Sustainable Transportation

Ralph Buehler's talk on Wednesday absolutely rocked!   Ralph had me saying "Yes! Yes! Yes!" out loud about a dozen times during his lecture. His concise, logical, fact driven lecture style with just the right amount of reserved enthusiasm was very powerful.  If you didn't go, you really missed out! 

The theme of his talk was “Making Urban Transport Sustainable: Comparison of Germany and the U.S.”  Many in the sustainable transportation planning world like to use Germany as a comparator to the U.S. as both countries are wealthy and have large automobile ownership and the automobile industry makes up a large part of the national economy.  In fact, the German car industry is even a bigger part of the German economy that it is here.  So Germans are just as much invested and in love their automobiles as Americans but that hasn't stopped Germany from making effective efforts at reducing automobile use.  Using a combination of transportation policies that make driving less appealing and make transit, cycling and walking cheap and convenient, Germans now make a four times the number of trips by foot, bike, and public transport and drive for a 25 percent less than Americans.  Ralph explained this all armed with solid facts and figures.

We are inquiring about a video link of the lecture so more can here Ralph's talk. 

Now the power Ralph's lecture came as no surprise to me as his insights into transportation policy are second to none.  The seminar that he taught when he was a Ph.D. candidate at Rutgers was one of the best classes I took at Bloustein. Today Ralph Buehler is an Assistant Professor in Urban Affairs & Planning at Virginia Tech’s Alexandria Center just outside of Washington D.C.

Save $15! NJ Bike & Walk Summit pre-registration closes at midnight!

Long distance road bicyclist and Assemblywoman, Grace Spencer to attend in a surprise, last-minute addition to the Summit!

Still hemming and hawing about going to the NJ Bike and Walk Summit this weekend?  Don't wait!  Register now!  Online registration closes at midnight!
Register online and pay only $50 and avoid paying the $15 "at the door" fee.  Space is filling up fast so you better not wait anyway.  And if you are a student with a valid ID you will only pay $25 but that will rise to $40 if you wait.  It's going to rain anyway on Saturday so what else are you going to do?

Assemblywoman Grace Spencer to appear on featured panel   
A member of the New Jersey Legislature, Assemblywoman L. Grace Spencer (D) has represented the 29th Legislative District, which includes the Essex County municipalities of Belleville and a portion of Newark, since November 2007. Ms. Spencer received her BA in business management from Rutgers University and her JD from Rutgers Law School.  She specializes in liability law at the firm of Marshall, Dennehey, Warner, Coleman and Goggin. Ms. Spencer is a member of the Major Taylor Cycling Club of New Jersey.

In total, the NJ Bike & Walk Summit will have a total of 18 educational session with over 50 speakers.  To find out more, check out the Summit Schedule.  The Summit will be on Saturday February 23rd at the Edward J. Bloustein School of Rutgers University in New Brunswick, a five minute walk from the New Brunswick train station.  Pre-registration closes on February 21 at midnight. Registration will be available on the morning of the summit, for an additional $15 per registrant. Register today!

NJ Bike Summit in just five days! LAB Board President to speak

The New Jersey Bike and Walk Summit, presented by the New Jersey Bike and Walk Coalition is proud to announce the late addition of Hans van Naerssen, Chair of the Board of Directors of the League of American Bicyclists.  Hans is a bicycling activist, and an active bicyclist. He is also co-founder and Board Chair, Pennsylvania Walks and Bikes, and Board member and past President of the Bicycle Coalition of Greater Philadelphia. He has a Governor's appointment to the PA Pedestrian and Pedalcycle Advisory Committee.  The addition of Hans to the list of speakers is a real surprise as he is will undoubtedly provide a valuable perspective on bicycle activism having experience working with all levels of government.

For all you trail users out there, the session "Building Community Support for Trails" should prove very interesting.   While the session will remind trail advocates that trails are used by groups well beyond the typical, hiker, biker, horseback rider groups, it will also be one of the few time members from all of these groups will all be in one room.  A sampling of the panel include Michael Gray and Becky Taylor of the Lawrence Hopewell Trail Corporation, Janice Elsishans, Trails Advocate for the New Jersey Horse Council , Equestrian Chairperson for the Heritage and Agricultural Association, participant in the Sussex County Trails Partnership and President of the Paulinskill Valley Trail Committee, and Wally Tunison of the Jersey Off Road Bicycle Association (JORBA)

In total, the NJ Bike & Walk Summit will have a total of 18 educational session with over 50 speakers.  To find out more, check out the Summit Schedule.  The Summit will be on Saturday February 23rd at the Edward J. Bloustein School of Rutgers University in New Brunswick, a five minute walk from the New Brunswick train station.  Pre-registration closes on February 21 at midnight. Registration will be available on the morning of the summit, for an additional $15 per registrant. Register today!



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4th Annual New Jersey Bike Walk Summit Happening February 23rd

The New Jersey Bike and Walk Coalition in partnership with the Voorhees Transportation Center will be hosting the 4th Annual New Jersey Bike Walk Summit (link to preliminary agenda) on Saturday February 23rd at the Edward J. Bloustein School of Rutgers University in New Brunswick. This year there will be 20 panel sessions to choose from, including one that will discuss The Circuit and how it can affect trail development and bike mobility in New Jersey.

The NJBWC headed up by Executive Director Cyndi Steiner is diving headfirst into state bicycle and pedestrian issues. They have partnered with us as well as the Tri State Transportation Campaign, NJ Future, the Safe Routes to School Partnership and other local advocacy groups on numerous issues. Most notably they have been working with NJDOT and the State's three Metropolitan Planning Organizations on policy changes under MAP-21 and with New Jersey Transit to improve its bike on rail policies. NJBWC's statewide advocacy strengthens our local advocacy efforts in the Garden State.

Registration fee for the Summit is $50 online, $65 at the door. For more information on the NJ Bike and Walk Summit go here. The Bloustein School is just a 5 minute walk from the NJ TRANSIT New Brunswick Station at the corner of Livingston Ave and New St.

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WBJ Exclusive: Driver charged with Chelsea Traynor's death ran red light

"I can tell you without a doubt that the truck ran the red light. It was a big 4x4 type pickup doing maybe 50mph."  That is what an eyewitness told WalkBikeJersey last week after we ran the story about Roger Hode being charged in the crash that took Chelsea Traynor's life.  Also according to the eye witness "she had the green light and that the truck ran the red light."

When WalkBikeJersey visited the site in December 2010, we looked at the signal timing specifically at how long it took to cross the intersection once the pedestrian signal button was pushed.  With this information it would seem likely that Chelsea took the time to wait until she had the proper signal and the right of way.  This new information makes her death all the more tragic.

Driver who killed Rutgers student charged in 2010 traffic death

The Star-Ledger is reporting that Rodger Hode of South River has been charged with aggravated manslaughter and death by auto in the December 2010 killing of Chelsea Traynor on Route 18 in New Brunswick.  On the morning of December 9, 2010 Traynor was crossing Rt 18 on her bicycle at the southern most intersection of George St when Hode's Ford pickup truck hit and killed her. 


View Bicyclist fatality Rt 18 and George St. 12/9/10 in a larger map

The then 21-year-old Californian Chelsea Traynor, of Concord, California was a sophomore, in the class of 2013, majoring in nutritional science at the university’s School of Environmental and Biological Sciences in New Brunswick, formerly known as Cook College.  She had previously studied at Humboldt State University in California and had recently transferred to Rutgers.

Site of the Traynor crash in December, 2010.

Traynor's death was the second reported bicyclist/pedestrian fatality on the newly renovated New Brunswick section of Rt 18.   The previous fatal crash was in October of 2009 when 15yo George Coleman was struck and killed just north of the George St intersection at Commercial Avenue.  WalkBikeJersey is thankfully unaware of any other pedestrian or bicyclist fatalities along this stretch of highway since Traynor's death.  WalkBikeJersey reverently visited the crash site in only a few days after the tragic events and investigated and photographed the facilities as they were at that time.

Our hearts at WalkBikeJersey reach out to the Traynor family and hope that justice carried out in her case.

Bloustein students proposed bicycle network and other ideas for Rutgers / New Brunswick

What might a bicycle network look like for Rutgers University and the City of New Brunswick look like? Graduate students at the Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy took on this question as part of Prof. John Pucher’s, Biking and Walking for Sustainable Cities Class. Students took a look at a number of issues including, bike share, turning Rutgers into a Bicycle Friendly University, a community bicycle center like Recycle-A-Bicycle and Second Life Bikes to name a few.

The other presentations I saw talked about:

• How to motivate people to walk and bike more, 
• Redesigning Livingston Ave (a primary access route to New Brunswick from the south),
• A look at the safety improvements and controversy with the Prospect Park West Cycletrack

Included below are several images of the one major presentation that investigated a New Brunswick bicycle network designed to maximize the connectivity between university campuses while connecting to the French Street commercial corridor (Note: I give the students credit for trying some innovative bike lane treatments however I must say that I do have some concerns with the finer points of some of the design treatments).  For those mega bike wonks there is a link to video of the presentation (webinare style) but I don't have that link available as I publish.

 

Rutgers Releases New Jersey's 2011 Pedestrian Safety Tracking Report

Today the Bicycle and Pedestrian Resource Center of New Jersey released 2011 Pedestrian Safety Tracking Report. The primary purpose of the report is to track crashes and analyze patterns including hot spots where multiple crashes have taken place. 2011 New Jersey Pedestrian Safety Tracking Report Final For a more detailed description of the report go to the New Jersey Walks and Bikes Blog.

Star-Ledger covers cycling at Rutgers Newark

Thanks to Streetsblog's Headlines I was made aware of this great story from The Star-Ledger covering bicycling at the Rutgers, Newark campus.  It's great to hear that the University is trying to take a more proactive role it getting its students, faculty and staff to think of the bike, with the use of transit, as a viable means of getting to and from campus.

As a two time alumni of Rutgers, New Brunswick, it would be great to see the Department of Parking and Transportation get more proactive in promoting cycling in and around the five campuses in New Brunswick.  I personally think that while the bus system is fantastic between the campuses, there is really no reason why many of the trips currently taken by bus, couldn't be done by bike.  And reducing bus demand would obviously reduce costs to students in an era of out of control student fees. I think to do this Rutgers should look to hire a bicycle and pedestrian coordinator (hint, hint - I know some one who would be perfect for the job - wink, wink).  And it would be really, really special to see Rutgers try to become a League of American Bicyclists, Bicycle Friendly University.

Come on Jack!  I know your up to it!

Rutgers' John Pucher and VT's Ralph Bueler do it yet agian

I've said it before but when John Pucher speaks, the bike/ped world listens. While his latest work with his protégé Ralph Buehler, now at Virginia Tech, is not revolutionary, it is none-the-less a comprehensive update of the comparative analysis work that Pucher (and now Beuhler) have become famous for. This latest paper titled "Walking and Cycling for Healthy Cities" is a feature article in the UK journal Built Environment. An e-copy of the journal issue can be found here and a free copy of a plain text version of the article from John Pucher's webpage can be found here.

The abstract of this article is as follows:

Walking and cycling are the healthiest ways to get around our cities, providing valuable physical activity for people on a daily basis. These forms of active transport also generate indirect public health benefits by reducing the use of automobiles, thus diminishing air, water, and noise pollution and the overall level of traffic danger. This paper provides a broad overview of the role walking and cycling can play in making our cities healthier. First, we summarize the scientific evidence of the health benefits of walking and cycling. Second, we examine variations in walking and cycling levels in Europe, North America, and Australia. Third, we consider the crucial issue of traffic safety. Finally, we describe a range of government policies needed to encourage more walking and cycling: safe and convenient infrastructure such as sidewalks, crosswalks, bike paths and lanes, and intersection crossings; traffic calming of residential neighbourhoods; integration with public transport; land-use policies that foster compact, mixed-use developments; people-friendly urban design; improved traffic education; strict enforcement of traffic regulations; and reductions in motor vehicle speed limits.

Essentially, much of their work looks to compare the difference countries make in investments in walking, biking, transit, education and polices, and then find corresponding correlations in walking, biking and transit use rates, obesity rates, crash statistics, etc.. Their work in making the argument for investments in walking and biking (and transit and good urban form) is quite compelling.

An example of Pucher's and Buehler's comparative analysis work from a previous publication. Not surprisingly the USA always has the lowest rates of walking and cycling while being the fattest and most dangerous to walk and bike, amongst many other dubious distinctions.

Previous WalkBikeJersey articles on New Jersey's and Rutgers' own John Pucher can be found here and here.

Cyclist killed in New Brunswick crash ID'd as California woman - Updated with photos of intersection

The Star-Ledger reported on Saturday that the woman killed in a crash on Rt 18 at Georges Rd in New Brunswick was 21-year-old Californian Chelsea Traynor, of Concord, California. Traynor was a sophomore, in the class of 2013, majoring in nutritional science at the university’s School of Environmental and Biological Sciences in New Brunswick, formerly known as Cook College. As of Saturday, no charges were filed against the driver.

Since the Google Streetsview imagery was outdated for this newer intersection I went out and visited the location, took some pictures so I and our readers could get a better understanding of the place and what could have happened to Chelsea Traynot. I went through the crosswalk to cross the northbound local lanes of Rt 18. Going over to the riverside it took exactly one minute to get the walk signal. Upon my return in took only 20 seconds. It also appeared that when traffic turning left from George Stgot the green light, all traffic on the northbound local lanes also came to a halt. I did not observe the operation of the light well enough to say that this was the case with 100% certainty.

It was rather somber to go to a place where someone had lost their life not even a week earlier and I took these pictures and show them here with the greatest reverence to the deceased.

Traffic turning left onto Rt 18 in the foreground. The green signal for these
drivers seemed to bring all Rt 18 traffic to a halt seen in background.A view of the approach to the intersection with George St.
A view of the approach to the intersection but further south along the highway.
Note the posted speed limit.

Rt 18 claims life of Rutgers student crossing on bike

MyCentralJersey.com and several other news organizations are reporting the death of a 21 female Rutgers Student 11:10 a.m Thursday morning who was crossing the local lanes of the highway with her bicycle at Georges Rd near the Cook and Douglas Campuses. This is the second fatality of a person crossing the northbound local lanes of Rt. 18 in New Brunswick. The previous fatal crash was in October of 2009 when 15yo George Coleman was struck and killed just north of the George St intersection at Commercial Avenue.


View Bicyclist fatality Rt 18 and George St. 12/9/10 in a larger map

We at WalkBikeJersey send our condolences to the unnamed victims family.

Cherry Blossom Rides (yes plural) & Bike Share all in Newark!

I had the pleasure of taking the train up to Newark and joining up with our friends from the Brick City Bike Collective this past Sunday for their Cherry Blossom Bike Tour. The ride was a smashing success with nearly 100 people in attendance, way more then anyone expected. Included in the mix was Kendra and Dave from the Morristown Pedal Pushers Blog. Elizabeth Press from Streetfilms who I invited on a last minute lark came with her camera along with some of her friends at Transportation Alternatives. We were all very glad she could make it and her Streetflims "shorty" below really captures the family friendly fun of the afternoon, despite the fact that most of the cherry blossoms were done blooming due to last week's heat.



Some of the sights along the way include Cathedral Basilica of the Sacred Heart, the ever elegant Forest Hill Neighborhood, the old Tiffany Factory (smartly converted into apartments) amongst many others and of course, 4,000 cherry trees in beautiful Branch Brook Park.

With this ride such a success, I was surprised to find out that the folks at the Brick City Bike Collective had done another Cherry Blossom Ride the week before with the transportation folks at Rutgers Newark. They too brought a film crew and in the below video of the event they even talk about Rutgers Newark's new Bike Share Program! My God! Who would have thunk it!

So what can be done? Solution #1 - Educating Enforcement

Earlier we talked about how bicyclists and pedestrians now account for nearly 27% of all fatalities, up from hovering around 23% for the previous 4 years. Well here is one idea to improve these statistics. I came across this while reading on the Association for Pedestrian and Bicycle Professionals (APBP) listserve and it really seems to have merit.

The story comes from Robert Johnson at a group called PedNet out of Missouri. Since I'm quoting him I'm purposely going to hide some names but the story is telling and his idea is something that should be given a try her in Jersey.

In September I had the opportunity to train all 150 (Blank) Police Department officers on bicycling law and issues. I went through the laws line by line, explained why the laws were written the way they were and gave them video examples what we were talking about.

This has made a tremendous difference in (Blank). Before the training the police department ignored bicyclists except for occasionally admonishing one for taking the lane even when the law allowed. They simply did not know the laws which led to their inactivity in enforcing laws for both motorists and bicyclists and led to some unfortunate remarks in local media outlets. The month after the training the PD made about 100 “contacts” with bicyclists who were breaking the law and one officer told that was about 100 more than ever before. Most of those were red light runners and riding at night without lights. That was 5 months ago and even now bike shop employees tell me story after story of a bicyclists coming into the shop, talking about getting pulled over and buying lights for their bicycle. They are also much more active when a bicyclist reports an incident of motorist harassment. It seems to me that every officer really believes that bicycles are vehicles which some clearly did not understand before the training.

The other thing I tried to convince them is that if a bicyclist is in a crash with an automobile then tell the media what led up to the crash. Most crashes in Columbia involve a bicyclist riding at night without lights or a sidewalk bicyclist. The newspaper articles typically state something like “bicyclist hit by suv” with no details as to why it was typically the bicyclists fault......or at least they were riding in a way that we teach not to. Since the training we have had three bike/car crashes severe enough to make the media and in all three the it clearly stated that the bicyclist was riding on the sidewalk and hit in the crosswalk. I think that is important because even though bicycling/car injuries happen much less frequently than auto/auto injuries in Columbia people tend to dwell on the bicycle injuries much longer and its a real detriment to people riding.

A personal failure of mine was the University of (Blank) Police Department. The chief just could not get past their ego’s to accept any training. They said that people already ridicule them and do not think of them as a “real police force.” Pulling over a bicyclist would only further that belief according to them. I have gently pushed as far as I can with them but they refuse and as a result we have 30,000 students in (Blank) who have no idea how to ride a bicycle. They sometimes find themselves under a automobile when they decide to leave campus and take a trip to Wal-Mart at 2 am, without lights and enter a crosswalk at 15 mph which is how they have ridden on campus and its the normal way to ride on campus.

So in my experience if you can get the Police Department to accept training that is well thought out, balanced on the issues of bicycle/auto and presses to them that bicyclists have RIGHTS AND RESPONSIBILITIES that it can go a long way towards safety and public relations.

If anyone has any specific questions about our training or how we made such an arrangement with our PD then just drop me a note.

This definitely seems like a great idea for New Brunswick and Rutgers University. With 40,000 college students and a large population of migrant workers in town, there is plenty of bike riding going on. Unfortunately 95% of riders I see usually violate at least one traffic law in a very flagrant manner. Many ride on the sidewalk (which is dangerous as well as being illegal in New Brunswick), ride with no lights at night, run red lights and ride against traffic just to name the most typical violations.

If we want cycling to be taken seriously and as a viable for of transportation just like motor vehicles then we must ride and act responsibly (I know most reading this blog already do). We must also expect the police to take our violations seriously and treat them with equal seriousness.

Rutgers' John Pucher Strikes Again!

For those of you who don't know, Prof. John Pucher is probably the most well known and widely published scholars on bicycle and pedestrian issues in the English language. His specialty is comparative analysis between nations of the beneficial economic impacts of walking and biking (often along with transit). When he is involved in the publishing of a paper on the topic, the entire bike/ped world stops and listens.

And he lives right here! In Jersey no less!

His latest is no exception. Working with four other colleges the last paper is titled, "Walking, Cycling, and Obesity Rates in Europe, North America, and Australia" has recently been published in the Journal of Physical Activity and Health.

The results in a nutshell: "Countries with the highest levels of active transportation generally had the lowest obesity rates." In fact the paper shows that "Active transportation is inversely related to obesity in these countries."

So essentially the more a people walk, bike and take transit to work the less likely they are to be fat. Seems like a simple enough concept but this report is pretty strong evidence that this is indeed the truth.

It's been getting some pretty good nation press too.

Oh and he goes by "Car Free John." It is a name which he really lives up to since he doesn't own a car and walks, bikes and takes transit for nearly all his trips. However, he has been know to mooch a ride off of friends once in a while. Hey! No one's perfect!