Fort Collins Wins Platinum Award: "Fort Collins bicycle culture, in nation's top 4, aims higher"

By David Young, the Coloradoan

First Published May 13, 2013

 Fort Collins has been climbing the ranks of “bicycle friendly” communities for 10 years now, but there’s still one more rung to go.

The city has been working toward becoming a platinum-level Bicycle Friendly Community ever since it reached the gold level, said Molly North, FC Bikes Program Specialist. To finally achieve it is a proud moment.

The League of American Bicyclists awarded Fort Collins the Platinum Bicycle Friendly Community status on Monday. It puts Fort Collins into the upper echelons of cities that embrace bicycles as a lifestyle.

Troutman Underpass on the Mason Trail, March 2013

Next up, the city is striving to reach the next level: diamond.

In the past five years, programs such as the bicycle library, bicycle ambassador program and bicycle infrastructure were key in reaching the next level, said North, who applied for the designation. She also credited both the city and the community for sustained commitment to cycling.

“Part of the spirit of this bike-friendly community program is that competition,” North said. “Really, competition against oneself.”

With bikes used as recreation as well as transportation, the city needs to get more people on bikes and further the programs in place if it wants to reach the diamond designation.

“We are not going to rest on our laurels,” North said. “We are not going to be ‘as is,’ but if not broken, we won’t fix it.”

Nicole Wynands, program manager of the Bicycle Friendly Community program with the League of American Bicyclists, said one of the big achievements that helped Fort Collins move to the next level was the Bike Ambassador Program, in which trained cyclists work with the community to advance safe cycling.

In addition, the infrastructure, such as an expansive 133 miles of off-street trails and 280 miles of bike lanes, contributed to the designation. Wynands also noted how CSU and businesses encourage cycling by offering bike parking.

More people ride bikes than walk in town — a rarity — as 6.6 percent ride and 3.3 percent walk, she noted.

The diamond designation is still in the works. In addition to an application, it would require a survey and some stricter requirements that accompany it. A diamond designation requires that ridership would need to be 15 percent and bike crashes would need to be limited to 50 per 10,000 daily commuters, with fewer than .02 fatalities, Wynands said.

Rick Price, Fort Collins Bike Co-op safe cycling coordinator, said the award is well deserved and the city has been working toward this moment for years. He gave much of the credit to City Council for its foresight in helping put Fort Collins on the map for biking.

Price has his eyes on the next level — diamond — noting that to reach it, there needs to be more education and policies that will help raise the next generation of cyclists.

Fort Collins achieved the status for its investment in bicycling promotion, education programs, infrastructure and pro-bicycling policies.

The Bicycle Friendly Community program evaluates quality of life, sustainability and transportation networks, providing benchmarks toward improving bicycle-friendliness. There are 259 Bicycle Friendly Communities in 47 states across America. But there are only four platinum cities in the country: Fort Collins; Boulder; Davis, Calif.; and Portland, Ore. There are five levels of the award — diamond, platinum, gold, silver and bronze. Fort Collins received a silver designation in 2003 and a gold designation in 2008. No city has reached the diamond level yet.

Moving forward, Dan Porter, cyclist and operator of local bike website yourgroupride.com, said he would like to see more races, such as the USA Pro Cycling Challenge, become standards for Fort Collins.

Coinciding with the award, FC Bikes new program manager, Tessa Greegor, started Monday. Greegor, 30, comes from Seattle, where, for the past five years, she has been the principal planner for the Cascade Bicycle Club, the largest bicycle advocacy organization in the country.

Greegor said the award reflects the level of commitment that the city has to cycling.

Coming into her first day on the job, she noted the framework is in place for bikes freeing her up to focus on updating the bike plan, expand the bike library and work on bike safety.

Greegor wants to help families and children feel safer when riding.

Education Priceless When it Comes to Bicycle Safety

First published in the Coloradoan, April 16, 2012 

Why Not Become a League Cycling Instructor?

By Rick Price, Ph.D.

Self-preservation suggests that you should take care of yourself on your 30-pound bike when surrounded by 6,000-pound SUVs.  Part of that care is to anticipate hazards and avoid them.  So I am baffled when I see cyclists who put themselves so blatantly in harm’s way that they are literally crashes waiting to happen.

The cyclists in this photo (westbound on Mountain Avenue at College) are waiting for the light to change.  To be safe they should all be in the center of the lane behind that SUV.  They are putting themselves in a hazardous position, trying to make themselves small, by crowding into the gutter.  They face the hazard of right-turning motor vehicles around them as well as the hazard of fellow cyclists starting out and possibly turning right.  Nobody can interpret where they are headed.  The lesson here is:  get in line with other vehicles sharing the road and wait your turn, whether you are turning right or going straight.

Headed south in the south-bound bike lane on Remington Street I noticed a young woman cyclist across the street headed south in the north-bound bike lane.  I couldn’t resist calling out as we pedaled south together, “you know, what you are doing, riding the wrong way in the bike lane, is the single biggest cause of bike-car crashes in the nation.”   She pedaled on and soon found a safe opportunity to cross over to the correct lane.  I explained that I had spent the morning teaching bike safety to kids and couldn’t resist calling out to her.  She thanked me, told me she knew her behavior was dangerous and illegal, and encouraged me to continue mentioning this to wrong-way riders.

Another day coming off of CSU campus I was east-bound on Laurel Street preparing to turn north onto Howes.  I merged from the bike lane into the left turn lane where I stopped at the light.  A young man eastbound on his bike in the bike lane came to the light, turned left abruptly in the crosswalk in front of five stopped cars, went up onto the sidewalk and headed north along Howes Street. 

I turned north on Howes when the light changed and in the next block this same cyclist came off the sidewalk and crossed the intersection diagonally to head north in the correct bike lane.  I overtook him at Howes and Mulberry where we both stopped at the light. 

I told him that I teach bicycle safety to kids and adults and asked him if I could deploy a team of videographers to follow him through town to illustrate dangerous cycling behavior.  He said no but he did ask me to tell him how he should have handled that maneuver and admitted that he “hadn’t a clue on how to bicycle in traffic.”  I explained the safest way to handle that situation as we awaited a green light. 

If you “don’t have a clue” on how to bicycle in traffic, here’s a partial solution for your own safety and for the good of the community:  the Bike Co-op is hosting a League Cycling Instructor seminar May 4 -6.  This intense seminar is taught by Preston Tyree, the best bicycle education coach in the country.  The seminar costs $200 and it’s worth every penny.  Help us teach eight hours of safe cycling skills to kids in town and we will refund that fee to you.  The scholarship is made available through the support of the City of Fort Collins’ Safe Routes to School Program.  If you are interested contact me for details.  

Does Stop REALLY Mean Stop?

How do we get bikers to obey traffic laws? Asks Christopher Beam in the October 16 issue of Slate online. "Why bother?" Would seem to be his answer. In this thoughtful and provocative essay Beam addresses the social and legal complexities of treating bicycles as vehicles. He discusses the "Idaho stop," which allows cyclists to treat stop signs as yield signs and he cites the failed attempt in Oregon in winter/spring of 2009 to institute the legislation there. He also has a succinct explanation of the divide among the two camps of "vehicular" (those who believe cyclists are vehicles and belong on the road) and "facilitators" (those who believe cyclists belong on bike paths or lanes separated from the road.) An interesting essay.

The above sign was (was) in Fort Collins until the spring of 2006 when it was called to the attention of our streets engineer. It disappeared within a few weeks.