“We have this picture of cycling commuters as being like supermen, and that discourages other people from doing it,” said P.M. Summer, transportation alternatives coordinator for the city of Dallas. “When I came into this job, our thinking was we needed to enable cyclists to make 40-mile bike trips. Now my thinking is we need to have development in place that allows a cyclist to make a one-mile bike trip.”
I’m spending the week in my company’s Dallas, Texas office and added to the week and a half of riding I missed due to an ice storm, I’m going a bit stir crazy. Also, I’m having to drive around in Dallas rush hour traffic. Ick. I’ve tried to convince a couple people here that they could seriously improve their commute time by getting out of the car and onto a bike; so far one person has actually made the transition to a scooter and is considering making the commute by bike.
As I was searching for something I could use to bolster my case I came across this article on Dallas News’ website. This article starts out like most bicycle commuter features — urban planners looking for ways to battle air-pollution and traffic congestion, followed by a profile of a normal, guy next door who decided to ride his bike and has found that he is saving money and his health and quality of life has improved.
The article then presents some promising news:
The city of Dallas has started the construction bidding process for the East Dallas Veloway, which will link the Fair Park area to the White Rock Lake trail by late 2009.
Late last month, Dallas Mayor Tom Leppert announced a land donation that would allow the Katy Trail to link with proposed trails along the Trinity River.
And construction is set to begin next summer on the four remaining segments of the Cottonwood Creek Trail that will open a bicycle-pedestrian corridor to ultimately link downtown Dallas to similar projects in Collin County.
and
“Ultimately you’ll be able to get on a bicycle from downtown Dallas up to Frisco and up to Plano.”
The article is a nice read and I’ll be sharing it with a few people while I’m down here. I would appreciate any comments those of you in the Dallas – Ft. Worth area care to share.
Side note: I’m trying to convince the powers that be to buy a bike that I could use on my trips down here. Think about it — I can take the shuttle from the airport to the hotel and then ride the bike to the office. The cost of the car rental for one trip would pay for the bike and there are actually a couple of us that come down several times throughout the year that would be willing to do this… Wish me luck.
Image from the Bike Texas! website.