Wednesday, February 24, 2010

Portland, Portland, Portland

"Marsha, Marsha, Marsha!" :)

Check out this interesting article in Bicycling Magazine that ends with "Let the competition begin!" with regards to the race to overtake Portland as the most bike friendly city in America.

Here (below) is one interesting nugget from the article. I wonder what Omaha's numbers would look like if we conducted the same survey? How does this inform us on where we need to concentrate our efforts?

To accomplish its goal of increasing ridership, (Portland) has to do more
to make cycling a viable option for those people who would like to ride, but
don’t. The city’s research has shown that when it comes to cycling,
Portland’s population breaks down into four distinct categories:

“The strong and fearless”: .5 percent of Portland’s population
“The enthused and confident”: 7 percent of Portland’s population
“The interested but concerned”: 60 percent of Portland’s population
“No way no how”: 33 percent of Portland’s population

3 comments:

Biker Bob/Runner Bob said...

5 years ago, I would have been in "The interested but concerned" category. Now I'm firmly into "The strong and fearless" category.

Being able to ride most of my commute on the Keystone trail made the "perceived" barrier to entry much less imposing. If I lived 13 miles west of my office instead of 13 miles north, it may have been a different story.

As our infrastructure improves and there are fewer "perceived" barriers, we will start catching up to Portland.

Momentum is already on our side. We just need to keep pedaling when we get to those hills between here and our destination.

T-bone said...

I'm in Portland till Tuesday. You should see the sweet bike boxes that have at the transit stations. Make me a contributor and I'll post some pictures.

Jim Nariel said...

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