Two-wheeled revolution

Local products and plans make way for bikes becoming a more primary form of transportation

BY TRACY IDELL HAMILTON

Joe Boudreau bought a B.O.B. Trailer for his solo two-month, 4,500-mile cycling trip through Europe. It wasn't until he returned home that he realized what a useful tool he had at his disposal.

"It's the ultimate carrying machine," he said about the one-wheeled trailer that hooks up to the back of any bike. "You can load it up with groceries, camping gear, anything you want." Having the trailer, he realized, meant he could eliminate many of the car trips he took around town–a Holy Grail for residents like Boudreau, who tire of fighting parking shortages, giant SUVs, congestion, and gasoline prices.

"I lived without a car for about seven years," Boudreau said, "riding to Los Osos almost everyday. I wish I had a B.O.B. trailer then."

Philip Novotny, founder and CFO of B.O.B. Trailers, said the company receives letters with sentiments similar to Boudreau's all the time. "People write and say, 'I bought your trailer for a cycling trip, but now that I'm home, I use the it all the time for errand-running and commuting.'"

Extremely committed to the concept of bike-as-vehicle, Novotny hopes to see more locals hooking trailers to their bikes instead of driving cars. "Ride bikes, bring stuff" has always been the company's motto and spirit, he said.

Now, thanks to a $5,000 grant from the Air Pollution Control District, B.O.B. will be able to subsidize the price of its trailers. As long as the grant money lasts, local bike shops will offer the trailers for a cool hundred bucks less than the retail $280 they normally sell for.

"I know that $280 a pop can be a bitter pill to swallow," Novotny said. "And we found that when R.E.I., one of our biggest distributors, lowers the price, sales skyrocket." If money is a barrier for people who have thought of buying a trailer for commuting or errand-running only, Novotny hopes the subsidy will help.

The grant comes from the APCD's Mover program, which aims to reduce air pollution by encouraging alternative transportation around town. The subsidy was one of 28 projects to receive funding, according to the APCD's Aeron Arlin-Genet. Getting residents out of their cars and onto their bikes even a couple times a week, she said, is a concrete way to help meet the APCD's mandate to lower air pollution.

But having a trailer to latch onto your bike is only part of the equation, Novotny emphasized. The city of San Luis Obispo must also continue its commitment to building the infrastructure necessary to make this town a truly bike-friendly place.

That commitment is already evident on some levels, but there's still plenty left to be done–and no one agency or group of people will be able to do it alone, bike advocates say. It's going to take a village.

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In 1982, the city of San Luis Obispo adopted a Circulation Element as part of its General Plan. That element included the following goal: "Reduce people's use of their cars by supporting and promoting alternatives such as walking, riding buses and bicycles, and using car pools."

In 1985, the city adopted a bicycle facilities plan, and in 1991, it established a bicycle committee and hired a bicycle coordinator to update the ’85 plan. In meetings and public hearings over the next year, the bike committee studied options for installing bike lanes and paths, setting bike parking standards, and establishing and promoting bike safety standards.

In October of 1993, the city council adopted the new bicycle transportation plan. By 1994—95 it was beginning to implement the committee’s recommendations.

Terry Sanville, principle transportation planner for the city, is also on the staff of the current bike committee. Sanville said most of the Class II bike lanes (those streets with a distinct bike lane) have been completed, as has a section of a Class I bike path (bike paths totally removed from other traffic) planned to run from Orcutt Road to the Jennifer Street Bridge and then to Cal Poly.

"We've built about 4.5 miles of bike lanes within the city limits," Sanville said, "although there are still some holes. We're working on those."

The bike path, on the other hand, has a less certain fate. What many see as the centerpiece to SLO's biking infrastructure does not yet have the funding for completion.

The first phase of the path, from Orcutt Road to Bushnell Street, is completed. The second phase, from Bushnell to the Jennifer Street bridge (which was designed with the bike path in mind, hence its rideable design), was supposed to be constructed last summer, Sanville said.

But difficulties with the railroad have delayed the project. The city must negotiate with Union Pacific, which recently bought the line from Southern Pacific, over where to move signal wires that are presently in the way of the planned path. "But the money is in place," Sanville said.

The third phase of the path, which would run along the railroad tracks to Cal Poly, does not yet have funding. But the city has moved forward, asking RRM Design Group to design the path and calculate preliminary funding needs.

Heading up the project at RRM are Mike Sherrod and Erik Justesen, both cyclists. The two have held public meetings seeking input on the design of the path. Novotny went to one of those meetings, where he expected to battle for the project.

"But they're on it," he said, pleasure creeping into his voice. "If they succeed, we're going to have a world-class bike corridor. We're going to have a bike freeway out there." Having a path that slices right through town, with no traffic to contend with, will significantly increase ridership, he believes.

Justesen backs him up. "We've done studies of how many people already ride along the tracks to get to Cal Poly. We think there are as many as 400 people a day using it right now."

The path is going to be world-class, Justesen said, with small parks and plazas incorporated into the design. "We're all really jazzed about this project. There's tremendous satisfaction in designing bike trails. As a bike enthusiast, I think it's just great."

That the current path is rocky, dangerous, and illegal to ride on doesn't seem to stop those looking for the most direct route across town, Justesen said. Getting Union Pacific to understand that a fenced-off path is in its best interest, from a liability point of view, is one of the obstacles the city faces in its battle to have the path completed.

Another is the bike plan itself. Before the city is eligible for more grant monies from the state or the federal government, the eight-year-old plan must be updated.

"It's getting a little bit long in the tooth," said Wes Conner, a former Cal Poly ornamental horticulture/landscape architecture professor, who, coincidentally, taught both Justesen and Sherrod.

Conner is heartened by the new city council mix, predicting that the slow-growth majority will also be more bike-friendly. In the past, Conner said, there was a distinct anti-bike bias on the council. "I was told by one councilmember, who shall remain nameless, that after the Marsh Street bike lane went in, he better see lots of bikes, or else it's going to be gone."

Sanville also warned of assuming that the current infrastructure is permanent. Just because the city has a certain number of bike lanes now doesn't mean they'll be there in perpetuity, he said. "And to be honest, the trend for bike riding, as a total percent of the transportation pie, has decreased in the last few years."

Sanville said the city "picked the low-hanging fruit" in its efforts to build a complete bike infrastructure, completing the less expensive class II bike lanes first. Not having the entire infrastructure in place, he said, is a hindrance for potential commuters. "Clearly, complete implementation of the bike plan would help increase ridership," he said.

Tim Valentine, the current chair of the city's bike advisory committee, agreed. During a recent city council goal-setting meeting at the Forum on Marsh, Valentine spoke demanded that the city make completing the railroad path a priority.

"There is an immediate need for this path not only to service the residents east of Orcutt Road, but to make the city's entire bicycle transportation effort successful," Valentine said to the council in front of a crowd of more than 100 people.

"The increasing level and type of traffic, aggressive drivers, and larger vehicles such as SUVs create hazardous conditions that deter bicycle use," he said. "This safety issue, combined with the hilly terrain in San Luis, makes a cross-town trip on a bicycle just too difficult for most people. Statistics bear this out: as San Luis becomes more crowded, bicycle use is decreasing."

The Railroad Recreational Trail, he said, is crucial: it's flat, and direct; it bisects the town, connecting one end of town with the other; and it's separate from the roadways. His comments drew sustained applause from the audience.

While the city's support of the railroad path is critical, it will also take a sustained effort by local bike enthusiasts and advocates to keep pressure on elected officials–something San Luis has traditionally lacked.

"Communities with more bike vibrancy typically have strong advocates in the community," said Sanville. Often, he said, that advocacy comes from the university community. It's not a coincidence that great bike towns like Davis and Santa Cruz are also college towns. On the other hand, he noted, the university's ever-changing population brings its transportation behaviors and values with them, and those can be hard to change.

The university is making some efforts to get kids out of their cars, although alternative transportation advocates say not enough. The free bus program that allows Cal Poly students to ride city busses without charge was going to be discontinued for lack of funds until public outcry forced administrators to rethink their decision. This year, in fact, the APCD is helping to subsidize that program to the tune of $30,000, according to the APCD's Arlin-Genet.

One idea being tossed around by university officials is to prohibit freshman from bringing their cars to campus. That's an idea Bruce Collier, former president of the SLO Bike Club, would like to see implemented at area high schools as well. Collier, who lives near San Luis High, has noted a tremendous drop-off in numbers of teens riding their bikes to school.

"Now, as soon as they turn 16, they want their own car. And because schools can't supply parking for all the cars, that impacts the neighborhoods."

Getting kids out of their cars, or out of their parents’ cars, could also help fight the growing epidemic of obesity in this country, said Chris Orfas, executive director of the California Bike Coalition, a statewide lobbying group that hopes to increase both cycling and the infrastructure to support it. "What's at stake here is the health of future generations," Orfas said. "Children are fatter than ever. Obesity now causes more illness and death than smoking."

A generation ago, he said, it wasn't uncommon at all to see a schoolyard full of bikes. "Now less than one in 10 school children walks or rides their bikes."

The California Bike Coalition has a couple main goals, Orfas said. First, "we need to recognize that the path we’re on is just not sustainable. We can't build our way out of gridlock." Second, he said, communities need to identify key corridors for multi-use trails–like the railroad path here in SLO.

Finally, communities must create a cultural environment that makes biking and walking not only possible but acceptable. "That can happen from both the top down and from grassroots efforts," he said.

That grassroots effort is not totally absent in San Luis, although even local advocates like Collier and Conner admit more could be done.

Some have suggested that locals can learn from Santa Barbara's Bike Coalition. That coalition has been active for the last 10 years, working with city and county officials to create a healthy bike culture with a strong infrastructure.

Robert Bernstein, the current president of the coalition, said he has been part of two models of bike advocacy. One, modeled after San Francisco and Boston events, is more confrontational, with Critical Mass and other street theater-type of events. The other, which Bernstein said is used in Santa Barbara and Oakland, is more collaborative, mobilizing letter-writing campaigns and offering solutions rather than just offering a "this sucks" observation.

Not surprisingly, he said, the latter approach usually results in better outcomes.

That's definitely the model that's emerging here, said Novotny, who said part of his job is also to advocate at the local, state and federal level for biking infrastructure dollars.

"Look at the monthly cruiser ride," he said. The ride, which leaves from Mission Plaza at 9:30 p.m. on the first Thursday of every month, is not adversarial, but inclusive, he said.

For many others, bike commuting is already a way of life. Janie Goldenberg and her husband, Stu, are regular bike commuters. He rides from Johnson Avenue to Cal Poly every day. Janie doesn't ride everyday, but when she does, it's quite an undertaking–she pedals all the way to Los Osos, where she's an aide at Monarch School.

"It takes about an hour and twenty minutes each way," Goldenberg said. "I'm not fast. But Los Osos Valley Road is really beautiful." Goldenberg leaves a gym bag of toiletries at work, and brings a change of clothing with her each day.

The Goldenbergs, who have been members of the SLO Bike Club for years, commute on their bicycles for many reasons. "I'm not doing anything that extraordinary," Janie said. "I just don’t like the gym, I don’t like running, so this is my exercise. Besides, it's just so pretty."

Not everyone has to ride every day, or be completely hardcore in their habits to make a difference in their health or the health of their community, Novotny said.

Just a few more bike trips per month, combined with a clear vision, and San Luis Obispo is poised to become a model bike city. "This town has so much potential," he said, citing the railroad path and the extension of the Bob Jones Trail from Avila Beach into town. "Look, I'm no tree-hugger. I'm a businessman. But it's exciting to think that we could transform the paradigm here." Æ

If Tracy Idell Hamilton rode her bike half as much as she talks about it, San Luis would already meet Clean Air standards. You can e-mail her with story ideas and comments at [email protected].