Friday Afternoon Commute - "I was a Bikeshare member, and it encouraged me to get a bike."

Good afternoon

• Must Read: "Bike store owners say bike sharing is actually helping their businesses by fueling an explosion in bicycling enthusiasm. Moreover, bike shops say they are witnessing a culture change in their neighborhoods as more people leave their cars at home and hop on two-wheelers." and "a 2008 report in Bike Europe, a website for bike professionals, cited a 39 percent growth in sales of city bikes possibly attributed to the huge popularity of the Vélib system."
• Apartment building owners are looking to attract customers who are looking for bike-friendly accommodations. This includes locations near trails, access to CaBi or other bike rentals and storage or bike-repair rooms. 
• The BAC has some suggestions for improving Ward 4 and the Georgia Avenue corridor. 
• The ICC Trail isn't particularly good, perhaps we can make it better. 
• “At least it’s not as bad as our Republican colleagues wanted,” complained Rep. Earl Blumenauer, Oregon Democrat, who has championed bike and pedestrian programs. “But make no mistake, it is not a bill to be proud of.”  Meanwhile, the Heritage Foundation thinks cutting bike funding is fantastic. Mark Blacknell tries to discuss this at Patch only to have the comments overrun by Streetcar opponents. 
• A rundown of Tour de France favorites, and of the way in changes how male cyclists view the Olympics. Mark Cavendish, for example, is focusing more on the Games in his home country than on the Tour. Meanwhile, news continues to trickle out about the accusations against Lance Armstrong. 

Comments

[Michael H.]

Re transportation enhancement funding and its critics, sure, I'd be more than OK with fewer visitor centers and flower pots being built. At least the bad bill is limited in duration. If the growth of bikeshare across the country, in cities large and small, helps to increase enthusiasm for freedom and choice in transportation design, then perhaps the next temporary or long-term transportation bill will be less focused on sustaining one single mode of transportation (i.e., automobiles).

I find it interesting for some critics of bike infrastructure funding to talk about freedom when single-focus transportation funding eliminates freedom for many people. When a transportation system is completely geared toward gasoline-powered automobiles, the government is enforcing a requirement to use automobiles. With unsafe roads, there simply isn't the option to use any other form of transportation, which is the case in many areas.

Fortunately D.C. and Arlington have a decent, if imperfect, bike network in place already.

As for cars, I can't help but think of one thing every time I see one. Well, I do think about how many people cars and car drivers kill every year and the pollution that is emitted by those vehicles. But I primarily think of cars as the means to provide massive multibillion dollar price supports and subsidies to the governments of Iran, Venezuela and Saudi Arabia. That's just plain insane. Why is it All-American to be lining the pockets of Ahmadinejad or Hugo Chavez?

Doesn't sound very American or patriotic to me. I'd prefer not to be laying out tons of cash to prop up the price of the key product that keeps those governments in power. Gasoline use is a foreign policy issue with me. Too bad more people don't see it that way. Even if we opened the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil drilling, our massive petroleum consumption still props up the world price for petroleum and petroleum products.

[oboe]

The Constitution works like this:

Things I like and that benefit people like me are the critical responsibility of the federal government, and must in no way be curtailed, lest our very way of life be destroyed.

Things I do not like, and which I perceive may benefit someone unlike me are pernicious infringements on the Freedoms bestowed upon us by our Creator and the Founders.

[oboe]

re: Cavendish concentrating on the Olympics instead of TDF..

Ok, on the one hand, it's understandable that a sprinter like Cav might decide to write off the Tour in favor of the Olympics on his home turf, a cynic might say his decision was forced a bit by Sky leaving all of his lead-out support at home so they could maximize Wiggins' chances.

A TDF squad with a credible GC threat will rarely give a sprinter any support at all. So Cav understands any stage wins he notches this year will be poached...

[charlie]

hmm..washcycle tour de france fantasy team?

[Greenbelt]

Does the ICC trail go from anywhere to anywhere? Or is it just a collection of unconnected dogwalks?