Reply to Connecticut Ave bike lanes are back!

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Reply to "Connecticut Ave bike lanes are back!"

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]What if the goal was a safe and thriving neighborhood?  If you want a dedicated tunnel to downtown then take Metro.[/quote]

If the goal is a safe and thriving neighborhood then the impact of any plan on accidents and traffic volume within the neighborhood is vitally important.

If your goal is to ban cars that's simply not happening.[/quote]

A safe and vibrant neighborhood has bike lanes.[/quote]

Pretty sure there are many, many safe and vibrant neighborhoods that don’t have bike lanes.[/quote]

But how many neighborhoods have bike lanes that aren't safe and vibrant?[/quote]

Lots. You especially see this in other cities that haven’t been overrun with gentrification.[/quote]

If there's one thing we can take off the table absolutely when it comes to this particular bike lane debate, it's gentrification. You can't gentrify out the landed gentry.[/quote]

Bike lanes are not about gentrification but they are about density, vibrancy and smart growth.  Connecticut Ave has had the reputation of being rather boring and, well, old.  Bike lanes add a certain hipness factor to attract younger buyers and renters.  This is the group that developers who want to build dense housing need to attract.[/quote]

Uh rent is expensive. Owning and storing a car is expensive. Younger people who have lower disposable income depend on biking to get around. [b]So if the city wants to continue to attract these post-college younger residents, bike lanes is a great way to do it.[/b][/quote]

DC attracts plenty of single post-college younger residents (and in any case it’s doubtful that many want to live in Chevy Chase DC or Cleveland Park vs U St or Petworth).  DC needs to do more to retain families who otherwise move to the suburbs  better quality public schools and overall public services.  Conn. ave. Bike lanes aren’t at the top of their priority list.[/quote]

For a lot of younger families who are car free or car-light, yes they are. You clearly have no idea of the demographic shift away from the Boomer-led car era.[/quote]

Petworth is full of parents, and hardly anyone uses the bike lanes, fyi. Bikes are extremely impractical when you have children. [/quote]

This is a reality for a lot of younger families.

[twitter]https://x.com/bellachu10/status/1784621213882687912[/twitter]

If we had the proper infrastructure, more people would do this.[/quote]

We have more than 150 miles of bike lanes. [b]We've spent billions of dollars on biking infrastructure[/b]. Still, the number of people on bikes is microscopic. People don't ride bikes because they don't want to ride bikes, and it has nothing to do with whatever you think the infrastructure is still missing. [/quote]

The bolded is a flat out lie, and a lot of the 150 miles of bike lanes you are citing is simply paint on the ground. That isn't infrastructure. Ergo, the false conclusion you are drawing is a result of the false premise and lies you start with.

Try again: if biking were safe, more people would be doing it. Despite the infrastructure, there are a lot of young families who are using cargo bikes and electric bikes as a replacement for a car or second car, and it works very well for them. Just imagine how many more would do this if they felt it was safe enough![/quote]

Look at the city's budget. DC spends $200 million on bike things every single year.

Also, if biking isn't safe, then *no one* should be allowed to put children on bikes. [/quote]

Bowser's budget included a whole lot more than $200M this year. To quote from the 2024 budget:

"$257.2 million to improve safety and mobility, including $90.9 million to install traffic safety infrastructure
around schools+ $56.4 million for Vision Zero improvements, hardening, and asset preservation+ $39.1 million
for bicycle and pedestrian safety+ $32.0 million for roadway segments and intersections where users have safety
concerns+ $18.5 million for signs+ and $15.3 million for expansion of Capital Bikeshare and electrification of
the bikeshare fleet

• $236.5 million for new or rehabilitated trail segments, including $52.0 million for the Long Bridge pedestrian
and bicycle connection+ $45.9 million for the Shepherd Branch Trail+ $36.5 million for the Anacostia River
Trail+ $36.5 million for the Metropolitan Branch Trail+ and $25.4 million for the Suitland Parkway Trail"

not every penny just for cyclists but gives you a sense of scale of funding that's been provided[/quote]

This is mostly federal funding and there is money for infrastructure repairs and improvements every year. This isn't BILLIONS for cyclists, but rather general improvements that in some cases, have some infrastructure for cycling. But go ahead with your "it is all going to that wasteful mode of cycling and nothing else" tripe that you keep trying to spread.[/quote]

Pretty remarkable there's a half billion dollars in one year's budget. They're cutting teachers at my kid's school. They say they don't have enough money to pay them. There's way more kids at our school than they are cyclists in the entire DMV. [/quote]

Capital budget for roads is different than operational budget for teachers and other salaries. This has already been explained up thread when you, or someone like you made the same complaint.[/quote]

So what? Have you figured out how to spend the same dollar twice? Every dollar in a budget that goes for one thing is a dollar that can't go for another thing.

The fact remains: we spend billions of dollars subsidizing the hobby of a tiny number of white guys while cutting funding for schools that mostly serve black children. [/quote]

The only way a person could think that going somewhere on a bike is "the hobby of a tiny number of white guys" is if they literally only see people on bikes if the people are white men in biking clothes on roads in affluent areas, and every other person on a bike, anywhere else, is literally invisible to them.[/quote]

Clearly there is a myopia in Upper NW DC that causes this affliction.[/quote]

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