Thursday, May 16, 2013
This Friday is the annual Bike to Work Day. Will you be participating?
Among the hundreds of Montgomery County commuters who will take to their bikes this Friday for Bike to Work Day will be Montgomery County Council members Roger Berliner, Valerie Ervin, George Leventhal and Hans Riemer. More than 10,000 Washington-area commuters are expected to participate in the event, which the League of American Bicyclists began in 1956, and which first took place in the DC area in 2001, with a few hundred participants, a County Council news statement reported. Now, Bike to Work Day is an event for thousands of people in the DC area, as bike commuting becomes more common. On Friday, pit stops—with refreshments, t-shirts, raffles and more—for commuting bikers will be set up all across the region, including: By the time …
Thursday, April 25, 2013
Bikes should be available in Silver Spring, Bethesda, Chevy Chase, and Takoma Park in August or September, WTOP reported.
The company that already operates the bikeshare program in the District of Columbia and Arlington and Alexandria in Virginia will run Montgomery County's bikeshare program, WTOP reported. Alta Bicycle Share signed a contract with county officials Wednesday to create more than 29 docks for 200 rentable bikes in Bethesda, Chevy Chase, Silver Spring and Takoma Park, according to the radio station. The company should be able to deliver the bikes in the next four to five months, meaning the program would be up and running in August or September of this year. Meanwhile, county councilmembers are discussing how to improve safety for bike riders, including adding more bike lanes and possibly employing a shared lane system, like the ones in DC and…
Thursday, December 13, 2012
Two cyclist groups sent Montgomery County a list of road improvements for Silver Spring, Takoma Park, Bethesda and Friendship Heights.
Extending trails, adding bike lanes and "sharrows"—these are the things area biking advocates said need to be fixed in Silver Spring and Takoma Park before Montgomery County can successfully implement its Capital Bikeshare program. The Washington Area Bicyclist Association and Montgomery Bicycle Advocates recently created a list of bike infrastructure improvements for Silver Spring, Takoma Park, Bethesda and Friendship Heights that they said "make people feel comfortable and safe on a bike." Among the suggestions are to finish two incomplete trails in Silver Spring: Metropolitan Branch Trail and Silver Spring Green Trail. For the latter, the groups propose that the trail be extended west along Second Avenue to Spring Street and that the …
Tuesday, December 11, 2012
Sierra Club lauded the light rail project in its list of country's best and worst transportation projects.
The Sierra Club has named the Purple Line amongst the best transportation projects in the country in its list of 50 best and worst projects nationwide. The 16-mile light rail line will connect Bethesda to New Carrollton. It's scheduled to open in 2020, but the project is not yet fully funded. According to the Sierra Club, good transportation projects should "provide an opportunity to further reduce our dependence on oil, reverse climate disruption, and save money." "Because transportation infrastructure lasts for decades, the impacts of transportation investments are felt for many years to come, with huge consequences for America’s ability to move beyond oil," read the report. The light rail line has been hotly contested by some advocates…
Tuesday, November 13, 2012
The Montgomery County Council passed two measures to make it easier for developers to build Capital Bikeshare docking stations, Bethesda Now reported.
This spring, Montgomery County is slated to get 29 Capital Bikeshare docking stations, with 200 bikes in Friendship Heights, Bethesda, Medical Center, Takoma Park and Silver Spring, Chevy Chase Patch reported. Eleven of those stations will be in Bethesda and four will be in Friendship Heights, Bethesda Patch added. To get the ball rolling on building the docking stations, the Montgomery County Council approved two measures on Tuesday, Nov. 13, Bethesda Now reported: The Chevy Chase Land Company is one of the county transportation department's private sector partners, and has offered to pay for two stations—one in Friendship Heights and the other in Bethesda. The land company's pledge enabled the county transportation department to come up …
Ian Cooper
11:42 am on Thursday, May 16, 2013
Having said that, if anyone out there is using Bike to Work Day as a launch point for a week of cycle commuting, or a month, or making a commitment to a lifestyle change, that's great and I'm with you 100%. But if you're planning to be back in your car on Monday, just don't bother turning out tomorrow, okay. Bike to Work Day ought to be more than an excuse for motorists to feel better about … more ›