[sustran] Mixed (motorized and non-motorized) transportation and Landuse.

[Obwon]

I will tell you this, from my reading on these lists over the last few
years, I do get the distinct impression that most tranportation 'mixed'
usage studies are between various motorized modes rather than between
non-motorized and motorized.

  Being a biker in an urban city like NY. I have found that I can take
my bike on the subway unimpeded. However that is not so with the longer
train lines like the LIRR (long island Railroad) Where passes must be
obtained in advance to do so and some (I suspect) rather restrictive
rules are applied.

  Even though I have found using the subway bike combination to be a
highly effective urban transportation solution.  Over the year there
have been some chilling attempts at imposing restrictive regulation
thereupon.  Nor am I addressing rule typs that would only make sense to
anyone with what is essentially a large package in an overcrowded
situation.

 But regulations of which I complain, would remove from the riders the
flexiblity of applying commonsense or using good judgement. As if
bicycle commuters/users were an undesirable thing to be prevented even
at some costs.  Fortunately, the TA police, applying their own good
judgement, gave such rules the enforcement they deserved (namely none). 

  Unfortunately too, over the last few weeks, our Mayor's drive to calm
traffic, has included bikes going through lights and/or the wrong way on
one way streets. Ovwr 10,000 bike summonses were issued costing 100
dollars or more.  I'm certain that this has had a chilling effect on new
or intended bicycle ridership.

 We have in NY, a system of one way streets and avenues that is even
vexing to auto drivers, forcing one to at times drive as much as a mile
out of your way to simply get to the next block.  While this merely cost
motorists time, it cost cyclists both time and muscular effort.  So it's
not something anyone would reasonably do without consideration.

  If you are on say 25th street (a eastbound one way street) and 6th
avenue (a northbound one way avenue. and you wanted to go to 24th
street.  Your choice is to ride 300 feet south against traffic on 6th
Ave, or ride 1/6 mile east on 25th, 300 ft south on B'way, 1/6 of a mile
back west.  You've gone over a 1/3 of a mile to get to a place you were
only a moment away from.  Add in stopping for traffic lights (not even
right turn on red allowed) and you have a very frustrated biker, forced
to spend some 15 minutes or more on what should have been a 30 second
trip.

  I've wanted to take my bike outside the city by mass transit so I
could ride when I got where I was going.  The intercity bus lines
(Greyhound and trailways) I've found will allow me to put my bike on
board in their baggage compartment if I remove the front wheel. Less
expensive Transit Authorities busses however, like New Jersey Transit,
don't have baggage compartments on their inter-city lines. 

  Bikes are very efficient for travel in American urban centers where
traffic congestion/parking costs are high, and distances are likely to
be short 1 - 2 miles most trips and 5 - 10 mile between extreme
destinations. But seeing as there is little provision for traveling with
a bike between cities, this mixed mode is hardly encouraged.

  It would be even more efficient to have 'station bikes' or something
like the Seattle yellowbike program see http://www.yellowbike.com (I
think or do a search on yellowbike and do another on redbike - another
program in place although I forget exactly where).  But even those bikes
don't solve the problem of carrying goods of some bulk that may be
purchased in various localities and getting them back to the station.

  That's where haveing various tricycle type vehicles with large
transport baskets/carrying capacities and even two or more seats to
allow people to travel together should be deployed.  Especially in
shopping centers where it is often found necessary to move the car from
one end of the shopping center to the other.  Often this 'local motion'
takes place under very congested conditions.  While a variety of hpv's
that could make such trips unnecessary fail to be even considered no
less deployed.

  These short auto trips, from one end of the mall to the other, are a
source of stress, noise, pollution, death and injury.  But these
negatives are apparently so acceptable that effective alternaties that
could attenuate them recieve scarce if any consideration.

  Obwon