[sustran] Re: Local cycling environment indicators: More on . . .

[Chris Bradshaw]

Todd's rejoinder to my earlier comments about whether modes compete or are 
compementary to each other could benefit from the "green transportation 
hierarchy.'

It suggests that favouritism/priority be accorded in accordance to the 
relative 'footprint' of each.  That puts them in the order:
- Walking (and for walking handicapped, rolling)
- Cycling (and in-line skates, skateboards)
- Transit
- Vehicle sharing (taxi, car-rental, ridesharing, carsharing, and informal 
sharing of cars where parties share expenses)
- Private car

As far as using the Internet to avoid going out at all, I am of the mind 
that walking is still superior to that, since vital streets play an 
important role, and so do co-workers seeing each other, even if not every 
day.  And, after all, some stay-at-home activities generate vehicle trips by 
others, e.g., delivery vehicles, which add little conviviality to streets.

This hierarchy means that one does not accommodate a mode at the expense of 
a mode _above_ it on the hierarchy.  For instance, I have always found that 
bike racks (and bikes with their 'protusions') on buses makes the front of 
the bus very ped-unfriendly in the case of a collision between the two. 
Could buses not be designed for bikes to be carried outside in another way? 
For this reason, I find carrying a well designed folding bike on-board, or 
using shared city bikes to avoid having to take a bike along on the transit 
portion of the trip, to be superior choices.

I have found that most of the 'choices' governments offer never seriously 
create any competition for car-use or car-ownership.  Rather, the measure is 
usually transit-dominant, with almost no effort to mix/match the other three 
modes above the private car, so that multi-mode trips are possible and 
comfortable.

Chris Bradshaw
Ottawa