While Ellen Fletcher, once the top bike activist in the world (who I did a podcast with HERE before she passed on) was becoming the most popular politician in Palo Alto because people there had grown weary of John Forester’s machismo approach to cycling, the old leadership at the League of American Cyclists was busy establishing him as its standard bearer. He had convinced them that they needed to certify serious cyclists using the book on Vehicular Cycling he had written called “Effective Cycling”. As such, the League and Forester had made it clear that our coast to coast bikeway that made use of bike lanes and off road greenways was not to be considered as worthy for its dues paying members.
Besides LAB’s lack of interest, there was another force working against the cyclist who wanted to go for a leisurely bike ride. Lance Armstrong. Armstrong made the American public think that the non smiling cyclists dressed in lycra taking the lane were on some kind of important mission, a “training ride”. And that any other kind of cycle trip was frivolous, not to be regarded as important. Glorified like a king, and seen as the face of cycling, Lance had achieved his fame and fortune from the same road their cars were using, why then should anything have to change to make it easier for all these cyclists doing their non essential jaunts? Well now that Lance has gone away and the folly of the Forester method is now being seen for what it was, the National Bicycle Greenway is now poised to become a force too impossible to ignore.
Having lived in both Palo Alto for a decade and Davis where the bike lane was first introduced to America, I have observed the part infrastructure, local politics and one man’s strong personality have played in shaping how and where we ride our bicycles. In making the National Bicycle Greenway real, as its director, I have moved to Indianapolis where Carl Fisher ran the Linclon Highway movement that connected the coasts with its first car highway. And where Ray Irvin turned a dying rust belt city into the Greenway Capital of America!! Sure seems like a formula for no doubt about it NBG success!!
HERE is what the Streets Blog people are saying about why it has taken so long for both bike lanes and dedicated bike lanes to become accepted.
Btw: In case you missed it, HERE is more on why the NBG moved to Indianapolis
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