9 News, Crappy "reporting" during Co Bike Month.

As opposed to much of the country, Colorado celebrates bike month during June instead of May. We even get our own bike to work day (June 25th), separate from the National Bike to work day. So as most other states have moved back to ignoring cyclists, news reporting in Denver is still writing articles somewhat tied to the subject of biking.

Enter 9 News. Today they ran a story under the headline "Cyclists at fault for several auto vs. bike crashes".

OMG, several crashes have been deemed to be the fault of cyclists? So is that several of the 113 COLLISIONS between autos and cyclists this year? Does it include the 330 collisions from 2013? How many is several? Is several less than the "dozens" of tickets handed out during a 4/20 rally?

"Dozens" of citations = 63

Well, from the 9 news article we will never know. It's almost like they are unwilling to give actual numbers, or do real reporting, because that might take away from the story, that cyclists should learn how to share the road. They even give a handy list of do's and don'ts for road users, such as (my annotations in bold):

Establish eye contact with drivers before crossing in front of them. Don't assume that all drivers will yield. [Even if it is state law]

Allow at least three feet between your car and cyclists or pedestrians when passing. [Because you can get arrested for passing within 3 feet]

Be aware of factors that might impact your driving ability, for example, medications, alcohol, fatigue, weather conditions, and poor lighting and visibility. [Never drink and drive]

This kind of hack "reporting" just gives fodder to those idiots who believe cyclists should "have insurance", or "pay registration" based on the fact that a vast minority of collisions between bikes and automobiles might be the fault of the cyclist. Never is it brought up how cyclists damage the road at a factor of a square of the rate of automobiles, that more than 35,000 road users die every year because of motor vehicles, or the effects on health and the environment caused by personal automobile use. No, instead lets just blame cyclists and then do nothing.

So to recap, 9 News wants to tie in that June is a month where Colorado focuses on cycling. So they bring that in by saying "several" collisions are the fault of cyclists, ignore who's at fault for the vast majority of the collisions, then give some cookie cutter ideas on how everyone should act around each other in such a bland way that they don't even mention the laws in Colorado, or how they affect the rules of the road.

But yay...bike month...right?

Washington Post Writer Horrendously wrong, misleading readers!

Washington Post staff writer/blogger Lenny Bernstein has made a fool of himself with an article formerly titled "Cities with bike share programs see rise in cyclist head injuries".

Streetsblog USA captured the headline before it was altered

The basic premise of the article is that for rider safety, bike share programs should provide helmets with the bikes. Lenny "backs up" this assertion by citing Public Bicycle Share Programs and Head Injuries by Janessa M. Graves, Barry Pless, Lynne Moore, Avery B. Nathens, Garth Hunte, and Frederick P. Rivara

As many have been quick to point out, Lenny doesn't seem to understand how statistics work. Lenny says:

In the first study of its kind, researchers from Washington State University and elsewhere found a 14 percent greater risk of head injuries to cyclists associated with cities that have bike share programs. In fact, when they compared raw head injury data for cyclists in five cities before and after they added bike share programs, the researchers found a 7.8 percent increase in the number of head injuries to cyclists.

When they looked at the same data for five cities that don’t have bike share programs, the number of head injuries had declined a bit, by 2.3 percent.

Sounds scary. The point seems clear, if you are in a city with bike share, the number of injuries, and especially head injuries, is on the rise! Problem being, that some people can actually read and understand academic papers, and Lenny was quickly shot down by Kay Teschke, a University of British Columbia public health professor:

In fact, the study showed that all injuries, including head injuries, decreased in the 5 BIKE SHARE cities after implementation. All injuries went down from 757 to 545 per year (down 28%). Head injuries went down from 319 to 273 per year (down 14%). Moderate to severe head injuries also declined from 162 to 119 per year (though some were unclassified as to severity). 

 In comparison, in the 5 NON-bike share cities in the matched time periods, all injuries increased slightly from 932 to 953 per year (up [2%]). Head injuries in the NON-bike share cities decreased slightly from 356 to 342 per year (down 4%). Moderate to severe head injuries increased from 181 to 192 per year (though once again some were unclassified as to severity).  

 ...

I did correct for the 2-year time period pre implementation. If you check table 2 of the scientific paper, you will see I used the actual numbers reported for the post-implementation 12 month period, but for the pre implementation period, I divided all the numbers by 2 to account for the 24 month period. 

Oh, it seems really clear that Lenny may be intentionally leaving out the numbers to make the percentages more frightening. Cities with bike share saw a huge DECREASE in injuries overall. It seems that head injuries decreased at a slower rate, meaning that as a percentage of total injuries, head injuries increased.

So to me it is pretty cut and dry, Lenny didn't understand a statistical analysis, and so focused on a increased percentage to "make his point". Well, after being so obviously wrong, the article must have been taken down. Nope! Lenny changed his title to "Proportion of head injuries rises in cities with bike share programs"

Oh Lenny

Rather than admit that he was wrong, Lenny is desperately holding onto his original premise and hoping you don't actually read his references. This is such appalling BS that is clearly meant to catch headlines through scare tactics.

So let us be clear. Bike share lessened the number of injuries within the 5 cities studied. The cause of this decrease is debatable, but the decrease in ALL INJURIES in very apparent. Lenny still argues that the article is valid because the percentages are increasing, but then falsely asserts that it means you are more likely to get a head injury in bike share cities than in non-bike share cities.

For more terrible reporting, follow Lenny on the twitter box @LennyMBernstein

Bollards help 15th St. Bike Lane!

As discussed preciously, the bike lane on 15th St. in Denver has had a rough opening. Mostly due to drivers deciding that it the bike lane is a perfect place to park. I had the luxury of getting caught this winter behind a FedEx truck with no driver, and an SUV who's driver yelled at me when I told him he was illegally parked.

 Well, finally "Stage 2" has been completed, and there are now vertical bollards between the bike lane and the car lanes.

photo from @DowntownDenver on the twitter machine

To be honest, it is a start, but to make 15th st bike way more safe and comfortable, there needs to be better separation. One way to work this would be to have a dedicated left turn lane for motorists, with a left turn signal, and a separate bike lane with a bike signal, thereby taking away the conflict between turning vehicles and strait through cyclists. An example of a great intersection design can be found on protectedintersection.com. As it stands now motorists have to merge into the cycle lane before they turn, and many still don't look for cyclists.

Since they installed the bollards there have been some interesting changes. One being that pedestrians are now waiting in the bike lane to cross the street. A great improvement though is that a few delivery drivers are parking outside of the cycle lane!

Pepsi truck blocking car traffic instead of the bike lane

I find this to be a huge improvement! Ideally the delivery drivers would use those "alley" things, or "loading zones" as places to park while making deliveries, but in my experience most are much too lazy to do so. Instead they have made it a habit around the city of parking in bike lanes (hey, they are mostly free of parked cars!).  If this trend holds, then cyclists might get a reprise from constantly moving back out into traffic to avoid taxis and delivery trucks. Furthermore if the police would ticket those same delivery trucks and taxis, it might be a lasting trend...We can always hope anyway.

Buying a car entitles you to free parking?

Recently in Denver there have been some seeming small proposed reforms centered around parking. In the Cherry Creek area, a task force suggested that they should downsize the ratio of parking spaces to commercial real estate from 3.3 spaces/1,000 sqft to 2.5/1,000. They have also suggested that residences could survive with only 1 parking space per unit. Currently they have 2.

So what does the entitled Glendale Cherry Creek Chronicle have to say about it? Well it has a classic ring to it. First assume that cars are the only way to get to an area:

 Where in the world are all these people going to park? The business district has a grand total of 555 on-street metered parking spaces. 

Add in some NIMBY sounding phrases:

The single family home areas of Cherry Creek North will soon be flooded with overflow parking from the commercial area regardless of whatever signs are posted or how many parking tickets are handed out.

try the slippery slope argument:

If these parking ratios fit “very well” perhaps eliminating any and all parking spaces would work even better.

and finally go nuclear:

One wonders when the Task Force’s recommendations are adopted what will there be left to destroy in Cherry Creek North?

 It really is such a sad attempt at "journalism". As cited in this article, 1/3 of all the traffic in Cherry Creek is a result of people searching for parking. It would seem then that better turnover could be a way to alleviate the issue, if cars are all you care about. If parking meter rates rose, and time allotted to each space was diminished, then people would have to park less and be more efficient while out of their cars. That would seem to lead to spaces opening faster and less cars idling and driving in circles.

Another option would be to severely limit the amount of parking and driving within the shopping district and force people to walk/ride/bus/skate/hop/dance/etc in from outlying areas. Then the road areas could be opened to more foot traffic, food trucks, outdoor patios. The essence of the Cherry Creek shopping district could be expanded to be a pedestrian paradise instead of what it is, a  maze of cars that makes crossing the street into a game of frogger.

I doubt though that this journalist is willing to consider solutions that are not based around cars. He starts from an assumption that increasing auto flow is the only choice. If the problem is approached from a different view, that increased movement of PEOPLE is the most important choice, then these task force recommendations could be part of a better and safer experience within Cherry Creek.

In other news apparently parking in one of the densest areas of Denver sucks. The solution? Remove all restrictions on where cars can park.

From City Park Friends and Neighbors:

The following letter was received from Scott Gilmore regarding parking in City Park. Please review and comment and respond.
If you chose to respond please copy City Park Friends and Neighbors CPFAN2014@gmail.com,
The parking plan is attached.

Dear Neighbors of City Park –
We would like your input/feedback on a potential operations change we are considering for City Park.
For the past several years, a majority of the park entrances and roads have been closed on Sundays. This dates back to a request that was made by the Denver Police Department years ago when gang issues and violence plagued the area.
Over the years, the social issues in the neighborhood have improved, but the road/gate closures have remained in place. We’ve received some feedback from area residents that this operation procedure has led to increased parking issues in the surrounding neighborhoods on Sundays throughout the year.
We have discussed this with the Denver Police Department and they have given Parks and Recreation their support of re-opening those gates and roads that are temporarily closed on Sundays. In cooperation with DPD, we will monitor the operations change and if there are issues that arise that are a concern to either DPD or Parks we leave open the option to return to how the park has been managed during previous years. By making this change, we estimate it will add 365 parking spaces within City Park on those particular Sundays. I have attached a map of the west side of the park to help understand where the additional parking on Sundays would happen.
This proposed plan to open the gates and roads in the park on Sunday does not include any of the permanently closed roads. We are only proposing to open the roads that are closed on Sundays, but are normally open every other day of the week.
We will still limit access to the area around the Pavilion on Jazz in the Park days, but this opening of the roads (primarily on the west side of the park) on Sunday’s will significantly increase the parking capacity in the park on those days.
Before we move forward with this change, we would like to hear your feedback. Do you support this change or do you have concerns? Please have your constituents email me directly over the next 10-14 days. I will follow-up with you again after that time to let you know what we heard from the collective neighborhoods. In addition, if you would like me to attend one of your upcoming meetings in the next month or so to discuss this change, please email me directly and I will be happy to make time or find another DPR staff member to attend in my place.
Thanks for all your support of City Park,
Scott Gilmore
Scott Gilmore | Deputy Director of Parks and Planning
Parks and Recreation
City and County of Denver
720.913.0665 Phone | 720.837.0489 Cell
scott.gilmore@denvergov.org

Sent along with the following map:

 So the one day where non-motorized travel rules the park is too much. Or maybe it's that the people in the surrounding neighborhoods are just too burdened by one day of extra cars. As a disclaimer I currently live about 1/2 mile from the park, and parking is not that bad.

The map is particularly annoying, as if you zoom out slightly, you could see the current parking spaces on almost every road n Denver. Additionally there are large parking lots near City Park. But to be fair, there are simply not enough people enjoying the car free time in city park to justify the continued limited access for motorized vehicles, or was it that too many people are there...

Photo courtesy of City Park Friends and Neighbors

As a crazy idea, perhaps the Chronicle could look to the City Park gatherings and decide that people are willing to walk a few blocks to get where they are going. Even when you can't park 3 ft from your destination people will still attend, and will in large numbers.