The mayor recently announced that he was re-committed to being a champion of the environment, which, coming from a man who's "Tiger Team" at the LADOT has wasted millions to speed up cars and induce more auto trips, seems quite dubious indeed.
Villaraigosa would do himself, and all Angelenos, a favor by studying what Mayor Bloomberg in New York, Mayor Newsom in San Francisco, Mayor Daley in Chicago, and London's former mayor Ken Livingston have done: they ditched their city's auto-only focus and spent a tiny sliver in transportation dollars to vastly improve the quality of life by becoming bicycle friendly.
The good news is that it would take a minimal amount of effort on Villaraigosa's behalf to get the ball rolling on these bike friendly initiatives:
- Funding the 1997/2002 planned Citywide Bikeway Network (total est. cost $60 million);
- Re-starting the Bike Master Plan process with full environmental review (to allow pro-bike street measures and to allow bike facilities to degrade car throughput);
- Pushing through several council requested "Sharrow" pilot programs;
- Introducing bicycle friendly training to the LAPD;
- Providing a map of all traffic injuries and deaths in Los Angeles;
The impact, however, would be great and immediate: less air pollution; fewer deaths from diabetes, heart disease, lung disease, and respiratory illnesses; fewer kids killed by cars; more retail foot traffic in LA's historic business districts with less car congestion; and generally a more livable city (which would be scientifically provable).
So, Mr. Mayor, what's it gonna take for you to become something more than a green smoke blower?
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2 comments:
Why focus only on bicycles when clearly transit improvements would contribute significantly as well? The alternative transportation communities in LA need to work together as a whole to effect change so we're not all pulling at the same pot. We shouldn't talk about making green changes with bikes without transit and vice versa. It baffles the mind that in LA even the bus and train people can't even manage to work together. That all said, your points are extremely valid. I laughed when I saw the Los Angeles Magazine cover last month with Mayor V dubbed as "Failure". I thought wow, that whole article could be about transportation alone but he seems to be an overachiever in the failure area.
"Focusing on bicycles" allows for all sorts of environmental, transportation, and health issues to be tackled for next to nothing in both staff time and dollars.
The red line will cost BILLIONS. To make LA bike friendly will cost, maybe (at most) $200 million for an over-the-top citywide road diet and protected bike lane network.
We can roll out a bike network in less than a year (after environmental review of plans).
Fast, cheap, effective. Can't say the same for transit, though I do see where you are coming from.
I think that other environmental advocacy groups need to wake the hell up as regards transportation.
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