Research summary archive

Boston has set a goal to have every resident within 3 minutes of a protected bike route. Progress since 2021 has shown and increase in ridership with more and more people interviewed saying they’re opting for their bike instead of car. Ridership increases are attributed to increased sense of safety while riding.

Cedar Rapids, IA implemented a road diet on four different roads that reduced the number of lanes of traffic. Using pre/post data, researchers found that there was no difference in emergency response times. Over half the EMS respondents in the follow up survey said the changes had either no impact or a positive impact on response times.

Protected bike lanes provide significant traffic calming in the form of max car speed reductions.

Meta review of years of bike lane and business research. Concludes that bike lanes are often good for business but occasionally have no impact. The doom and gloom to business that some may predict, however, isn’t justified.

NYC DOT added 3.18 miles of protected bike lanes in East NY, Brooklyn. The subsequent traffic calming and shortened crossing distance reduced death and serious injuries for all road users (that’s drivers included) by 18.1%. For senior pedestrians the decline was 39%!

Indiana’s Monon Trail is a “rail to trail” conversion that was very good for nearby property values. Homes within 1/2 mile of the trail sell for on average 11% more than those farther away.

Makes the safety, economic, and equity case for why so many cities are investing in bike infrastructure. Covers changes across 13 cities across the US. Discusses the impacts of protected bike networks specifically.

Studied business corridors that received street redesigns in 6 different cities. Business results were often positive, but in a few cases had no impact. Overall, food service and retail sales improve as does employment in those sectors. These results hold in cases where parking was removed for bike lanes.

From 2015 to 2019 FDNY response times were up 8.6%. In the annual NYC management report the fire department attributes the slower emergency response times to increased congestion, more cars on the road.

Covers the studies demonstrating retail sales, jobs, and property value gains from bike lanes. Pulls from over two dozen different sources for stats and quotes.

Covers University of Colorado research on safety benefits of protected bike lanes across 12 US metros.

As Copenhagen’s protected bike network grows, cyclists feel safer, and ridership grows. Government estimates are that each new protected route yields 15-20% more riders. From 2006 to 2016 there’s been a 22% increase in kilometres covered by bike (1.4 million km in 2016). Around 62% of commutes for those that live and work in Copenhagen are by bike.

Danish government estimates that 1 km of biking in Copenhagen creates 4.80 kroner (~ $1 per mile) in economic value. If that trip by bike replaced a car trip the economic value goes up to 10.09 kroner per km (~ $2.10 per mile). In 2017, 43% of work commutes in the city were taken by bike, so this value estimate is across a lot of kilometers of biking.

Crash data from Chicago 2011 - 2014 shows that streets with sharrows have increased cyclist injury rates. Cities would be better off not painting sharrows and leaving the street without any markings at all.

Seville, Spain built a full protected bike lane network and saw ridership increase > 400% and the risk of bike and car crashes decline > 60%. The share of total trips taken in the area went from near 0% by bike to almost 9%, a mode shift size that’s hard to overstate.

Converting two-way four lane roads to two travel lanes with center left turn lane not only reduces crashes 19-47%, but can also improve emergency response times. Case studies from Ocean City, NJ and Woodbury, NJ demonstrate this; the former’s road diet also included a buffered bike lane in the design.

Protected bike lanes are good for property values

Salt Lake City removed 30% of parking on Broadway and that stretch saw retail sales outperform the rest of the city by ~25%. The road diet converted angled parking to parallel parking to create the space for 9 blocks of protected bike lanes.

A review of 12 studies related to bike lanes and business. Key takeways are that shoppers by bike spend at least as much as drivers since they return more often, business owners consistently underestimate the share of customers who arrive by bike, and business owners often overestimate how far away their customers live. As a result, protected bike lanes are likely good for business.

Narrowing travel lanes and building protected bike lanes both reduced cyclist risk by roughly half and rush hour car travel times declined by 35%. Removing parking for the “pocket lane” for car left turns is an innovation in the parking protected bike lane design that helped with travel times.

3 years of data from protected bike lane implementations around NYC show reduction of injuries for all road users. Everyone, drivers and their passengers included, are injured in crashes less often when streets have protected bike lanes.

NYC DOT studied different protected bike lane segments around Manhattan. They found that protected bike lanes often dramatically increase ridership. Over a 6 month stretch …

When bike lanes are present riding on the sidewalk declines dramatically, on average ~56%, even when ridership goes up. In one case sidewalk riding went down 81% despite bike volume going up 190%.

Using video to count cyclists researchers found protected bike routes increased ridership from 21% - 171%. Survey data data indicates that 10% of those riders came from other modes of transportation. Overall 91% of survey respondents from all modes, e.g. cyclists, pedestrians, and drivers, agreed that separating bike traffic from cars was desirable. Both cyclists and pedestrians said they frequent businesses more often after the bike lanes were installed.

Covers research of Kyle Rowe at University of Washington. The conclusion is that bike lanes don’t hurt local business; may actually be good.

Covers research out of Portland demonstrating that pedestrians and cyclists, by virtue of being more loyal/frequent customers, spend more per month than drivers

Investigation of bicyclist injuries in Vancouver and Toronto show risk of injury is ~90% lower on streets with protected bike lanes compared to those no bike infrastructure.

Protected bike lanes decreased injuries for all road users.

NYC DOT studied the impact of different redesigns on local businesses. The conclusion: protected bike lanes are good for business, maybe even great.

New Zealand made bike helmets required in 1994. Cycling data from 1988-91 and 2003-07 shows that average hours biked per person in NZ declined 51% and overall injury rates per hour biked increased 20%. There was a 75% reduction in biking for children 5-17 years old.

Then deputy mayor writes a memorandum on the popularity and safety benefits of bike lanes. The data comes from lessons learned building 255 miles of bike lanes in the prior four years. Some facts …

Even among unprotected bike lanes design considerations matter. NYC found that bike lanes painted green are safer than unpainted bike lanes.

Bicyclist injury risk is 28% lower on cycle tracks compared to streets without bike infrastructure. Cycle tracks also are much more desirable routes seeing 2.5x the bike volume.

From 1989 to 2006 New Zealand’s bicycle mode share reduced from 4% to only 1%. This coincides with a large increase in transportation by motor vehicle. During that time the injury rates for cyclists increased 20% while declined by 40-50% for all other modes of transportation.