Jason Varone

The competition is heating up between Eurpoean cities seeking to build the best bicycling infrastructure. As we noted this morning, Amsterdam is mimicking Copenhagen's "green wave" for cyclists. And now Rome is bringing a Paris-style bike sharing project to the Italian capital by 2008.

The green wave of Odense, Denmark.

In a letter to Marc Shaw, Chairman of the New York City Traffic Mitigation Commission, the New York Building Congress urged the Commission to support a congestion pricing plan that dedicates all revenues to capital improvements for the city's transit system. The NYBC also indicated their support for the MTA's propsed fare hike "as merely one element of a long-term multi-layered response to the considerable financial challenges faced by the MTA." Download the letter and here's an excerpt:

Climate change, Iranian nukes, the declining dollar, a $100 barrel of oil... Sure, all of that stuff is important but not as important as parking or New York City's lack thereof.

The Philly CarShare program (Motto: "Why own when you can borrow?") is one of the most successful of its kind in the country. Currently in its fifth year, the Philadelphia-based non-profit recently surpassed 30,000 members and is generating $10 million annually to pay for a small staff, the purchase and maintenance of a fleet, and a reduction in rates when possible.

 

This new buffered bike lane begins at Petrosino Square at Lafayette Street and Spring Street and heads southbound all the way down to Duane Street on the way to the Brooklyn Bridge. Along the way you'll find quite a few bike boxes and sharrows, new bike safety tools in the Department of Transportation street design tool box. (As Project for Public Spaces has pointed out, Petrosino Square could easily be enlarged and transformed into one of Lower Manhattan's finest little public squares).

Only 20 years ago, Beijing was one of the most bike-friendly cities in the world. Today, rapidly increasing automobile congestion is helping to turn the Chinese capital into one of the most polluted cities on Earth. Air quality is so bad, the Chinese government is initiating special driving restrictions ahead of next year's Olympic Games in order to make the air breathable for the world's elite athletes. Meanwhile, one entrepreneur is trying to bring back bicycles, capitalist-style with a bike sharing program similar to the one recently set up in Paris.