The bicycling enthusiast was concerned about what Hoboken was doing for bicycle safety and awareness.
A simple search led me to this FAQ section on the City of Hoboken's website.....
http://www.hobokennj.org/departments/transportation-parking/bicycling/
Here is the section as it is today August 24 on bicycle safety:
"I’ve almost been hit by a bicyclist on the sidewalk. I’ve seen bikes riding the wrong way on one-way streets. What are you doing about that?"
Over the past year, The City of Hoboken has been focusing on the basic infrastructure to foster increased bicycle ridership in Hoboken as a way to mitigate parking and traffic demand in the city. The results have been significant increase in ridership around town, as well as in the specific “commute to PATH” sector. These improvements come at the expense of increased interactions and conflicts between bicyclists and drivers and pedestrians. To address this, the city has been moving on several fronts:
1. Through a grant from NJDOT, we have been working with a consultant on developing a Pedestrian and Bicycle Safety Master Plan that is purposed to provide the City with guidance on how to best accommodate these critical modes in tandem with the other traffic on our streets. In July, 2010, we conducted our public input session and received a great deal of useful input from the community that will be included in the consultant’s recommendations. This plan is particularly important in terms of its ability to guide the city in a strong outreach and education effort about bicycling and roadway safety. This plan is completely funded by NJDOT and comes at no expense to the taxpayers.
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| Bike Lane - photo Courtesy of City of Hoboken |
3. As part of the re-examination of both the basic zoning code and the specific requirements in upcoming redevelopment plans, we are including appropriate accommodations to improve the differentiation of streetspace between cars, bicyclists, and pedestrians.
4. The Department of Transportation and Parking has presented to the City Council Transportation and Parking Committee a plan for expanded bicycle facilities in tandem with a thoroughly reworked set of bicycle rules that address many of the most common concerns raised by the community about increased bicycling in Hoboken (i.e. riding on the sidewalks and bicycling the wrong way on one-way streets). These rules are the basis of increased enforcement and education of the rights and responsibilities of bicyclists in Hoboken.
5. We have been adding bicycling content and information the City website as we are able, and we are hosting several “savvy cyclist”, bicycle safety, and training workshops geared towards urban riding.
6. We have taken the opportunities of regular events (bike to work week, national park[ing] day, etc.) to begin our outreach and awareness efforts; however, these are obviously still not enough. We clearly need to do more about education and awareness, but we have been making great strides in a very short amount of time.
My comment: Good job City of Hoboken! At least you have a plan to help make bicycling safer. Now that you have a plan it is the implementation that matters. The devil is in the details. ◦
