Next Wednesday: Get Your Innermost Bicycle Questions Answered At Center City DiBruno's

Curious about how bike sharing will work in Philadelphia? Want to know what the new Complete Streets bill will do to Center City sidewalks? Want to get bike parking in front of your business or residence?

You don't need to buy an airline and hire Leonardo DiCaprio to get your questions answered.

Center City Residents' Association is hosting us and Andrew Stober from the Mayor's Office of Transportation and Utilities for a Q&A on bicycling in Philly.

Wednesday, April 17th

7:00 pm - 9:00 pm

DiBruno's Center City, 1730 Chestnut St., 2nd fl.

Attendance is limited to 50 people. Click here to register to attend.

After the Q&A our Bicycle Ambassadors will provide an urban riding basics class geared towards newer bicyclists interested in getting more comfortable with city biking.

Philly Bike Share Forum Presented by Mayor's Office of Transportation & Utilities on April 30, 2013

Mayor Michael A. Nutter has announced that Philadelphia develop a Bike-Share System that will enable Philadelphians, commuters and visitors to check out iconic, sturdy bikes from a self-service docking stations and drop it off at another station. With this announcement, Philadelphia joins 42 other cities in North America which either have, or are planning to develop, bike-share systems.

Please join The Mayor’s Office of Transportation and Utilities (MOTU) on Tuesday April 30th at 6:30 (doors open at 6:00) in the evening to hear presentations from the architects of some of the nation’s best bike sharing systems, hosted by the Academy of Natural Sciences of Drexel University. Come hear representatives from Boston, Denver and Washington DC discuss their experiences developing, launching and operating bike sharing systems in their cities. The forum will conclude with a brief presentation on the City of Philadelphia’s plans to launch a first-class bike sharing system by the end of 2014.

Guest Speakers:

• Rina Cutler, Deputy Mayor for Transportation and Utilities, City of Philadelphia
• Nicole Freedman, Executive Director of Boston Bikes
• Parry Burnap, Executive Director of Denver Bike Sharing
• Chris Holben, Bike Sharing Project Manager, District of Columbia Department of Transportation
• Andrew Stober, Mayor’s Office of Transportation and Utilities, City of Philadelphia

The forum is made possible with the support of the William Penn Foundation, Pennsylvania Environmental Council and JMT Engineering. Tickets are limited and are available here.

Registration Open for Philly Pedestrian & Bicycle Summit

Interested in the future of walking and bicycling in Philadelphia? The Mayor's Office of Transportation and Utilities (MOTU) has opened registration for their day-long summit coming up April 30th.

Transportation is becoming a big deal in Philadelphia. We are not a city of cars - we are a city of people trying to get places. MOTU is holding a summit to discuss and demystify Philly's plans, strategies, and purposes for how it manages foot and bicycle traffic.

Topics will include:

• Where and when Philadelphia will get new bike lanes;
• The City's sidewalk cafe regulations;
• How and why the City optimizes traffic signals and manages construction to benefit pedestrian traffic;
• The future of The Circuit and other regional bike/ped trails. 

High-level people from MOTU and regional planning and development agencies will be in attendance, speaking about their work and taking questions from the public.

The summit is free to attend but you need to register in advance.

Click here to register

Click here for the summit agenda

If you have any questions, or to find out more information, contact Ariel Ben-Amos at the Mayor's Office of Transportation and Utilities (ariel.ben-amos@phila.gov or 215.686.9001) or Cassidy Boulan at DVRPC (cboulan@dvrpc.org or 215.238.2832).

Philadelphia Rolls Out New Road Safety Education Campaign

The City of Philadelphia is rolling out a new public safety campaign titled, "It's Road Safety Not Rocket Science." Included here are three of 19 different ads that will begin appearing on SEPTA buses, subways and bus shelters.

Keep off sidewalks!

The Mayor's Office of Transportation and Utilities  (MOTU) worked with Philly-based LevLane Advertising to develop the Ride-Right Walk-Right Drive-Right messages.  The goal of the campaign is to remind all users that pedestrians, bicyclists, transit riders, and drivers share the road and that we need to keep the streets and sidewalks safe for each other. 

Don't be a salmon!

The $125,000 campaign is funded by the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation and will run through the spring. Advertisements will appear on at least 65 buses, 50 bus shelters across the city, and dozens of Broad Street Line and Market Frankford Line subways.

Red means Stop

If you want to see more of the ads, visit MOTU's blog where they are posting them daily. The ads target different groups of street users, but these here are aimed at bicyclists. The Bicycle Coalition and AAA were consulted during the campaign's development.

Complete Streets Bill Coming Before Philly City Council Nov 15th

A bill with large ramifications for Philadelphia's streets will be discussed in City Council on November 15th. Bill #120532, aka the Complete Streets Bill for Philadelphia, will be introduced at a hearing of the Streets & Services Committee chaired by Councilman Mark Squilla.

We are very excited that this bill will finally have its chance to be voted out of committee and sent to full City Council. It is the result of a tremendous amount of work and discussion between Councilman Squilla, the Mayor's Office of Transportation and Utilities, the Streets Department, and ourselves. The result is a series of amendments to the original bill which make it a big win for Philadelphia's ability to walk and bike safely.

What: Streets & Services Committee hearing on amendments to the Complete Streets Bill
When: Thursday, November 15, 2012 at 2:00 pm.
Where: City Council Chambers, 4th Floor

We applaud Councilman Squilla's leadership and initiative in creating one of the nation's strongest municipal complete streets policies. By improving streets, intersections, and sidewalks for walking, biking and driving, crashes will be reduced, lives will be saved, and more people will be encouraged to get out and get healthy.

The amendments to the bill accomplish two of the Bicycle Coalition of Greater Philadelphia's goals: make Philadelphia a safer place to bike by enacting a Complete Streets policy, and update the City's traffic rules for bicyclists.

What specifically will the amended bill do? See below:

This Month: Public Discussion on Philly's New Complete Streets Handbook

The Mayor’s Office of Transportation and Utilities (MOTU) and the Streets Department recently released a draft of the Philadelphia Complete Streets Design Handbook (the Handbook) for public comment. The Handbook lays out the preferred street designs and management practices that should provide all travelers with safe and convenient streets.

The MOTU is hosting three Complete Streets Handbook Discussions in the month of September. Two are for the Development & Design communities and one is being held for the general public.  

• MOTU encourages professionals involved with Community or Real Estate Development to attend the Sept 10th meeting (11am – 12:30pm)
• MOTU encourages professionals involved with Design or Engineering to attend the Sept 12th meeting (11am – 12:30pm)
• MOTU encourages members from the general public to attend the Sept 24th meeting (6 – 7:30).

All Discussions will be held at Room 1450 of the Municipal Services Building (1401 JFK Blvd).

Three of Eight In-Street Bike Corrals Installed In Philadelphia

People in perpetual search for bike parking received exciting news recently with the City's announcement of the installation of three bike corrals. They are three of eight scheduled for installation over the next two weeks (some are pending City Council approval):

Already Installed

• Filbert St in front of Reading Terminal Market
• South St in front of Whole Foods Market (betw 9th & 10th)
• South St in front of Tattooed Mom's Bar (betw 5th & 6th)

Coming Soon

• Baltimore Ave in front of Mariposa Co-op (betw 48th & 49th)
• Chestnut St in front of Drinker's Pub (betw 19th & 20th)
• Front & Thompson St in front of Kung Fu Necktie
• Girard Ave in front of Johnny Brenda's (at Frankford Ave intersection)
• 10th & Cherry in front of Philadelphia Chinatown Development Corporation

The Mayor's Office of Transportation solicited applications from local businesses and received eight completed applications. Huge thanks are due to Aaron Ritz at the Mayor's Office of Transportation, MOTU's contractor J. Fletcher Creamer, and the Streets Department for working together to make this project happen. And of course, a big thanks to the U.S. Department of Energy for making an Energy Efficiency Conservation Block Grant (EECBG) to the Mayor's Office of Sustainability through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act that made this project possible!

Below are some photos of the recent installations:

Mayor Nutter Thanks Everyone, Drops Some Great Quotes At Bike To Work Day

"It is absolutely the best way to get to work. I always look forward to Bike to Work Day...This is the best thing I'm going to do today."

That was Mayor Nutter in Love Park this morning, speaking in front of press and a crowd of more than 100 cyclists for Bike To Work Day.

The event was well-attended by a wide spectrum of Philadelphia officials. Mayor Nutter, Deputy Mike DiBerardinis from Parks & Recreation, and Councilman Mark Squilla all participated in the ride. Deputy Mayor Rina Culter from MOTU joined us for the press conference.

One inspiring part of the event was the number of Philadelphia-based bicycling-related companies and organizations involved. In attendance was ZipCar (car-sharing), Fuji (major bicycling manufacturer), Gearing Up (bicycling-focused social service), Wash Cycle (bicycle-powered laundry service), Cosmic Cafe (food vendor for bike/ped trail), Pedal Co-Op (recycling and delivery) and Wheel Fun (bicycle rentals). Taken together, they represent a city with an established and growing bicycle culture.

Mayor Nutter used his remarks to thank a wide variety of event participants (including our own Alex Doty and Sarah Clark Stuart by name). He also hit on some important subjects for Philadelphia bicyclists:

Help the Bicycle Coalition Keep Philly's First Bike Corral!

 What's not to like (love) about the new bike corral on Sydenham Street that was installed last week for Park(ing) Day?

We think it's pretty fabulous and are thrilled to see bikes parked in it all day, every day, since we collaborated with the Mayor's Office of Transportation to get the loan from Dero Bike Racks and installation by the Streets Department last week.

We're not alone in loving this rack. The Mayor's Office of Transportation, which wants feedback on the racks from the public, received this email last week.

My husband and I happened to walk past the bike corral at Walnut & Sydenham tonight and our jaws dropped . . it was just one of those moments where you get warm fuzzies and think "I love my city!" We are Center City residents and bike commuters who use the 22nd Street/Pine/Spruce bike lanes daily/year-round, and we work on Walnut Street near Rittenhouse, so we know the feeling of not being able to find enough bike parking. We love seeing new & innovative ideas coming from the Mayor's Office of Transportation and this is one that shows you don't need to break the city budget to create something useful. The public art factor cannot be ignored either - instead of a generic multi-bike rack, we get to see something creative & unique. Walnut Street plays daily host to many tourists, day trippers, and city residents and it is high time for some visible signals that Philly is a progressive, modern city that can balance the needs of all of it's residents (pedestrians, bikers, public transit, deliveries and drivers)! --Kelly Gibb

We couldn't agree more with Kelly. We want to make this rack permanent (although we're not sure of the exact location--that needs to be worked out with the Parking Authority). But, we need to raise $4500 to purchase the rack. We have one donation of $500 to start us off contributed by attorney Stuart Leon. If you are interested in making a donation to purchase this corral, please contact Mary Duffy, our Development Director at Mary@bicyclecoalition.org or click here to make an online donation. You don't need a Paypal Account to donate, just enter your donation amount and scroll down to where it says you can continue without a Paypal Account.

Help us Buy the Bike Corral!

p.s. If you want to give your own feedback on this rack and whether more should in installed in the future in Philadelphia, to the Mayor's Office of Transportation, please send an email to aaron.ritz@phila.gov

Bikes Only Park Here

Here's a photo of the awesome bike corral (or cycle stall) loaned to the Bicycle Coalition and City of Philadelphia by Dero Bike Rack Co. that the Streets Department installed yesterday for today's Park(ing) Day. It will be up for 6 weeks as a demonstration. Located at Sydenham and Walnut, come check it out! Fill up this bike corral and keep the bikes off trees on Walnut Street! There's also 6 beautiful ganged U racks in front of U of Arts on S. Broad Street loaned by Saris Racks. More to come later this morning.

If you like this kind of high quality, innovative bike parking and want more, or know of a business who might want to get one installed in front of their location, send a message to the Mayor's Office of Transportation at aaron.ritz@phila.gov

More info here