Foodies or Fixies? The Philebrity Award Dilemma (with Statler and Waldorf)

We are 24 hours away from the end of voting for the 2011 Philebrity Awards. Five worthy nonprofits are nominated, but it's been a two-horse race for most of the voting period. The Food Trust (polite applause) has held solid at 40% of the votes, while we, the Bicycle Coalition of Greater Philadelphia (thunderous applause!) has maintained roughly 30% of the voting.

Why is 70% of the vote going to these two organizations? Because Philebrity is giving its hipster readership an impossible choice: foodies vs. fixies.

To help sort this out, we spoke to two people who know nothing about hipsters but do enjoy sharing opinions: Statler and Waldorf. Here is a transcript of the conversation:

Oh, By The Way, 13th Street Bike Lane Will Be Permanent

An excerpt from a report issued from the Mayor's Office of Transportation and Utilities (MOTU) concerning the 13th Street bike lane:

Based on the findings, which indicated that the pilot bike lane on 13th Street was not resulting in substantial impacts to motor vehicle traffic and was successfully attracting bicyclists, the Streets Department and the Mayor’s Office of Transportation have decided to make the bike lane on 13th Street permanent.

The full report is available for reading here. MOTU found that average vehicle speeds, vehicle volume, and vehicle delay at lights on 13th street were not significantly changed by the pilot bike lane. City cameras found that the majority of delay in vehicle queuing to make turns is caused by vehicle-pedestrian interactions, not the bike lane.

The report also supports our own (kind of obvious, but you know how some folks are) findings that adding a bike lane significantly increases bike traffic on that street:

above graph taken from MOTU report also linked above

Interestingly, a quick search found only CBS Philly and Philebrity covering this news. Of course, the more controversial 10th Street bike lane will probably draw more attention. But we have come a long way when MOTU can announce the permanent implementation of a Center City bike lane, and it causes so little ruckus.