BikeScore

[Andy Goodell]

WalkScore never seemed to be trying to say where to walk (or take transit, or now bike to) but rather finding out if a place is well-suited for that mode. When I was moving, I found looking at the WalkScore helpful to get an idea of how easily it might be to get around certain areas without using a car. Of course, any system like that will have flaws and their assumptions are not the same as mine - so even though my current walkscore is only 22, I am easily able to bike for most trips (other than groceries as I'm up a large hill), all things I need are still within 2 - 4 miles which is very bike-able in my opinion. 

You can see from their heat-map image of SF how that works. It becomes instantly clear what areas they are highlighting as easily bike-able. Of course, a long trip would change that as you pass out of the "core" areas. I agree that bike infrastructure isn't the best way to rank this, but they have to start somewhere. In my experience, bike infrastructure exists where traffic is often highest, and on roads that I would typically tend to avoid unless they are the most direct route. To new cyclist, I always recommend trying routes out in the country, on the county roads as they are nearly always great quality and have nearly no traffic - yet those are the roads which are the most narrow, often lacking paved shoulders. But when only a few cars are passing per hour, bike infrastructure and shoulders makes little difference.

On Mon, May 14, 2012 at 1:44 PM, John Forester <fore...@johnforester.com> wrote:

The methodology appears to consider only very short trips, with 200 meter radii from origin for various characteristics  and places a great deal of emphasis on bikeways. And yet the authors felt that it was important to include data on the amount of cycling (as obtained from commute statistics). Clearly, the physical model does not predict the amount of cycling, as that had to be included as a component. So, what does the scoring system do? What purpose can be made from its scores? I suspect that it is not useful for, say, deciding in which city one will choose to live, for other factors appear to be of far greater importance.