OT: some good news for caltrain

[Maxence Nachury]

Begin forwarded message:

From: Janice Li <jan...@sfbike.org>

Subject: Re: I Support More Bike Space On Board and More Bike Parking for Caltrain

Date: July 2, 2015 at 5:22:55 PM PDT

To: Maxence Nachury <nac...@gmail.com>

Hi again,

I'm thrilled to share with you that the Caltrain Board voted to increase bike space on future electrified cars and the Board has committed to finding a minimum of $3 million in funding for bike parking at stations.

The staff recommendation came back surprisingly weak, proposing no increase to the current ratio of bike space to seats. Also, while staff had been working hard to secure $3 million for bike parking improvements, they were unable to do so in time for today's meeting. We see the Board's push back as a response to the hundreds like you who wrote letters and signed petitions.

This isn't the whole win -- we had been asking for bike space for 16% of overall riders, and this gets us significantly closer but not yet there. We will continue to push Caltrain Board and staff to do what's right and not turn away its bike ridership, especially for the majority of its riders who depend on Caltrain to get to work, home, school and beyond.

You can read the full details in our blog here today. There will be more work to do and more decisions to come especially regarding the exact design of the cars, but this is a promising start.

I can't thank you enough for your support, and please do not hesitate if there's anything the SF Bicycle Coalition can better advocate for when it comes to meeting our mission of promoting the bicycle for everyday transportation.

Best,

Janice

[Peter Colijn]

Chris, Christine and I were there to heckle 'em! Actually, we tried to be polite. There was actually only one dude who was opposed to more bike space, and he said everybody should get folding bikes.

--
-- follow: http://twitter.com/sf2g | terms: http://sf2g.com/terms.html | bike prep: http://sf2g.com/bike-prep.html | unsub: http://groups.google.com/group/sf2g
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "SF2G" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to sf2g+uns...@googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.

[Zoe Hoster]

If that guy buys me a folding bike, I'm totally in favor of his proposal. 

[Maxence Nachury]

Chris, Christine and I were there to heckle ‘em!

Wait, where was our official SF2G heckler (a.k.a. Peter G.)? 

Kudos for making our voice heard. It seems pretty surreal that the Board essentially overruled the staff. Not sure who to be grateful to (SFBC, SF2G, anonymous letter writers) but this is good.

[Matthew Hiller]

I'd actually proposed semi-seriously back in the day that if Goog NYC had simply bought a folding bike for every serious bike commuter un the office rather than opening bike rooms, it would have been cheaper in the long term than paying bike room rent. (Or, later on, opportunity costs.)

[Peter Colijn]

Interesting. I think sometimes people under-estimate the size a folding occupies when folded sometimes though. I have a brompton, and yes it's pretty compact when folded, but it's not nothing. It's like a medium suitcase. It won't fit in an airplane overhead compartment or under an airplane seat (many people assume it will before actually seeing it folded up). I don't think caltrain is really set up for everyone to bring a suitcase on board. Though arguably an office space might be able to handle it (though it would make things even more cramped than they already are at Google NY...)

On Fri, Jul 3, 2015 at 5:42 AM, Matthew Hiller <matthew...@gmail.com> wrote:

I'd actually proposed semi-seriously back in the day that if Goog NYC had simply bought a folding bike for every serious bike commuter un the office rather than opening bike rooms, it would have been cheaper in the long term than paying bike room rent. (Or, later on, opportunity costs.)