Most people driving motor vehicles who hit people riding bikes hit them from the back. My friend, Paul, just wrote a very hard-hitting and moving email to my local Mayor and City Council about his broken back following a person hitting him (from the back) with a car while he was on his bike. The extraordinary response this morning to this email by one of our city councilors leads me to believe that Paul’s lived experience may have been the tipping point after years of advocacy in this city by many people (some on city council right now) for safe-access-for-all.
I have requested the bike-lane protectors in the photo above be added to every major road’s current bike lane (which do not meet safe-acccess-for-all standards), at least as a small segment to each as a pilot test, within a month. I just rode them all around Dublin, and they work (at least until more permanent infrastructure can be installed).
Optimist that I am, I believe the City of Dunwoody, Georgia in the USA is about to become one of the best cities in the world for people on bikes, and a model for suburban cities everywhere. This is a city with a PeopleForBikes rating of just 16 out of 100, in a state that is 23rd in the nation for bike-friendliness (according to the just-released standings by the League of American Bicyclists). Middle-of-the-pack. Mediocre. We can and will do better. Just watch.
You may remember my post about Paul when he first survived the crash. If not, here it is. Paul has not been on a bike again since then, but he and I are planning to ride together in a couple of weeks once his bike is finished being repaired. Stay tuned! Follow so you don’t miss any updates on this developing story.
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