Philadelphia Weekly’s Josh Kruger conducted an extensive interview with Bicycle Coalition of Greater Philadelphia executive director Alex Doty for this week’s issue. They cover a ton of really important topics, and we definitely recommend you read the whole thing. In the meantime, here’s a short preview:
Among the topics discussed: Vision Zero, our candidate forum, Roosevelt Boulevard, the animosity between commuters and the Coalition’s work to make Philadelphia’s mobility that much better.
Among Doty’s money quotes:
“[N]o person should be killed by a motor vehicle: occupants of motor vehicles should not be dying, and pedestrians, users of public transit, and bicyclists should not be dying from traffic deaths. This is something we do not see as a “bicycle” issue—it is something that is important to everybody that lives in the city of Philadelphia. We should make changes to our streets so that we are all safer, and we should no longer be prioritizing speed or convenience over safety.”
“The ultimate thing on Spruce and Pine is not that bicyclists got space on there; it’s that motor vehicle crashes are down 26 percent in the time since the bike lanes were put in. The bike lane is great as a facility for bicyclists, but it turns out that its biggest benefit has been to keep motorists out of the hospital.”
“Yesterday it was 28 degrees and raining, and there were as many people biking on the streets that I ride on as there had been biking on the most beautiful September day ten years ago. The number of people who are biking has just exploded.”
“I really resist the notion that somehow an entire group should be held accountable for the misbehavior of some small segment. If somebody says to me, “Bicyclists shouldn’t get their own bike lanes until all bicyclists are behaving,” I feel like saying, “Well, we should shut down I-95 until all car drivers are behaving.” Hey, it’s Philadelphia; we’re never going to be waving and handing roses to each other at intersections. But I think we can get to the point where, on the roadway, we have at least the same kinds of respect that we have on the sidewalk.”
“City Council is important. It’s remarkable how few people even know who their councilperson is. So if you start to understand the importance of that, it doesn’t take a lot of work to become somebody who can have an impact in your neighborhood through your councilperson, because of the fact that so few people are engaging in that way. That’s an area we’re trying to help people figure out how to navigate, both through online resources and in-person trainings as well. It’s all in support of an agenda that we’ve come up with in collaboration with other groups and with our membership.”
Check out the entire article here.