- New York City
- Los Angeles
- Portland, Ore.
- Memphis
- Austin, Texas
- Providence, R.I.
- New Orleans
- Fort Collins, Colo.
- Baltimore
- Tucson, Ariz.
This is a disappointment, of course, but not at all surprising. The City's application did not seem very strong or focused. It did not have a real purpose with a clear set of goals, and it also did not follow the suggestions for local match dollars. It looked like it was more for show than for durable action and transformation.
Hopefully the City of Salem will reassess and look to make a stronger showing in future planning and grant applications.
About the winners, People for Bikes says:
Over the course of the next three years, these cities will be laboratories for innovation, ultimately illustrating the ways in which U.S. cities and towns can tap into bicycles to improve the health and vitality of their communities. Each city will annually receive the equivalent of $200,000 in in technical support from PeopleForBikes to support the development of bike infrastructure and programs that encourage biking in a given neighborhood; an additional $50,000 in local matching funds from the city, community partner, or local foundations each year will also be contributed to the program....
The winning cities all demonstrated ongoing commitments to improving transportation, housing, and redevelopment, with both leaders and residents at large mobilized toward change. With the Big Jump Project, PeopleForBikes hopes to accelerate those changes through technical assistance, leadership development, and a network of peer cities and leaders.
3 comments:
Bike Portland just wrote up their winning program.
"Dubbed the “Gateway to Opportunity” project (more on that name later), the bureau of transportation will zero-in on the area bordered by I-84, East Burnside, I-205 and NE 132nd Avenue with the goal of making it much more bikeable than it is today. With this nudge from People for Bikes, PBOT will look to advance and complete 13 different projects by 2019. The projects include protected bike lanes on the NE Halsey-Weidler couplet in the heart of Gateway, three major neighborhood greenway projects, a bikeway overpass of I-205 to connect to the Sullivan’s Gulch trail, and much more. In total, the Gateway to Opportunity project will encompass an estimated $21.35 million in infrastructure spending and create about 39 miles of new bikeways."
https://bikeportland.org/2017/01/24/national-org-will-help-portlands-gateway-district-make-a-big-jump-for-bicycling-214543
Maybe "People for Bikes" needs to consider expanding outside of these cities that are nationally recognized and into smaller cities that actually need help accomplishing projects.
You're not the first person to say something like this, and they earlier responded -
"...we'd argue Baltimore, LA & Providence are pretty unusual suspects, as are the focus areas of several others."
They also said about criteria -
"What mattered most in our selection wasn't the initial network quality but the shovel-readiness and the political consensus for change."
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