Skip to Content
Streetsblog USA home
Streetsblog USA home
Log In

The question isn't whether your city can afford high-quality bike infrastructure anymore, say our friends at the Green Lane Project. It's whether your city can afford not to.

false

The Green Lane Project has been working with the Alliance for Biking and Walking on a study examining the different ways protected bike lanes help local businesses. Blogger Michael Andersen classifies the economic benefits into four basic categories:

1) Protected bike lanes increase retail visibility and volume. It turns out that when people use bikes for errands, they're the perfect kind of retail customer: the kind that comes back again and again. They spend as much per month as people who arrive in cars, require far less parking while they shop and are easier to lure off the street for an impulse visit.

2) Protected bike lanes make workers healthier and more productive. From Philadelphia to Chicago to Portland, the story is the same: people go out of their way to use protected bike lanes. By drawing clear, safe barriers between auto and bike traffic, protected bike lanes get more people in the saddle -- burning calories, clearing the mental cobwebs, and strengthening hearts, hips and lungs.

3) Protected bike lanes make real estate more desirable. By calming traffic and creating an alternative to auto travel lanes, protected bike lanes help build the sort of neighborhoods that everyone enjoys walking around in. By extending the geographic range of non-car travel, bike lanes help urban neighborhoods develop without waiting years for new transit service to show up.

4) Protected bike lanes help companies score talented workers. Workers of all ages, but especially young ones, increasingly prefer downtown jobs and nearby homes, the sort of lifestyles that make city life feel like city life. Because protected bike lanes make biking more comfortable and popular, they help companies locate downtown without breaking the bank on auto parking space, and allow workers to reach their desk the way they increasingly prefer: under their own power.

Elsewhere on the Network today: UrbanReview STL asks what are the ingredients of a better big box store. Peninsula Transportation Altneratives reports that the city of Palo Alto is trying to reduce solo car commutes 30 percent in an effort to save $100 million in parking costs. And Better Institutions says that L.A.'s roads were designed to induce rage.

Stay in touch

Sign up for our free newsletter

More from Streetsblog USA

Friday Video: Ride The Best Bike Tunnel In the World

Take a break from U.S. transportation news in one of Norway's most iconic biking hot spots.

March 21, 2025

Friday’s Headlines Fill ‘Er Up

As electric vehicles cut into gas tax revenue, it looks like raising gas taxes is a more viable option politically than taxing miles driven.

March 21, 2025

Talking Headways Podcast: The Public Works Director for Democrats

U.S. Rep. Rick Larsen on the Trump administration's recent guidance for stripping sustainable projects of funding, and why he thinks active transportation advocates should focus on safety.

March 20, 2025

Trump, Republicans Make D.C. Ground Zero in Their War on Cities

The Trump administration is bullying D.C. — and other cities (looking at you, New York) could soon fall in the crosshairs, advocates say.

March 20, 2025
See all posts