Thursday, August 19, 2010

For more than a year, a group of dedicated Key West residents has been meeting regularly to improve their hometown. They have committed their time, energy and passion to finding ways to make this island city more bicycle-friendly.

The result is a five-year Bicycle Master Plan, and its intent is to make cycling in the city safer, more convenient and more enjoyable. In other words, they hope to improve the quality of life for residents and the quality of experience for visitors in ways that help reduce the city's carbon footprint and its endemic traffic congestion -- not to mention promoting a healthy lifestyle.

First, we thank the members of the Bicycle Action Advisory Committee for taking time out of their lives to improve their community; time they could have spent ... well, cycling. If there was ever a city where their efforts could have a visible impact, it's this 6-square-mile subtropical refuge for the laid back, the creative, the eccentric, the Parrothead and the urban and/or climatological escapee.

Second, we hope the plan isn't relegated to a shelf to gather dust after a few minutes of laudatory rhetoric at a City Commission meeting. These folks have worked hard to create something of potential benefit to the city and its residents without having spent tens of thousands of dollars on a consulting firm. Rather, if city commissioners ever decide on a new City Hall, they might want to consider hanging a bicycle in the foyer as a reminder that there are alternatives to congestion and parking issues.

The plan contains nothing disruptive or revolutionary, and its implementation would be gradual. It calls for more public bicycle racks, for road improvements that allow ample and unobstructed space for bike paths, and integration with other modes of transportation, such as placing bike racks on taxicabs and buses. And it involves locating bicycle rentals at key locations convenient to visitors.

Of course, there also are public education elements to the plan, and incorporation of a "bicycle-friendly" theme in the city's destination marketing.

Good job. We hope this group is inspiration for other such efforts to make the city greener -- in several senses of the word -- more pedestrian-friendly, and increasingly oriented toward outdoor recreation.

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One small footnote: We humbly suggest the committee rethink the bicycle rentals at the airport. While it may be possible to secure a carry-on bag to the basket, those hefty Samsonites would be a real bear.

-- The Citizen