Stimulus Bike

Cycling India

Written by Lee Norris

India is a class conscious society where most people equate prosperity with the automobile while the bicycle is considered transportation for the poor. Only around 7% of Indians own automobiles and there are roughly as many small motor cycles on India's roads as bicycles. There are a billion Indians and most of them want a car. The bigger the car is, the more status the owner has. On main thoroughfares like the Grand Trunk Highway, Indian motorist have been known to hit poor cyclists and pedestrians and leave them lying along the road without offering assistance. There are almost no bike lanes or bike paths in India and the roads are often muddy full of pot holes.

On the other hand, India is a paradoxical country and full of contradiction. Many tourist that go to India say that the bicycle is still the best way to travel around the small towns and the country side of India, because there are few cars on the road. You go from village to village and from out door stand to stand and hardly ever encounter a car. They say that bicycling in India can be likened to riding through a giant outdoor market.

In the cities, techies in well paying jobs cycle to work. Most of them speak English and want to be westernized. These techies are demanding bike lanes in in districts like Bangalore’s high tech district. Who says that the west doesn’t have a positive influence on India?

Sources: BBC, mrpumpy.net

Senate Amendment Aims To Nix All Bike Funding

Written by Andy

Senator Jim DeMint (R-SC), chair of the Senate Steering Committee, has proposed an amendment to the stimulus bill that would prohibit any funding of bicycle infrastructure from this bill. He was supported by Senator Tom Coburn (R-OK) who is known for his opposition to bicycle lanes and paths.

"When people see bike trails and hiking trails and golf courses, they know this is not designed to stimulate the economy and create jobs. It’s just basically special-interest pork barrel spending."

Blumenauer rebuts DeMint's statement with this:

"Republican amendments and assertions that the creation of hike and bike trails in the recovery plan will not create jobs or stimulate the economy shows us just short-sighted and out of touch they are. Investment in bike paths will not only improve our economy, and take our country in the right direction for our future; it is precisely the kind of investment the American people want. American families have indicated time and again in the passage of bond measures across the country that they favor spending on alternative transportation, such as bicycles and mass transit, over spending on more highway capacity. Americans want a real solution to the economic crisis, not just a band-aid fix. These investments will stimulate the economy in the present and point our nation toward the economic and environmental realities of the future."

Here is what it means to Americans: While about 16 million of 330 million Americans use bikes, and even fewer of those use them regularly for commuting or errands, bikes are a viable form of transportation that is quickly gaining support in many major cities. Surely spending a million dollars on a bike lane in a rural area is not a smart investment, but creating a network of livable streets in urban environments is. Currently, the stimulus bill has a lot of funding for highways, which has few restrictions and may go towards building and expanding highways. Fixing our existing infrastructure is a good idea, but that doesn't mean adding more lanes or more routes for cars, it means fixing old bridges and repairing roads that desperately need it.

President Obama and his administration have made a strong commitment to finding solutions for climate change, reducing our use of non-renewable resources, and improving Americans' health. Any attempt to improve our population centers to accommodate public transit, pedestrians, and cyclists is a good step towards those solutions. We need to prepare our economy and way of life for a sustainable future, and highway expansion or restricting bicycle infrastructure is a major step in the wrong direction.

In the past year, we saw gas prices over $4 a gallon across most of the country. Car sales plummeted 30% and America's major car manufacturers are in dire trouble just trying to stay afloat in this economy and even overseas manufacturers like Toyota are now struggling. Many transit programs saw major increases in ridership this past summer, but still lack the proper funding to expand service. Bicycle infrastructure is the cheapest, most effective way to get people around without causing environmental harm. To think that this is somehow a detriment to creating jobs or helping our economy is just an ignorant excuse for wanting to get around in cars more. But we need to face the facts: Personal vehicles, for single-occupant use, will one day be a thing of the past. Gas prices will go up, fewer people will drive as more take buses, trains, and live closer to work to walk and bike for their commutes, and infrastructure costs for maintaining this enormous highway system will overwhelm the economy. Let's make good decisions now before we waste billions finding out that more highways doesn't help our economy.

Sources: League of American Bicyclists, Bike Portland, Streetsblog

The Bicycle and the Economic Stimulus Plan

Written by Lee Norris

The Senate republicans want a tax break for the purchase of new cars in 2009 as part of the economic stimulus package. The amendment would allow individuals buying new cars with financing and write off the interest. This tax break does not include a purchase of used vehicles either. The amendment would also let buyers claim the state excise tax. This is a tax break for the wealthy who can afford to buy a new car each year. For the average consumer, the cost of financing a new car out weights any tax benefits. During recession, financing has traditionally been harder to obtain for lower and medium income people.

Just a few months ago, the agenda in congress was weaning this country off of its dependence to foreign oil. Now that the price of crude is down and economy is crashing, the problem of dependence to foreign oil has slipped onto the back burner. The problems of importing oil and the trade imbalance has been around for the past 50 years. If we do not do something about this problem during this recession, then it will come back again in times of prosperity. These problems will most likely be worse in the future.

Why not give tax credits for purchasing new bicycles or for cycling to and from work as part of the economic stimulus package? In the United States on an average, half the car trips made are under three miles. This country consumes around 22 millions of barrels of oil a day. A large percentage of that oil could be saved each day by using bicycles as transportation on these short trips. if only 25% Americans would cycle on trips 5 miles and under, the social benefits to the country would be enormous. Two of the most expensive problems facing Americans today are rising health care costs and arresting greenhouse gases. Cycling makes people slim and healthy, and there are no greenhouse gas emissions to cycling. Cycling is better than tax credits for the economy. The Money saved at the pumps is more cash for the consumer to spend. With a tax credit, the consumer has to wait until they get their tax return. Cycling saves consumers money all the time there by stimulating the economy faster.

Recessions are times of re-tooling for the next round of prosperity and rethinking the way we do things. If all Americans do is buy new cars to stimulate the economy, we will pay for it later. This is just more of the old squirrel cage economy that got us into this economic mess in in the first place. In effect, what we are asking future generations is to finance our expensive life style today. Is that all there is to the economic stimulus package?

Transportation in China: A New Look

Written By Lee Norris

Are the Chinese all getting cars? The Chinese stimulus package does not say so. With the Chinese economy hit hard by the world wide recession, the Chinese government is making the move away from the automobile as a main source of transportation. They are spending more on passenger rail lines and less on highways. The problems of the automobile in China are enormous. Pollution caused by the automobiles in the major cities is unbearable and a major concern. Traffic jams and automobile accidents are commonplace. Besides, The majority of the population cannot move from the lower to the middle classes where they can not afford a car.

The world wide recession has hit China. No one in China questions the urgent need for spending on large scale public projects. China has drafted the largest economic stimulus plans in the world and with few debts and a small deficit, the Chinese government is making moves to decrease their dependence on the automobile and foreign oil. They are spending less money on highways and more on passenger rail lines. Huge project are underway such as $17.6 billion being spent on a passenger rail line across the Northwest Desert and $24 billion being spent on a high speed rail line from Beijing to Guangzhou, which is around 1,400 miles. Another $88 billion is being spent on inter city rail lines in cities across China.

In China, you can take the train, but you still need a bike for the short trips. China is still the largest bicycle-using country in the world, and the bicycle isn’t going away any time soon. There are an estimated half billion bicycles in China. In communities and cities all over China, goods are moved and services are still delivered by bicycles. China leads the world in production of bicycles by making over 60% of the bicycles produced in the world. Nine out to ten bicycles sold in the United States were manufactured in China.

Here's An Idea: Bike Corral or Oasis

With millions or billions of dollars going towards infrastructure improvements, bike parking could be one of the most economically stimulating of them all. There are two designs I will focus on here: a bike corral and a bike oasis.

Bike Corral
A bike corral changes on-street parking from cars to bikes, by just adding a bike rack to lock on to, and possibly signage and markers to lower the risk of cars bumping into the racks. What was once 2 parking spaces for cars can become space to park 25 bikes; even two minivans can't hold that many people! The pros are numerous: with more people able to park in a small area, the nearby stores will get more business from customers that were able to bike to the store instead of paying all the costs of a car and parking on-street. The only cons are that street cleaning equipment such as street sweepers and snow plows cannot manage that area. But a shovel and a broom can handle those issues without too much hassle. According to the users in the video from Streetfilms, it also empowers more people to ride when there is equality in parking. Pedestrians should also love this because it means fewer bikes locked to sidewalk items like streetlights, trashcans, and parking meters. What other option could be so easy and cheap, and bring in more business for local shops?

Bike Oasis
The bike oasis is a similar type of parking design, but has a slightly different use and purpose. A bike oasis would be put in an area of extended curb, so that cars would be diverted away, but street cleaning equipment can still do its job. The bike oasis also includes a small roof structure to protect bikes, and can include maps of the area as well. This would be a bit more costly than a bike corral, but compare that to trying to add a new highway to deal with congestion and this is a drastically cheaper solution. A bike only uses about one-tenth of the amount of space as a car on the road, so why spend billions to expand our roads when we can just spend a small amount to accommodate for the small vehicles on the road that don't use any gas or have toxic smog-forming emissions?

Congratulations to Seattle for their Department of Transportation that is going to be installing several bike corrals. They just released a statement saying that every neighborhood will get one or two spaces converted for bike use, coming as soon as the middle of February. Read about Seattle's new on-street parking here >>. Imagine if more U.S. cities was able to hire more workers to change our streets for the better, stores could hire more people from increased sales, and 95% of Americans were able to buy a bike from the Making Work Pay tax cuts coming from the stimulus bill. Sounds like a great idea to me!

Stimulus Bill Passes with Amendments in the House

The House amended and passed the American Recovery and Reinvestment Plan but still without support from republicans. House democrats drafted the bill, as President Barack Obama urged for a bill that would receive support from both parties, but even with some parts catering more towards republican wants, there were no votes support from the party. The final vote was 244 to 188. Obama is still hoping for a few more changes to get support all around: "I hope that we can continue to strengthen this plan before it gets to my desk... We must move swiftly and boldly to put Americans back to work, and that is exactly what this plan begins to do." The bill as passed by the House includes $607 billion for infrastructure and other direct spending measures, and $212 billion in tax cuts. Earlier predictions for the tax cuts were much higher, and republicans wanted to see less spending and more tax cuts. While overall it appears that this bill will help American's keep and create jobs there is a lot of room for improvement still. Let's hope that the Senate can make that happen.

Making Work Pay Credit
Under the Ways and Means Committee, the details of the Making Work Pay Credit are still unchanged fromthe draft version. American's can expect to receive 6.2 percent of earned income or $500 ($1,000 in the case of a joint return) whichever is lower. The specifics on how this will work are still not clear, but it is apparent that this will come in the form of reduce tax withholdings over 4 months time. This amounts to around $60 per paycheck.

Stimulus Bike
So far Stimulus Bike has about 40 people make the pledge to use their tax credits towards supporting bikes either for themselves or others. This website has been featured on more than 15 other blogs now and issteadily receiving hits. Thanks for helping this resource grow! Even if you stumbled across this site just looking for stimulus details, click around and check out our resources, supported petitions, and the pledge.

Stimulus Bill: From the House to the Senate

The stimulus bill draft by the House has been floating around for us to see, and unfortunately showed a stronger support for highways than public transit and finding ways to create jobs without expanding unnecessary pieces of our infrastructure. Past projects to add roads to ease congestion have - in almost every circumstance - resulted in the same congestion problems. That's why it is so unfortunate to see the House asking for $30 billion to go towards highways while only $10 billion going towards public transit. The argument that comes up is that roads and bridges are sub-par and in desperate need of funding to be fixed. In reality, stimulus money that is headed for roadways can easily be advertised as fix-up projects, but then be spent on adding a new lane in attempts to ease congestion. This is exactly why we should be looking to alternatives to expanding highways, such as trains, buses, and livable streets - places where we can walk and bike and be part of traffic instead of a nuisance to traffic.

Recently the Senate posted a press release online outlining their plans for the stimulus bill. The transportation part is as follows:

- $27 billion for formula highway investments.
- $8.4 billion for formula investments in public transportation.
- $5.5 billion for competitive grants to state and local governments for surface transportation investments.
- $1.3 billion for investments in our air transportation system.
- $1.1 billion for investments in rail transportation.

So highway funding has dropped $3 billion, but transit has also reduced a significant percentage from $9 billion to $8.4 billion. Consider Oberstar's original call for $20 billion needed for transit related projects, and $8.4 billion (although still a heck of a lot of money) is pennies compared to what it should be.

Keep an eye out for details on the new $5.5 billion for competitive grants for surface transportation. The Senate Appropriations website has no further details at this time than the press release, which does not go in depth on this portion of the bill. There is a good chance that this could go towards projects to make 2-wheeled transportation get more notice, but it is all chances at this point. Check out the PDF of the press release from the Senate Appropriations website.

Share Your Stories

Share Your Story!
Do you have a story about your bike, your commute, your advocacy, or what you plan to use your stimulus money for? We will feature stories from time to time, so please email them (with a picture if possible) to [email protected] or leave a comment below.

Let me share mine:
From Andy in Ithaca, NY
If the ground is mostly dry in winter, I take the road racing bike. I bought this used for $600 in NH on Craigslist, having never ridden on a road bike before. I knew that I would be moving soon, and was looking for small cities that were relaively bike-friendly and easier to be car-free. I landed in Ithaca, NY, sold my car, and commute to work each day on this bike or an old mounain bike if the roads are bad. I like commuting by bike, but I feel like I need to just get out and ride occassionally so that I don't associate bikes with just commuting - since I find riding on weekends and a few weekdays very fun and rewarding.

I added aerobars so I can keep up with the cycling club I joined, waterbottle cages (who knows why it didn't come with these), and the rear light. I mount a headlight on the end of the looped aerobars, and strap the battery to the base of the aerobars for the occassional ride at night, and when even leaving work at 4:00pm was getting dark. My Garmin GPS can also mount on the end of the aerobars, which is great for mapping where I have been. The gearing is 52/40 by 11-23 which has made my legs much stronger from 800ft of climbing on my everyday! I could have gotten a bike with 3 chainrings, but this really keeps me fit, and I don't get much exercise other than cycling.

I plan on using my extra $500 of tax cuts towards upgrading parts on my bike. I've got a small list of "defferred maintenance" and a few extra parts I want to buy, such as new handlebar tape, a few new cables, and more cleaning products like soft brushes that can clean around brakes and gears better. This bike is 5 years old and still looking good (other than many small dings to the frame from locking it around town) and I hope to make it last many more years!

Support Stimulus Bike

Now that we have a new president, information about the stimulus plan and the tax act will be hitting the news more often and with much more depth as it progresses. Stimulus Bike will post all of the latest updates, straight from their sources. You can rely on us to translate the "legalese" documents into plain English so that you know exactly what to expect in the coming months.

Our website and blog are quickly growing, and we hope to grow even faster. You can subscribe to the blog feeds by clicking the orange RSS icon on the right, so that you get updates as soon as we post them. If you have friends, family, or co-workers that are interested in putting their stimulus tax cuts to good use, email them a link to the site!

Want to help out? Stimulus Bike is currently seeking a blog writer and an outreach coordinator. Email us at [email protected] if you are interested in volunteering your time. We are also accepting donations, in any amount, to pay for web hosting and upcoming features such as polls and email campaigns. You can donate by PayPal using this button.

Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure LIVE Thursday 10am

Thursday, January 22 at 10:00am there is a live webcast of the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure.

Infrastructure Investment: Ensuring an Effective Economic Recovery Package
This hearing will "examine how infrastructure investment contributes to job creation and economic recovery. The hearing will address infrastructure across the Committee's jurisdiction, including highways, bridges, public transportation, rail, aviation, ports, waterways, wastewater treatment facilities, and Federal buildings." - according to their press release.

We're hoping for more talk on public transportation and less support for expanding our highways. Isn't Stimulus Bikes about cycling and not public transportation though? Well, it's a fact that when a city has more ways of getting around, that cycling becomes safer and more popular. For example, when cities can expand their bus service, they can also add bike racks on the front of the buses as they do in many cities. Some cities also allow a special lane for buses and bikes to share. This allows urban cyclists to get around by bike for shorter distances, and hop on the bus to get further or up hills. Teamwork!

The House's Transportation website has a button to click tomorrow at 10am to tune into the live webcast. Check it out here >>