UGA budget cuts impact Athens Transit

ABH: "The University of Georgia will cut subsidies for students and employees to ride Athens Transit, costing the bus system $150,000 next year, officials said Thursday."

The Athens-Clarke government does not plan to cut service or spend more local tax money on buses, Athens-Clarke Manager Alan Reddish said, because federal grant money will make up the difference.

Car Free Day

Three University of Georgia organizations are promoting next Friday as "Car Free Day," asking people to use alternative transportation to work and school.

The School of Ecology, in collaboration with the GoGreen Alliance and Students for Environmental Action, will station "commute captains" off campus and offer free food, drinks and prizes to participants.

Commute captains will be located at College Station Road and International Drive at 7:10 and 9 a.m. and at South Milledge and Oakland avenues at 7:15 and 8 a.m. to lead groups to campus.

Organizers will set up a refreshment stand at the front entrance of Memorial Hall between 7:30 and 11 a.m. with free food, drinks and a chance to win prizes including gift certificates for gear and a free bike check from Sunshine Cycles.

Scooters

Athens Rising breaks down the impact of the scooter/moped trend, especially on UGA's campus.

Scooters have made traffic move a little more slowly and safely, creating a better environment for bicyclists and pedestrians as well. Sure, there are bad scooter drivers, but those kids would be just as bad behind the wheel of a Suburban, which is where this change in policy will likely send them. If scooters are made to be inconvenient to use, then we’ll likely see a host of other unintended consequences kick back up.

I agree. Scooters are a much more bike/ped friendly mode of transportation than automobiles. They're less noisy than cars, have good gas mileage, and they travel at much safer speeds. I'd rather bike next to a 35 mph scooter than a 55 mph Expedition. For folks whose physical condition or geographic location prohibits cycling and/or walking, scooters are a much more sensible transportation than a full-size car for short, in-town errands.

UGA does need to come up with a solution for the crowded and haphazard scooter parking on campus, however. Scooters block entrances and sidewalks, and they are frequently chained to bicycle racks, which are in high demand. Pushing scooters to the frontiers of campus is not the solution. As Williams notes, "any hasty move which disincentivizes this mode of transportation will cut off a whole realm of possibilities for the future of Athens."

Any other perspectives on this?

Parking it at UGA

The Red & Black compares UGA's parking facilities to those of its peer institutions.

“Parking is one of the biggest problems on most any large university campus,” [ University of Florida vice president of Business Affairs Ed] Poppell said. “On our campus we say, ‘We have enough spaces, but just not in the right places.’”

The saying is a result of one of UF’s initiatives to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and congestion on campus by enforcing certain regulations, such as the university’s “auto-free interior campus,” where only buses and service vehicles are allowed on the interior of campus from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.

“We have significant policies on our campus limiting what students can do and where they can park,” Poppell said. “We have also continuously increased the price of our decals, encouraging people to find alternative means of transportation.”

At the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the parking is highly selective. With 16,000 total parking spaces on campus, the school allows only 3,900 of its 28,136 students to park on campus. Unlike the University, UNC does not offer parking to incoming freshmen.

“There are a lot of folks who prefer to utilize the transit system,” said Randy Young, spokesman for the UNC Department of Safety. “We’ve gone to inordinate measures to make sure that the congestion and dependence on single-occupancy vehicles are attended to here on campus. We have 6,000 people on the Commuter Alternative Program.”

The program offers students an incentive to walk, ride bikes or use transit on campus by rewarding them with prizes and merchant discounts.

The University has a similar program called the Alternative Transportation Program, with a student participation of 1,200.

The program allows students who walk or take the bus* to receive 22 days of free parking per year in specified parking locations.

*ATP is also available for cyclists. With its campus pedestrian malls, campus transit, and bike racks, UGA certainly leads the county in supporting alternative transportation infrastructure.

Still, more can be done to encourage alternative behavior among a student body overwhelmingly conditioned to drive enormous SUVs for 2 mile errand trips. Increasing ATP participation should be a top priority. Given the comparatively low levels of participation, UGA has a ways to go before it can say it has "gone to inordinate measures to make sure that the congestion and dependence on single-occupancy vehicles" are minimized.

Indeed, since its inception, the Alternative Transportation Program has grown more restrictive, due to concerns that the program was being abused. Instead of marginalizing a good idea, UGA ought to develop creative enforcement solutions and then widely publicize the program's availability and benefits. Fewer cars means less need for bond-financed parking decks, which means less congestion, both on our roads and in our air.

Unfortunately, other considerations tend to distort the University's thinking on these things.

Map of campus bike racks

UGA has a campus map indicating the locations of bike racks (pdf).

Thanks, Nina, for the heads up!

Reed Alley update

The state Board of Regents won't approve this renovation proposal until next spring.

Bike/ped designs for "Reed Alley"

The University of Georgia's architects have plans to breathe some life into the forlorn alleyway between Sanford Stadium and Memorial & Reed halls. The alley currently serves as a dirty & forgotten loading area, but the paved corridor connects Sanford Dr to East Campus Rd.

Instead of gray concrete and cracked asphalt, pedestrians and bicyclists will travel a covered walk by the stadium with plants and other landscaping features.

"It connects more of our open space and pedestrian pathways; it will facilitate east-west pedestrian and bicycle flow. It's going to create a much nicer kind of pedestrian walkway," [says UGA Campus Architect Danny Sniff].

Before and after images featured in the full article.

Kudos to UGA for once again taking the lead on increasing bicycle and pedestrian connectivity in Athens!

BRP in the news

The Red & Black, UGA's student-run newspaper, profiles our Bike Recycling Program today.

BRP is gearing up for its annual Holiday Bikes for Kids campaign. Want to get involved? Come by the shop during open hours to volunteer:

Sunday, 2:00-4:30 pm
Monday & Wednesday, 6:00-8:30 pm

Do you work at UGA? Do you like what we do?

Attention, UGA employees!

The 2009-2010 Campaign for Charities is now underway.

As a member of Georgia Shares, BikeAthens is eligible to receive contributions through this workplace giving program.

To choose BikeAthens as a recipient organization, just enter our ID number, 194064, on your donation form.

You may also designate your charitable contributions online at https://webapps.ais.uga.edu/PBCC/home.seam
First, log in with your UGA MyID and password.
Choose "Federated Charitable Organizations," then select
"194000-Georgia Shares," and then
"194064-BikeAthens"

Donating to your favorite local transportation advocates couldn't be easier!

For more about the annual Campaign for Charities, visit http://www.busfin.uga.edu/charities/

All donations support our outreach programs, advocacy, and educational efforts. Thank you for your continuing support of transportation choices in Athens!

Bike rentals at UGA?

An undergraduate student is proposing a bike rental program at UGA.
Great idea!

UGA Campus Transit

The Red & Black features a story about campus buses and pedestrian safety. As a central campus employee, I see dozens of hair-raising near misses between pedestrians and buses on Sanford Dr & Baldwin St.
Folks, the physics are pretty simple:

Watch where you're going, and take a rest on the texting while you're mobile.

R&B editors also call for bike racks on Campus Transit.

UGA students reminded to obey traffic laws

Red & Black, the campus newspaper, reminds UGA students who bike or walk that they need to obey traffic laws and use some common sense.

I'll add that cyclists need to a) wear a helmet and b) be visible.

For you students who are driving around Athens, watch for pedestrians and cyclists. Give them plenty of room, and save your harrassing comments for Florida and Auburn fans.

Welcome to Athens

Welcome to Athens, new UGA students! And welcome back, all who summered elsewhere.

Check out bikeathens.com or this blog for everything you need to know about transit, walking, and cycling in Athens. If you like to volunteer, we have plenty of opportunities! You can always check out the great local weekly, Flagpole, for transportation news and event announcements as well.

In its orientation-to-Athens issue, Flagpole generously mentions BikeAthens quite a few times...

* BikeAthens Co-Chair Amy Johnson is quoted in a story on the Long Range Transportation Plan.

Don't forget to come by Trappeze at 7 pm tonight! We'll be discussing the LRTP and finalizing BikeAthens' formal comment on the plan. If you can't make it, be sure to submit comment on the plan. If you haven't read it, don't worry! While we strongly advise you to read the plan, you can submit any comment you like on the future of transportation in Athens. It will all be considered. You can email comments to macorts@co.clarke.ga.us until August 18th. Or, stay tuned for our soon-to-be-live online comment form, where you can tailor your comments on the LRTP and submit them from a single web page.

* Also, City Dope talks sidewalks, Athens Rising covers downtown and parking decks, and a feature for new arrivals points folks to our free Bike Map.

* Finally, the events calendar reminds the volunteer-minded to consider our ongoing Bike Recycling Program.

BikeAthens encourages you to walk, ride a bike, or take transit whenever possible. It's easier than you think to get around without a car! It will save you money, keep you healthier, and reduce traffic all around.

When you do drive, watch for pedestrians and cyclists, and give them the right-of-way. It's not just neighborly, it's the law!

And when you bike or walk, just remember:

• Be aware of your surroundings
• Be visible
• Ride legally & predictably
• Wear a helmet
• Share the road with all users

Enjoy yourself, and take advantage of all that Athens offers. We hope you'll get involved with BikeAthens!

Athens Transit & UGA buses to receive filters

A federal grant will allow both ATS and UGA Campus transit to install emissions filters on their fleets:

For an average city bus, the filter would reduce the amount of harmful particulates by 60 percent, he said.

"It will have a substantial air-quality impact. ... It will reduce the number of tons of particulates in the atmosphere in the air that we breathe in, not just at the bus stops, but countywide."

UGA Bike Planning Workshop

If you cycle to, on, or around the UGA campus, you are invited to a ...

UGA Bike Planning Workshop

When: Monday 27, 2009, drop in between 4:00 - 5:30 PM

Where: Jittery Joe's Roasting Co. (780 E. Broad St. Athens, GA)

Why: The Office of University Architects is working with a graduate student in Community and Regional Planning to develop a Bicycle Plan for UGA. The intent of this workshop is to verify existing conditions; identify areas of concern for cyclists; and document ideas for improving bike facilities to, from and within the UGA campus. Feedback from the workshop will provide a basis for planning and design. The result of this study will be a refined bicycle plan for campus with recommended steps toward implementation.

UGA-ACC land deal opens door for greenway expansion

From the Banner-Herald:

The University System Board of Regents today should approve the University of Georgia's decision to donate 1.35 acres of land off East Campus Road to the Athens-Clarke County government.

[R]iverside acreage [will] extend the North Oconee River Greenway from Oconee Hill Cemetery all the way south to College Station Road.

Athens-Clarke will get land along the North Oconee River to extend the North Oconee River Greenway from Oconee Hill Cemetery to College Station Road. The planned bridge will allow cyclists on the greenway to get to bike lanes on College Station Road.

Parking, planning, paths and bus fares

Downtown parking proposal stirs up protest

UGA planning to be managed in Atlanta?

Alt-trans funds: Sidewalks & South Milledge bike-ped path

Possible bus fare increase

Federal earmarks help replace UGA buses

Of the $9 million set aside for UGA in the federal stimulus bill, $1,330,000 will be used for replacing UGA buses.

More parking decks at UGA

Awwww.... come on!

The University of Georgia will add two more parking decks, one near the intramural fields off College Station Road and one near the Performing and Visual Arts Center on East Campus.

If approved today as expected by the University System Board of Regents, construction crews will begin work within weeks and finish as early as August, said UGA spokesman Tom Jackson.

The $9.2 million, 490-parking space deck near the intramural fields is scheduled to be finished in time to furnish overflow parking for UGA home football games, Jackson said.

UGA is supposed to be discouraging automobile use. These decks are utterly at odds with the university's demonstrated commitment to 1) expanding greenspace, 2) increasing walk- and bike-ability on campus, and 3) encouraging on-campus living.

The increased automobile traffic they create will make cycling on College Station's bike lanes far less safe.

This is a terrible, backwards-ass idea, and it sounds like it's being done to appease the tailgating Escalade convoys from out of town, and that it's too late to oppose it.

Not only is this asinine from a transportation perspective- it demonstrates a callous mis-allocation of money for the university. The state keeps shoveling money at UGA, but only for megalithic student centers and wrongheaded parking decks. Meanwhile, academic departments and student service offices are facing unprecedented cuts, including potentially widespread layoffs.

Is it sane to build a monumental campus, full of hapless students in empty, un-staffed buildings, while cash and bourbon-fueled donors park their land yachts in awful, modernist parking decks?

Bike Recycling Shop featured in photoshow and interview on UGA's Grady College of Journalism website

http://www.gradyjournal.com/?p=1046

Nice feature on the BikeAthens BRP history, mission, and accomplishments created by Jeffrey Uzzel from UGA. Thanks Jeff!