As bike use grows, New York needs to install more parking for cyclists, say bicycling advocates.
There’s just one bicycle parking spot for every 100 spaces for cars, pro-bike group Transportation Alternatives said in a report released Tuesday.
That’s the result of years of prioritizing cars over bikes — and recent efforts by the de Blasio administration to boost bike infrastructure are inadequate, the group said.
“Simply put, there is not enough bicycle parking in New York City,” Transportation Alternatives executive Danny Harris said in a statement. “Despite more households owning bikes than cars, bike parking has taken a back seat to free private car storage on our streets.”
The city could start with communities of color and low-income nabes — “where streets are most dangerous due to historic and modern disinvestment, and utilities like bicycle parking, bicycle share, and bicycle lanes are largely absent” — the group stated.
The city Transportation Department disagreed with the thrust of the report.
“NYC DOT takes bike parking very seriously and, contrary to the report, has without question brought about a successful broadening of parking availability across the five boroughs, and done so facing COVID-related challenges,” transportation spokesman Scott Gastel said in an email.
DOT built about 1,150 bike spaces last year and plans to install 13 new “bike corrals” this winter, he added.
That’s as bike use has boomed — by one measure, cyclist traffic across the city’s four East River bridges rose 21% during a stretch of 2020.
Transportation Alternatives said between the surge in bike use and a reported 27% increase in bicycle theft make the creation of new parking spots urgent. But the group didn’t put a number on the number of new bike parking spots the city needs.
The group suggested “reclaiming” car parking by turning vehicle spots into “shelters” that can hold seven to 10 bikes, and the creation of big, keycard-protected “bicycle parking cages.”
The group applauded the launch of bike-share services and the creation of some protected bike lanes.
Last year, the city built 28.6 miles of protected bike lanes as 25 cyclists died on city streets, according to NYPD stats, nearing a record set in 2019.
With Rocco Parascandola
