<
https://www.businessinsider.com/bike-lanes-good-for-business-studies-better-streets-2024-3>
"Businesses hate bike lanes. Sure, they reduce pollution, slow the pace of
climate change, cut traffic fatalities, and make cities healthier and more
pleasant. But they also take away parking spaces, which makes it tougher for
shoppers to load up their cars with piles of stuff. Freaked-out business owners
have been fighting bike lanes coast to coast, in cities from San Diego to
Cambridge, Massachusetts. They worry — not unreasonably — that anything that
makes it harder for customers to get to their stops will eat into their already
precarious margins.
“As someone whose family had a small business when I was growing up, I know
how invested you get in it,” says Joseph Poirier, a senior researcher at the
urban-planning consultancy Nelson Nygaard. “It’s your whole life. Anything you
think could threaten that, even if the government and their consultants tell
you it’s not going to be a problem, is very scary. It makes sense.”
It’s also wrong. Four decades’ worth of research proves it. I know this because
I’ve read every study and report I could find that looked specifically at the
economics of bike lanes since 1984 — 32 research articles, to be exact. The
results show that making streets friendlier for bikes — and sidewalks
friendlier for pedestrians — is actually good for business. The rise of
“complete streets” and “road diets,” as urban planners call them, has been a
huge boon to businesses in cities."
Via
Reasons to be Cheerful:
<
https://reasonstobecheerful.world/what-were-reading-bike-lanes-dam-debates/>
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
