Cool New Jersey

Building a Walkable and Bikeable Community

A central element of climate friendly municipal planning and management is the facilitation and promotion of alternative transportation, notably bicycling and walking. Far too often in New Jersey, these forms of transportation are seen only as recreational activities or only viable for very short trips (i.e.: from the parking lot to the store’s entrance.) However, properly designed and managed communities can make walking and bicycling a real, everyday alternative to automobile use. The result is not only reduced automobile use, and thus a healthier climate, but also a healthier and happier population. (Millions of tons, CO2 equivalent

Transportation is the largest single source of climate changing emissions in New Jersey

Walkability

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♦ Ensure sidewalk connectivity.
A walkable community requires sidewalks that are wide, buffered from roads, continuous, and that allow connectivity between residential areas, commercial centers, parking, mass transit, and greenways.
A well-developed pedestrian network also offers a more healthy community. Research indicates that the decline in sidewalks in American communities has significantly contributed to inactivity, particularly among older adults, and is tied to increasing obesity among all segments of society.

♦ Require connected, walkable sidewalks in all new developments.
New developments are often required to provide sidewalks within the development. However, developers can also be required to pay the cost for connecting these sidewalks with existing pedestrian routes and nearby commercial areas.

♦ Facilitate walking and cycling to school programs.
Several counties in New Jersey participate in the Safe Routes to School program in an effort to encourage more students to walk and bike to school. Cutting down on the number of parents who must drive their children short distances to school on a daily basis promises a healthier alternative for our children and the environment. Extra police protection and crossing guards can help ensure safety.

♦ Ensure wide sidewalks in commercial areas and town centers.
Wide sidewalks encourage lingering and allow for sidewalk services and events that can promote pedestrian travel, encourage a sense of community, and foster civic engagement more generally. A vibrant town center means less driving and less sprawl, and so less climate changing emissions as well.

♦ Encourage sidewalk commerce.
Facilitated permit requirements can be used to encourage walk-up windows, sidewalk dining, and retail displays. Encouraging walking requires that we provide a pleasant walking environment and plentiful services and amenities to pedestrian traffic.

♦ Establish clear standards of walkability for future development.
Communities should adopt clear design standards for community sidewalks and establish periodic review procedures for sidewalk performance and design to ensure the maintenance of a walkable community.

♦ Employ traffic calming devices.
Design devices such as raised intersections, speed humps, curb extensions, bus bulges, center islands and plantings, diagonal parking, and road narrowing help promote a walkable and bikeable town center.

♦ Prioritize pedestrian access.
Pedestrian travel must not be an appendage to car-centered development. Walking and biking can be a central element of the planning process from the outset if it is codified into municipal planning policies and procedures. Crosswalks should be plentiful, marked with a physically distinct surface or raised area and signage, and they should be facilitated with prioritized, pedestrian-activated signals. Traffic signals should be timed to allow pedestrian to cross before turning vehicles and to have adequate time to complete the crossing. Routes must be safe, pleasant and offer connectivity.

♦ Establish pedestrian galleries closed to motor vehicle traffic.
Outdoor pedestrian malls are unfortunately rare in New Jersey. However, in communities around the country, pedestrian malls in town centers and urban shopping areas have proven to be a win-win-win option. Citizens get a more livable and pleasant town center, merchants get considerable drawing power for new customers, and the planet’s climate gets a small respite.

♦ Make pedestrian and bicycle planning a routine and required part of all transportation planning and development.
Requiring that all future development and planning prioritize pedestrian and bike traffic can help ensure the future development of a climate-friendly community and livable town center.

Most of New Jersey is a flat, and much of it is compact and therefore potentially a great place to walk and ride a bicycle. But pedestrians and cyclists face many obstacles and threats, from the lack of secure places to leave their bikes to unsafe street conditions.

Roughly eight to sixteen percent of trips made in New Jersey are made by bicycle. While advanced bicyclists represent only twenty percent of all cyclists, they account for a full eighty percent of all trips. Both of these numbers indicate that there is a great deal of room to enhance and expand the use of bicycles as a everyday transportation alternative. Proper municipal policies can help encourage this move.

♦ Ensure accessible bike racks are placed in commercial areas and town centers.
Research indicates that one of the primary reasons Americans do not ride their bikes to shopping and leisure activities is lack of facilities. A convenient and secure place to leave you bike while shopping is an important way to encourage human powered, and fossil-fuel-free, transportation for short trips.

♦ Define bike lanes in town centers and major thoroughfares.
Bike lanes should not only allow for leisure riding, they should facilitate convenient connections between residential and commercial areas for adult bike traffic.

♦ Ensure safe bike lanes to, and bike facilities at, every municipal school.
This policy reaps triple dividends. By encouraging biking to school, communities can lessen the emissions of school buses. Less parents driving to drop off and pick up their child also reduces fossil field use. And as an added bonus, recent research indicates that biking or walking to school can be a vital part of the fight against youth obesity.

♦ Establish clearly designated bike lanes in major commuter corridors.
Biking should be a major part of a community’s transportation planning. By adopting innovative policies, some municipalities in the US have been able to encourage over ten percent of their road traffic to be by bicycle.

♦ Offer public access bike storage, changing rooms and showers in municipal buildings.
Biking to work can save time and money while allowing the rider to get a quick workout each morning. Surveys and common sense indicate that Americans are more likely to bike to work if they have a convenient place to store their gear and a way of washing before they start work. Municipal facilities, particularly those located in town or urban centers or near businesses, can make municipal facilities publicly available; or municipalities and businesses can negotiate affordable public access to private facilities like sports clubs and gyms for bike commuters.

♦ Create incentives for private/public bicycling facilities.
For example, developers and businesses might be given a reduced parking requirement if they provide showers, lockers, and bicycle parking for employees. Or developers might be allowed to contribute to a shared facility in exchange for reduced parking requirements or other consideration.

♦ Require covered bike parking in new commercial constructions.
Encouraging or requiring sheltered bike parking or bike lockers is not only good for the climate, it can help build ties between the community and merchants. Even extensive bike facilities are a very small part of the total construction costs of a large commercial development.

♦ Establish a bicycling and pedestrian citizens committee.
An established committee of citizens can help improve municipal projects, develop new resources, promote walking and cycling, and periodically review municipal practices. With many municipalities strapped for cash, a team of engaged volunteers can help identify options without requiring a major outlay of new funds.

♦ Define bicycle transportation as an obligatory element of municipal planning.
Defining a comprehensive program to facilitate and encourage bicycling requires that cycling be understood as an important aspect of any municipality’s transportation and development planning. Bicycling access and connectivity should not be left as an afterthought or appendage to planning, but must be incorporated as a central element of the planning process from the beginning.

♦ Establish physically separated bike paths in commuter corridors, preferably through greenways.
People are most likely to turn to bicycles as a regular form of transportation when it is both convenient and pleasant. A separate bike path through a greenway can provide that environment while avoiding the traffic management challenges associated with greater bike traffic. Routes connecting residential areas with town centers and commercial areas should be a priority.

♦ In larger municipalities, establish a bikeshare program.
Bikeshare programs have been used successfully in Europe and are being planed in several communities in the United States. Some bike sharing programs allow residents to sign out bikes from stations around the city and return them to other stations at the end of their trip. In smaller towns, a bike loan program might allow residents to check out bikes for a set period of time. Some municipalities have opted for a subsidized purchase program for commuter bikes, easing the management and maintenance costs of bikesharing programs. In such programs, residents can purchase a commuter bicycle at a discount subsidized by the municipality.