Paper Details

TRB 91st Annual Meeting (January 22-26, 2012)

Event Number:	539
Event Title:	Bicycle Planning and the Built Environment
Event Date:	Jan 24 2012 10:45AM- 12:30PM
Event Location:	Hilton, International Center
Event Description:
Event Agenda:

Using Bicycle Level of Service to Assess Community-wide Bikeability (12-4154)

This paper introduces a novel method to assess the quality of bicycle travel throughout a community. At the outset, the paper distinguishes between “bicycle suitability” as an assessment of the comfort and safety of a linear section of bikeway and “bikeability” as the assessment of the comfort and convenience of an entire bikeway-network in terms of access to important destinations. The focus of this paper is bikeability, but the proposed new measure incorporates suitability in the equation. A review of the literature reveals that most of the previous work concerning the quality of bicycle travel deals with bicycle suitability, not bikeability. There is, however, ample research concerning the related concept of “accessibility.” The new calculation for bikeability builds on an equation commonly used to measure accessibility and is demonstrated through a case study involving three different capital investment scenarios. Engineers and planners can follow a similar procedure to help prioritize improvement projects or to communicate the benefits of new projects. The paper also discusses how engineers and planners can determine what level of accuracy is needed when estimating the necessary input data.

Authors
     Lowry, Michael B., University of Idaho
     Callister, Daniel , University of Idaho
     Gresham, Maureen H., Idaho Department of Transportation
     Moore, Brandon , University of Idaho