Advocates say bicyclists promote health, wealth

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By Ken McCall, Staff Writer Updated 11:12 PM Thursday, August 20, 2009

Why would 320 cities, villages and regions want to apply for Bicycle Friendly Community status?

Here’s a hint: It’s not just about the bikes.

“It’s about health, wealth and freedom,” Bill Nesper, director of the Bicycle Friendly America program for the League of American Bicyclists, told 300 people gathered last week for the first Miami Valley Cycling Summit. “We’re talking about creating communities where people really want to live, bike and walk. We’re talking about transforming communities.”

Health, because the country is suffering from an obesity epidemic for which walking and biking is an obvious prescription.

Freedom, because if there were more safe places to ride, the one-third of the population (including kids and many elderly) who don’t drive or have access to a car could get around more easily.

And wealth, because biking is good for business.

Nesper pointed out to the group of cyclists and local officials that 80 percent of business owners surveyed in Portland, which is one of three cities with the league’s highest rating for bicycle friendliness, agree that the conditions created to gain the status have helped their business.

Nesper cited another study in Toronto, that found cyclists spent more in a commercial district than people driving cars.

In addition, he said, the National Association of Realtors — realizing that their members sell communities as much as properties — changed their policy statement on transportation to call for the consideration of the needs of all kinds of users, including cyclists, pedestrians and transit riders, in every transportation project.

“The reasons we hear from business owners is that people want to be in the sorts of places where bicycling and walking is really encouraged, where people are on the streets,” Nesper said. “Businesses think that by being in these communities that you have more foot traffic and more people being connected to the neighborhood.”

It turns out, a group of Dayton businesses are thinking the same thing.

Toward the end of a very full day at the summit, philanthropist and downtown advocate Mike Ervin said a group of 200 volunteers is putting together a plan to transform downtown Dayton.

As part of that project, he said, they brought together 25 companies to talk about what they needed to thrive.

“They told us, ‘You have to create a great sense of place in the downtown. If you can’t do that, we can’t recruit employees,’ ” Ervin said. “Companies are moving where people want to live.”

A big part of creating a place where people want to live and visit, Ervin said, means changing the function of the streets.

“The streets need to be designed equally for cars, pedestrians and bicycles,” he said. “They need to be a real amenity, a nice place to be.”

The city needs not only “multiple bike lanes,” he said, but also employers who support bike commuting and parking.

“I think bicycling is going to be really important to the future of Dayton,” Ervin said.

Contact Ken McCall at (937) 225-2393 or kmccall@DaytonDailyNews.com.

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