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This research looks at bicycle transportation, particularly bicycle commuting, in three North American cities with extensive bicycling activity and programs: Madison, Wisconsin; Boulder, Colorado; and Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The study describes bicycle transportation in these cities to gain ideas for further improvements in Minnesota bicycle transportation. Madison, Boulder, and Toronto share a reputation for high levels of bicycling activity. Each city plans for additions to its extensive system of bike paths and bike lanes. Wisconsin's state plan calls for an interconnected transportation system across government boundaries and jurisdictions and completed a Wisconsin Bicycle Transportation Plan in 1998. Boulder completed a Bicycle System Plan in 1996 as part of its Transportation Master Plan Update for the Boulder Valley. It, too, addresses the need to develop a continuous and well-connected provincial government of Ontario recently amalgamated the six municipal governments in the Toronto metro area to form The New City of Toronto, and the new city is now working on a new bicycle plan. A City Cycling Committee, a committee of the city council, looks at programs to increase the quantity and quality of bicycle trips in Toronto. The three cities also have developed public initiatives to promote bicycling, including bike-to-work events, free bike programs, and awards programs. All three cities publish extensive information about bicycling programs and issues on the Internet. Internet sites include official city sites, sites managed by independent organizations and individual bike activists, and electronic newsletters.

To improve the visibility and safety of pedestrian and bicyclist crossings, traffic-safety professionals across Minnesota have installed the Rectangular Rapid Flashing Beacon (RRFB) and Pedestrian Hybrid Beacon (PHB) at numerous locations around the state. The purpose of this evaluation was to determine the safety benefits, if any, for pedestrians and bicyclists after installation of an RRFB or PHB. This report included a before-after analysis as well as a cross-sectional analysis for each type of beacon with a corresponding group of comparison sites. The before-after analysis found that installation of an RRFB resulted in a 67% decrease in fatal crashes and a 62% decrease in bicyclist crashes. Installation of a PHB resulted in a 53% decrease in suspected minor injury crashes, a 67% decrease in pedestrians crashes, and a 50% decrease in bicyclist crashes. The results of the cross-sectional analysis did not indicate that these reductions were statistically significant compared to similar reductions in the control group. Still, the decreases in severe crashes and crashes involving non-motorists at RRFBs and PHBs indicated that both types of beacons could be effective safety treatments.

In order to increase the mileage of public roads that provide an acceptable level of service with available funds and to maximize fully the value of existing roadways for bicyclists, Mn/DOT has adopted bikeway design standards. Because more flexibility is provided, these standards will permit improvements to be made which will result in greater uniformity of highway geometries over major lengths of roadway. These standards are based on the relationship between the characteristics of the road design (bicycle driving area) to the average daily motorized traffic. Although these bikeway standards have been developed and should be used to the maximum extent possible, as with most engineering projects, the designer should use engineering judgement in the application of the standards.

This project provides a statistically defensible estimate of bicycle-miles of travel (BMT) for at least a substantial portion of the Twin Cities region and assesses the feasibility of monitoring bicycle volumes using sampling methods similar to those used to monitor motor vehicle traffic. Researchers used an ArcView database of the Twin Cities street system for the initial sampling frame and extended the database by manually adding information about average annual daily traffic volumes and about on- and off-road bicycle facilities. A stratified random sample of roadways links in Hennepin, Ramsey, and Dakota counties was drawn, and during the months of May through June and August through October 1998, the daytime bicycle volume for one day at each sampled site was obtained using time-lapse video. Researchers then used Cochrane's combined estimator to compute an estimate of average daytime BMT for the study area. Findings show that monitoring bicycle miles of travel using methods similar to those employed for vehicle miles of travel is now technically feasible in the Twin Cities region where several permanent counters on bicycle trails provide a rudimentary continuous count element. A video-based approach appears to be more accurate and less demanding of personnel than is on-site manual counting.

This report describes a system for monitoring bicycle activity in sequences of gray scale images from a stationary camera. Applications for such a system include determining the use and congestion of bicycle paths. The output of the system is a count of the number of bicycles detected in the image sequence. The system uses a simple model of two circular objects separated by relatively known distance, with four levels of abstraction: raw images, blobs, edge images, and the bicycle model. The system was implemented on a dual Pentium computer equipped with a Matrox imaging board and achieved a peak performance of eight frames per second. Experimental results based on outdoor scenes show promising results for a variety of weather conditions.

This report 1) describes the potential for improving bicycle transportation in the Twin Cities metropolitan area, 2) identifies the common barriers and limitations to bike transportation as described by metro area transportation officials and bicycle advocates, and 3) provides an overview of the organizations involved. The cities of Boulder, Colorado; Madison, Wisconsin; and Toronto, Ontario, Canada have built reputations for being bicycle friendly and were reviewed to provide examples of innovative bicycle programs. This guide serves as a starting point in describing bicycle transportation in the Twin Cities metropolitan area. Management of the transportation system in the Twin Cities metropolitan area is based on a multi-agency, regional approach. The Metropolitan Council, the Minnesota Department of Transportation, the counties and the cities all have responsibilities related to transportation in their jurisdictions. Important areas for development in order to make bicycling a viable transportation choice include: bike facilities, leadership, communication, planning, networks, research, measurement, partnerships, funding, information sharing, and customer needs.

This report gives a brief overview of four related small research projects. The full papers resulting from the projects are included as appendices. The four projects were related by the theme of bicycling preferences and behavior with regard to bicycling facilities. The studies were also connected by the fact that they were all based on information from the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota. The four reports are: Effect of Trails on Cycling. Value of Bicycle Facilities to Commuters. Effect of Facilities on Commute Mode Share. Cycling Behavior Near Facilities. Generally speaking, the results support the notion that people value bicycle facilities, in that they are willing to incur additional time costs in order to use higher quality facilities. The presence of facilities also appears to be associated with higher amounts of riding, although the precise nature of the impact is still unclear..

This Bicycle and Pedestrian Toolbox is a synthesis of current research on bicycle and pedestrian planning and facilities providing transportation planners and engineers with information on how to plan and design a bicycle and pedestrian network for a community. This Bicycle and Pedestrian Toolbox provides transportation planners and engineers with information on how to plan and design a bicycle and pedestrian network for a community. This toolbox summarizes each stage involved in the process of designing an active transportation network with a focus on how land use effects transportation planning. The planning is a cyclical six-stage process where first, community values are determined; second, existing features are evaluated; third, desire lines are identified; fourth, phasing of development is defined; fifth, selecting design treatments; and finally, sixth, evaluation of the network based on performance criteria.

This report establishes basic facts about bicycling in Minnesota, and estimates the sizes of the various types of benefits that bicycling creates. There are three main parts to the report. The first uses surveys and data analysis to estimate the amount of bicycling that takes place in Minnesota, and to describe its characteristics. The second part is the development of a theoretical and accounting framework for categorizing and measuring benefits. The third part calculates estimates of the total general benefits of bicycling in Minnesota. Probably about half of adults bicycle at least once in a typical summer. The benefits that result from this riding are large relative to expenditures on bicycle facilities; by our conservative assumptions, total benefits in Minnesota are in excess of $300 million per year. The size of these benefits is particularly notable when one considers that they are derived from relatively limited bicycling by most of the population. We find that the benefits to cyclists themselves are much larger than the benefits to society that bicycling creates, and that recreational riding, due to its much larger volume, creates more total benefits than does utilitarian riding.

This project addressed several MnDOT critical issues and strategic directions: easing congestion and improving mobility by making multi-modal transit options more easily accessible. It did so by extending the Cyclopath bicycle route-finding system to support multi-modal routes that combine cycling and transit. This required extensions to the route-finding algorithm - to combine biking and transit appropriately - and user interface - to let users express modal preferences and enhance the visual presentation of routes, e.g., to mark mode shifts. We used the Graphserver open-source software to as the routing engine; by building on existing software, we reduced development effort. We conducted interviews with a number of multimodal transit users to guide the design of the user interface.

The practices in this guide provide an overview of the current general state of the practice in Minnesota relating to the design, and operation of pedestrian- and bicycle-related factilites.

The purpose of this project was to develop methodologies for monitoring non-motorized traffic in Minnesota. The project included an inventory of bicycle and pedestrian monitoring programs; development of guidance for manual, field counts; pilot field counts in 43 Minnesota communities; and analyses of automated, continuous-motorized counts from locations in Minneapolis. The analyses showed hourly, daily, and monthly patterns are comparable despite variation in volumes and that adjustment factors can be used to extrapolate short-term counts and estimate annual traffic. The project technical advisory panel made five recommendations: (1) MnDOT should continue and institutionalize coordination of annual statewide manual bicycle and pedestrian counts; (2) MnDOT should improve methods for reporting results of field counts and explore web-based programs for data reporting and analysis; (3) MnDOT should lead efforts to deploy and demonstrate the feasibility of new automated technologies for bicycle and pedestrian counting, focusing on new technologies not presently used in Minnesota; (4) MnDOT should begin integration of non-motorized traffic counts from existing automated, continuous counters in Minneapolis into its new databases for vehicular traffic monitoring data; and (5) MnDOT should work with local governments and explore institutional arrangements for (a) establishing a network of permanent, automated continuous monitoring sites across the state and (b) sharing and deploying new technologies for short-duration monitoring to generate traffic counts that provide a more comprehensive understanding of spatial variation in nonmotorized traffic volumes.

Many cities in the United States are installing roundabouts instead of traditional intersections, due to evidence that roundabouts dramatically reduce fatal and severe injury crashes compared to traditional signalized intersections. However, the impact on pedestrian safety is not clear. This project was developed to investigate pedestrian accessibility in Minnesota urban roundabouts, addressing complaints from pedestrians regarding difficulties in crossing and safety. The methodology followed in this ongoing research is typical of other observational studies. A sufficiently large number of observations on the interactions between pedestrians or bicycles (peds/bikes) and vehicles at two modern urban roundabouts in the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul in Minnesota were collected and reduced. These observations have supported a two phased analysis. Phase 1 involved the extraction of general information describing the crossing event, such as who yielded, the location of the crossing, or the number of subjects involved. Phase 2 looked deeper into these factors by considering the conditions inside the roundabout before the vehicle proceeds to the crossing and meets with the ped/bike. The results presented, although containing no surprises, do highlight and categorize the existence of friction between pedestrians and drivers at roundabout crossings. Also the identification of factors affecting driver yield behavior and pedestrian wait time do offer good background for modeling such interactions.

This project estimated the economic impact of the bicycling industry and events in Minnesota, estimated bicycling infrastructure use across the state, and assessed the health effects of bicycling in the Twin Cities metropolitan area (TCMA). A survey of bicycling-related manufacturers, wholesalers, retailers, non-profit and advocacy groups found the industry produced a total of $779.9 million of economic activity in 2014. Using data from multiple sources, The number of bicycle trips in Minnesota was estimated to be between 75.2 and 96 million annually. The TCMA accounts for 69%-72% of the total number of trips and miles traveled in Minnesota. Bicycling events, including races, non-race rides, fundraising events, mountain bicycling events, high school races, and bicycle tours, produced a total of $14.3 million of economic activity in 2014. All six types of bicycling events mainly attract white, non-Hispanic male participants. "Riding my bicycle" was the most frequently identified reason to attend an event (except for fundraising event participants), and there is a variety of enjoyable attributes that differed across event types. Overall, respondents were satisfied with the events. Bicycle commuting prevents 12 to 61 deaths per year, saving $100 million to $500 million. Bicycle commuting three times per week is also linked to 46% lower odds of metabolic syndrome, 32% lower odds of obesity, and 28% lower odds of hypertension, all of which lower medical costs. Project findings tell a compelling story for the positive effects of bicycling and provide direct evidence that supports the efforts of promoting bicycling-related industry, infrastructure, events, and activities.

The Minnesota Department of Transportation (MnDOT) launched the Minnesota Bicycle and Pedestrian Counting Initiative in 2011; a statewide; collaborative effort to encourage and support non-motorized traffic monitoring. This report summarizes work by MnDOT and the University of Minnesota between 2014 and 2016 to institutionalize bicycle and pedestrian monitoring. The project team established a new statewide bicycle and pedestrian traffic monitoring network with 25 permanent monitoring locations and a new district-based portable counting equipment loan program. Other key accomplishments included Minnesota's first Bicycle and Pedestrian Annual Traffic Monitoring Report; a new MnDOT website for reporting annual and short-duration counts; and a new Bicycle and Pedestrian Data Collection Manual that local jurisdictions and consultants can use to design manual and automated non-motorized traffic monitoring programs. The project team also included provisions in MnDOT equipment vendor agreements that enable local governments to purchase bicycle and monitoring equipment; established new annual training programs for bicycle and pedestrian monitoring; and contributed provisions in the Statewide Bicycle System Plan and Minnesota Walks that call for bicycle and pedestrian traffic monitoring and creation of performance measures based on counts. Despite this progress; challenges in implementing monitoring remain and continued investment in and support for bicycle and traffic monitoring is needed.

The Minnesota Department of Transportation (MnDOT) launched the Minnesota Bicycle and Pedestrian Counting Initiative in 2011; a statewide; collaborative effort to encourage and support non-motorized traffic monitoring. One of the objectives of the Initiative was to provide guidance related to monitoring bicycle and pedestrian traffic. This manual is an introductory guide nonmotorized traffic monitoring. The manual describes general traffic monitoring principles; bicycle and pedestrian data collection sensors; how to perform counts; data management and analysis; and the next steps for bicycle and pedestrian traffic monitoring in Minnesota. The manual also includes several case studies that illustrate how bicycle and pedestrian traffic data can be used to support transportation planning and engineering.

Engineers need information about interactions between vehicles and bicyclists to design efficient; safe transportation systems. This study involved a review of design guidelines for bicycle facilities; observation of bicycle-vehicle interactions at nine roadways with different types of bicycle facilities; analysis of results; and description of design implications. Facilities observed included buffered and striped bicycle lanes; sharrows; signed shared lanes; and shoulders of various widths. Driver behaviors were categorized as no change in trajectory; deviation within lane; encroachment into adjacent lane; completion of a passing maneuver; and queuing behind cyclists. Drivers on roadways with bicycle lanes were less likely to encroach into adjacent lanes; pass; or queue when interacting with cyclists than drivers on roadways with sharrows; signs designating shared lanes; or no bicycle facilities. Queueing behind cyclists; the most significant impact on vehicular traffic flows; generally was highest on roads with no facilities or shared facilities without marked lanes. Statistical modeling confirmed the descriptive results. Given an objective of increasing predictability of driver behavior; buffered or striped bicycle lanes offer advantages over other facilities. Sharrows may alert drivers to the presence of cyclists; but traffic impacts on roadways with sharrows may not differ significantly from roadways with no facilities. Signs indicating bicyclists may occupy lanes also may alert drivers to the presence of cyclists; but this study provided no evidence that interactions on roadways marked only with signs differ from roadways with no facilities. From the perspective of reducing potential traffic impacts; bicycle lanes are to be preferred over sharrows or signage.

This project extended the existing Cyclopath and Cycloplan bicycle routing and planning system. The primary goal of this project was to develop a statewide bicycle map. The map was intended to serve multiple purposes, including: Giving people throughout Minnesota easy access to bicycle routing information, thus making it easier for them to utilize bicycling as transportation; Supporting long-distance bicycle travel and bicycle travel outside of urban areas; Compiling disparate sets of bikeways data - from different sources and in different formats - into a single, unified dataset and tool; Serving as a collaborative tool for public participation and inter-agency cooperation. We achieved these goals by working closely with relevant stakeholders - both end users and planners - over the life of this project. The result is a version of Cyclopath that: Enables bicycle routing for the entire state of Minnesota; Features a significantly simplified and improved end-user interface; Adds useful new features for transportation planners.

Investigators created a manual to help MnDOT and local agencies implement counting programs, which can be used to evaluate safety and use of bicycle and pedestrian facilities. The first edition of this manual was published as a draft version. The final version is Report 2017-03.

The Minnesota Bicycle and Pedestrian Counting Initiative: Implementation Study reports results from the second in a series of three MnDOT projects to foster non-motorized traffic monitoring. The objectives were to install and validate permanent automated sensors, use portable sensors for short duration counts, develop models for extrapolating counts, and integrate continuous counts into MnDOT traffic monitoring databases. Commercially available sensors, including inductive loops, integrated inductive loops and passive infrared, pneumatic tubes, and radio beams, were installed both as permanent monitor sites and used for short-duration counts at a variety of locations in cities, suburbs, and small towns across Minnesota. All sensors tested in the study produced reasonably accurate measures of bicycle and pedestrian traffic. Most sensors undercounted because of their inability to distinguish and count bicyclists or pedestrians passing simultaneously. Accuracy varied with technology, care and configuration of deployment, maintenance, and analytic methods. Bicycle and pedestrian traffic volumes varied greatly across locations, with highest volumes being on multiuse trails in urban areas. FHWA protocols were used to estimate annual average daily traffic and miles traveled on an 80-mile multiuse trail network in Minneapolis. Project findings were incorporated in a new MnDOT guidance document, "DRAFT Bicycle and Pedestrian Data Collection Manual" used in statewide training workshops. A major challenge in implementing bicycle and pedestrian traffic monitoring is data management. Years will be required to institutionalize bicycle and pedestrian traffic successfully.

The objective of the project is to analyze existing technologies used for the process of generating counts of bicycles and pedestrians in transportation facilities such as walk and bicycle bridges, urban bicycle routes, bicycle trails etc. The advantages and disadvantages of each existing technology which is being applied to counting has been analyzed and some commercially available products were listed. A technical description of different methods that were considered for vision based object recognition is also mentioned along with the reasons as to why such methods were overlooked for our problem. Support Vector Machines were used for classification based on a vocabulary of features built using interest point detectors. After finalizing the software and hardware, five sites were picked for filming and about 10 hours of video was acquired in all. A portion of the video data was used for training and the remainder was used for testing the algorithm's accuracy. Results of counts are provided and an interpretation of these results is provided in this report. Upon detailed analysis the reasons for false counts and undercounting in some cases have been identified and current work concerns dealing with these issues. Changes are being made to the system to improve the accuracy with the current level of training and make the system available for practitioners to perform counting.

Report #9 in the series: Access to Destinations Study. Conventional transportation planning is often focused on improving movement (or mobility) - most often by the automobile. To the extent that accessibility, a well-known concept in the transportation planning field since the 1950s, has been measured or used in transportation planning, such measures have also been auto-based. Broadening the scope of accessibility to include a wide array of destinations and non-auto modes such as walking, cycling, and transit has been previously proposed as a much needed aim among planning initiatives. A central issue is that to date, however, there have been few examples of measures draw from. When it comes to bicycling, walking, and transit measures of accessibility are an endeavor long on rhetoric but short on execution. This report discusses such hurdles, presents alternatives for overcoming them, and demonstrates how accessibility for walking, cycling, and transit - and for different types of destinations - can be reliably measured. We focus on explaining specific features of non-motorized transportation that complicate the development of accessibility measures, and offer solutions that conform to conventional transportation planning practice. In this research project, non-motorized measures of accessibility were developed for the entire seven counties of the Twin Cities (Minnesota, USA) metropolitan area. For purposes of this exposition in this report, we discuss the details of creating such measures using a sample application from Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA to demonstrate proof of concept for the endeavor.

This guide presents a practical planning model for bicycle transportation in cities, suburbs and small towns. It focuses on the use of networks of specialized bicycle facilities and bicycle friendly zones to support and promote the use of bicycles for transportation. The potential of using bicycle roadway networks in relationship to land use is discussed in terms of using them to make a civic contribution to the form of the city beyond transportation function. A model classification system for bicycle facilities is presented that is similar to the "functional classification of streets" for motor vehicle roadways. Bicycle Expressways, Bicycle Boulevards and Bicycle Byways are introduced and discussed as specific types of bicycle roadways. Detailed planning parameters are recommended for assembling the different types of bicycle facilities into integrated systems to support bicycle use for utilitarian transportation. Planning guidelines for bicycle friendly zones are presented, along with a step-by-step process that describes how communities can plan for bicycle transportation. Planning and design considerations that are important to the success of a bicycle transportation system are also discussed. These considerations include the needs of cyclists, skill levels, personal safety issues, system legibility and traffic calming techniques. This guidebook is intended for use by professional planners, designers and engineers, neighborhood groups, bicycle advocates and community decision makers.

This handout pertains to report 2016-36, Assessing the Economic Impact and Health Effects of Bicycling in Minnesota.

This handout pertains to report 2016-36, Assessing the Economic Impact and Health Effects of Bicycling in Minnesota.