How Boston Built An Amazing Bike Lane Network

Bike Lanes have been built across America. But few cities have had as much success as Boston. In this episode we look at the history, opposition, and results of bike lane programs in Boston, Cambridge, Somerville, and other cities in the Boston Metro Area.
#bikelanes #architecture #transit #urbanism #city #cities #Boston
Picture Credits:
Keep McGuinness Moving Protest pictures - Josh Katz @joshkatz
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Sources & Credits:
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Case Study Videos:
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Why Road Diets Don't Hurt Businesses: • Road Dieting NYC Streets
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Social Media:
Instagram: @i.just.walk
Threads: @i.just.walk
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Contact:
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[@willsmath]

great video, crazy how Boston's leadership was 10 years ahead of the current surge in popularity of urbanism and anti car dependency. Hopefully that means a lot of cities who are just now catching on can have as robust a bike network as Boston a decade from now

[@timwalks]

That also really surprised me when researching this story. That Boston Mayor's were already considering a potentially bike dominant future back in 2010. I would love to be able to go back in time and ask Mayor Menino what sparked this idea.

[@nunyabidness3075]

How many bike trips to car trips is the ratio that makes a bike lane successful? We have some that get used a LOT, and a new one which was controversial that is rarely used.

[@lbergen001]

As a 🇳🇱Dutchman, I am so thrilled that the Boston area has this vision to make a liveable city; good biking infrastructure is just one element in that. I guess they are on or close to the pivot point where most people will switch and get out of their car, and experience all the benefits of this policies.

[@cullenelwell6178]

Boston still has a long way to go

[@StillAnotherStudent]

Really makes me wish LA would get a cycling friendly city council

[@timwalks]

It seemed to work in Santa Monica! I know theyve been working on improving bike infra

[@gasmaster8437]

@@timwalks Yeah LA council just lacks the crucial element you described in how Boston pushed through opposition. It's the same reason we still have nearly 80% of City of LA zoned for detached SFH and lead the nation in homelessness and rent burden

[@georgepeters3344]

Makes more sense for LA to have bike paths vs Boston that has snow/ice to contend with for 4 months of the year.

[@KJSvitko]

Cities need to do more to encourage people to ride bicycles. Safe protected bike lanes and trails are needed so adults and children can ride safely. Speak up for bicycles in your community. Bicycles make life and cities better. Ask your local transportation planner and elected officials to support more protected bike lanes and trails. Children should be riding a bicycle to school and not be driven in a minivan.

[@Lukehmcc]

As a Bostonian myself, I would say that Boston is actually far worse off than Cambridge and Somerville. Some of the major streets like Huntington, Commonwealth avenue, and beacon Street all are quite bad in terms of bike infrastructure. The vast majority of them are simply covered by painted bicycle gutters or less. Whenever I go over to Cambridge I'm a little bit jealous of how much better the bike infrastructure is.

[@timwalks]

I totally agree. Cambridge and Somerville certainly left me more impressed!

[@christophermcmullen5307]

Nice to see Boston really moving up. I returned to cycling while living in Montreal in the summer of 2004. I kept cycling upon my return to Boston but it was...not easy. I left in 2007 ( for other reasons). Now in Montreal I'm spoiled by the infrastructure, but in the last two years I've brought bikes down to Boston. While my rides are mostly downtown or in Cambridge, I'm happy to see so many cycletracks and look forward to exploring more.

[@peteroleary9447]

Now do winter in Montreal. Or Boston for that matter.

[@ratedpz9461]

What an amazing video! great editing, great points, and really well put together. As a Bostonian, it was cool to see so many places in the video that are right in my neighborhood, and see how much we are improving from a different perspective. I use the bike lanes very often, and even though it is far far away from being finished and the system will never be perfect, I've seen way more people using the bike lanes, especially just to go to work and take their kids to school via an e-bike or cargo-bike or something of that sort. The MBTA has seen better days, but as you mentioned, at least the bike lanes provide a viable alternative. I also wish nimbies understand that being tied to a single mode of transportation is NOT freedom, and even if they still want to drive, the bike lanes will convince others to ditch their cars and they will have to worry about less traffic. At least some have a sense of humor, like the "NimBEE," that made me laugh.

[@timwalks]

Thanks for the thoughtful comment! I also didn't realize just how risky it is for cities to be tied to a single mode of transportation until I started exploring urbanism more. But it makes sense. In Engineering we intentionally create redundancies for when systems fail. We need to have redundancies in our transportation networks and modes.

[@zoepaulastrassfield2664]

I think “parking” is so much easier in Boston with a bike anyway- the streets are so narrow in the old parts of the city that there are never spaces anyway, but I can tie up my bike to any lamppost or street sign if a rack isn’t available (and usually one is, we have a lot of racks!)

[@kinkema]

Boston is definitely improving but Cambridge and Somerville are leaving it in the dust. Cambridge is the leader when it comes to bike specific infrastructure(by a long shot), but Somerville has been doing a great job with quick, cheap neighborhood traffic calming.

[@timwalks]

I definitely agree! But I will say there were some parts of Cambridge where I did feel unsafe riding around. Somerville Avenue's sidewalk level bike lane is the ideal. Somerville's Community Path is also so wonderful! Are there certain streets in Cambridge you think I missed that I really need to check out next time?

[@kinkema]

​@@timwalks Our two showcase streets would probably be Galileo Galilei Way as well as Cambridge St./Hampshire St. through Inman Square. Both feature sidewalk level lanes with protected intersections. Western Ave. and Vassar St. are quite similar to the Somerville Ave. lanes(raised, level crossings, signal separation). For our newest quick build projects, both Garden St. and Brattle St. utilize pre-cast curbs which makes them far more comfortable imo.

[@AmtrakProductions]

@@timwalks I'd also go check out Garden Brattle and Western. Inman Square is the most dutch intersection in the US as well

[@MikeMacHenry]

All hail Camberville! I'm honestly proud of both Boston and Camberville for the developments. But I agree Camberville's leaving Boston in the dust. I'm excited that there are plans to run a new bike path through the right of way through Kendall connecting Magazine Beach to the Somerville Community Path at inner belt. I think that's going to be awesome.

[@drjustino]

I'm not sure what the "traffic calming" effect is that you're seeing in Somerville... It's the worst it's ever been

[@statelyelms]

I vaguely remember hearing that the main reason the Netherlands got so bike friendly from their car dependency era was because the government nationalized road design or something along those lines, with a national design booklet. Obviously the USA couldn't do this exactly due to the sheer differences between cities, but what about on a state or regional level? Would really help with that "trying to getting bike lanes right and failing" issue. Also, absolutely great episode and I'm so glad to see this progress.. seeing as Boston started early it's almost like a glimpse into the future for those starting now.

[@ChristiaanHW]

the (main) reasons why cycling gained traction in the 70's was a combination of circumstances. you had the oil crises which made oil harder to get and way more expensive, you have the fact that cars are pretty expensive to buy in The Netherlands and due to the rising amount of cars more and more people got killed and injured in traffic accidents. among those deaths were a lot of children. so a group of people who had enough of those rising fatalities (among them some people who lost children themselves and had a big voice in the community) started a protest movement which gained a lot of traction and eventually was able to make the government listen to them. but that was how it started, after a start you have to keep on going. and The Netherlands does that by never being happy with how it is now, there's always room for improvement and so we keep on developing and improving our (cycling) infrastructure. we test some new concept in a few places and if they end up safer and better than our current infrastructure we start to implement it in more places. and yes we do have a nationwide guideline for engineers to make infrastructure uniform across the nation so people know what kind of street they are driving on by just looking at it. instead of every region having it's own type of roads and rules.

[@jonjurgens7412]

This gives me hope for the US. I lived in Boston from 2012-2018 and never really felt safe on my bike, unless I was on the Charles. Living in Europe now, but looking forward to a visit this coming summer. Seems like a different city from when I left.

[@timwalks]

It's definetly no Amsterdam, but if you havent been there in 5 years, it will be a drastically different city. Some of the biggest developments in Cambridge and Somerville only took place in the last 3 years

[@seantroy3172]

@@timwalks I lived in the Cambridge/Watertown/Waltham area for about 10 years, but have been away for the previous 3. Visiting here now and coming back it's amazing to see the amount of new bike infra starting to extend through this area.

[@MikeMacHenry]

Great video. I'm from Somerville and we're all pretty excited about the extension of the bike path. Most of our community is pretty eager to jump on this development asap I think. I know a few folks who already game up driving to work in favor of biking once the bike path opened up. Another friend is too scared to at the moment but wants to but lives in Chelsea where we haven't yet extended our bike network. But there's plans to create a pedestrian and bike bridge across the Mystic from Somerville to Chelsea beginning next year. So I think eventually she'll be able to stop driving too. As for the anti bike folks, I wish they'd realize folks like her are the solution to the problem they also want solved, which is less traffic congestion. I would also like to critique a small point on Boston's multi-city make up. The fact that most of Boston doesn't live in Boston is definitely not due to urban sprawl and white flight. Those things happened in every city equally back in the day, sure. That would account true suburbs way out of the network. But Cambridge, Somerville, Arlington, Newton, Brookline, Watertown, and others, these are not suburbs. They're part of the actual city. In any other city like Chicago or LA, they would be just part of the city proper. Due to Boston's very early American settlement and lots of odd town lines being drawn very early in history, they have remained technically separate town. And you're absolutely correct that this posses all sorts of political headaches when trying to do city wide infrastructure projects like the bike network because anyone city which is actually just a neighborhood of the same city could opt out. But image you told Chicago that Hyde Park and Wrigglyville and Boystown could all have their own separate mayor and we'd call them different cities and have separate elections. It'd be the same exact situation but that's definitely not an more urban sprawl or white flight happening there. You just drew the town lines different. That's exactly what's happening. We drew our town lines a long time ago way smaller than typical US cities.

[@timwalks]

Thanks for the compliments and feedback! I've gotten quite a few comments about how I related the various cities around Boston to each other, haha. Ironically, most are pretty angry that I associated the outer Boston cities to Boston itself. This comment interestingly takes it in the other direction. I agree that Cambridge, Somerville, and Arlington feel like they are part of the urban core. But these areas definitely experienced some post war suburban sprawl. If they were more urban cities, I'd compare them to Long Island City in NYC or Downtown Brooklyn. While these Boston areas do have a downtown, they just don't have the same level of density across their whole area. I think the definitions of urban versus suburb can be a tad subjective. I was actually surprised how many people in the Boston Metro area considered themselves to live in an urban area. Raise in NYC, most parts of the Boston Metro area feel very suburban to me. But all of this is to say, that we have different perspectives for what is a "dense city"

[@MikeMacHenry]

@@timwalks Interesting folks are upset about it. I'm definitely not. But it's something I find non-Bostonian's confused about because it's genuinely confusing. Yeah suburban sprawl hit everywhere similarly and Boston is no different there. The main point I'm conveying is not that I think Cambridge and Somerville are dense enough to be considered a real city or not. So I don't think we necessarily disagree about what counts as a dense city. What I'm saying is look at say Hyde Park, Chicago, where I used to live. It's less dense by a little bit than Somerville. Hyde Park is also 4.75 miles from the loop at the closest point whereas Somerville is 1 mile from Downtown Crossing. And yet Hyde Park is legally speaking Chicago proper whereas Somerville is a completely different town with it's own mayor. That is not normal for American cities. If we were zones like any normal US city instead of zones the way settling Europeans laid it out, just given the way city tend to cover large areas, Somerville would defintely just be Boston proper. It would be a much less, suburban feeling neighborhood of Boston proper just like Hyde Park is a suburban less dense feeling neighborhood of Chicago. So that's why I say Somerville, Quincy, Cambridge, etc are all basically Boston. The only difference is it's harder to unite the whole city on a plan when you need to convince every mayor and electorate of the plan instead of one mayor and a pure majority allowing, say Somerville to out vote Quincy. But that can't happen here. So yeah it's just the arbitrary lines that make us different. Not more or less sprawl or white flight. I think we had that stuff the same amount as most.

[@mindstalk]

@@timwalks As I said in another comment, Cambridge and Somerville are denser than Boston. I think Somerville is the densest city in New England. Streetcar suburb largely full of triple-deckers.

[@ChrisDevers]

Yeah, at one time, Somerville was supposedly the densest city in America - beyond even Manhattan - because it was/is all two & three family houses, and was (not anymore) a lot of families with a lot of kids. The “white flight” comment in the video is amusing, because while it’s “true”, it’s not really Cambridge & Somerville that “benefited” from this trend, and it’s weird to have suggested otherwise. Rather, a lot of people moved out of the the whole Boston/Cambridge/Somerville core to further suburbs. The Somerville population was over 100k a century ago, then declined steadily until 1980; it’s been slowly coming back up since then, but it has yet to get much beyond 80k. The story is similar in Cambridge, which was 120k in 1950, ~95k in 1990, and is just now getting back to the previous level. Anyway, the accurate bits of the video were good. :-) The leadership in these cities has definitely been a big part of the story. I believe that the mayors of both Boston and Somerville are bike commuters, for example - I know I’ve seen Mayor Ballantyne out on the community path, and Mayor Wu has been involved with the Boston bike community in various ways, too. Having leadership that “gets it” helps a lot!

[@KJSvitko]

Electric bicycles are bringing many older adults back to cycling. Ebikes makes those hills much less of an issue.. Every city needs to beaa bicycle city. We all need to support healthy exercise and fossil fuels free transportation options. Add a little more green space, bike lanes and outdoor dining to the city and it is a winner.

[@BrianSPaskin]

I live in Somerville and it has been incredible what they have done over the past few years There is a ton more to do. I ride my bike everywhere and the newly opened community path is great, with 1 steep climb. Getting to my destinations in Somerville, Cambridge, and Boston are now a breeze.

[@timwalks]

Yeah, I was impressed how flat most of that path was! That one hill up around the train lines though is pretty brutal.

[@LimitedWard]

The next logical step for Boston would be to engrain these best practices into the codes and regulations for roadway design within the city. That way any time a road needs to be resurfaced (which is fairly frequent for a city that gets so much snow/ice), it would automatically get upgraded with better bike infrastructure. The problem I see with these types of bike plans is that it leaves open way too many opportunities for competing interests to water down the implementation using bad faith arguments and fearmongering.

[@timwalks]

This has always been my concern with paint and plastic bollards. Some praise it as incremental progress and experimentation. But I can also see it as a committment failure and bending over to minority criticism

[@LimitedWard]

@@timwalks yup and in 10 years when the city re-evaluates the project and they see plastic bollards did nothing to increase mode share they'll question why they're dumping "so much money" into bike infrastructure no one uses.

[@ChrisDevers]

What you’re describing is more or less what the Cambridge bike ordinance mandates: any time there’s major roadworks, providing bike accomodations is now just part of the plan. There’s no community meetings to derail things, which are well intentioned, but tend to be where good ideas go to die. With the new law in place, the only debate is over how best to build the bike infrastructure for a given street, not whether or not to build it at all.

[@LaMach420]

Bike lanes not only make the city function smoother, it just looks and feels nicer.

[@methos-ey9nf]

As somebody living in the greater Boston area (outside 95, inside 495) this makes me kind of jealous. Not enough to make me want to move, but still it would be nice to have protected bike lanes to make running short errands on a bike or e-bike more palatable.

[@KJSvitko]

Walking, running, bicycles, escooters, green open spaces, electric buses, electric commuter trains and trams are all parts of a good transportation system. Speak up for improved transportation options in your city. Every train station needs safe, protected places to park and lock bicycles. Children and older adults should be able to ride bicycles to work, school or for fun safely.

[@smaskell]

Cambridge and Somerville are great but I don't know about Boston. I lived in Beacon Hill 2021-2023 and literally never biked anywhere in the city (only across the river) because the network seemed quite lacking. Definitely hope it improves but it seems like mayor Wu has been caving. It's been a huge struggle to get a bike lane on Charles St and years of advocacy hasn't really gone anywhere.

[@timwalks]

I somewhat agree. I was way more impressed by Somerville's and Cambridge's bike lanes than Boston's. I think Boston has some great connections, especially in Downtown, Back Bay, and around BU, but there are definitely spots where it needs to improve. But I do remember, when I first biked into Northend, I felt so lost.

[@Nozizaki]

This is actually echoed in People for Bikes' City Rankings. Boston has a much lower score than Cambridge or Somerville. It's weighed down a lot by some of the less urban areas like West Roxbury, Roslindale, and Ashmont. Still, MassDOT has incredible guidelines for building bicycle infrastructure so thong will just keep getting better.

[@snowyyyyyyyyyyyyy]

really??? even w the southwest corridor?

[@JL1]

Competition between these cities should be good, can put pressure to speed up these changes. Let's hope Boston gets some good lanes!

[@pavld335]

Crazy you made this 2 weeks ago and now I am seeing it for the first time.

[@timwalks]

The youtube algorithm works in mysterious ways

[@coopaloopmex]

This is an excellent video! Thanks!!!

[@Whatneeds2bsaid]

Glad to see Boston's doing well on the bike front! As a region with a notious and gnarly winter, I'm curious if they have best practices for winter cycling? Folks bike in Montreal, so I know it can be done, but would be great to see more American cities showing others how it's done.

[@lisal3773]

I'm not sure about best practices, but I recall seeing Cambridge and Somerville using small snowplows that fit in the bike lane. So at least some fraction of the bike lanes do get plowed and salted. If there's enough snow and it's a street level bike lane though, the bike lane will get covered by the street snowplows.

[@collinosullivan3175]

@@lisal3773 Boston resident here, riding in the winter is honestly pretty good. Cambridge Somerville and downtown all have small bike lane cleaners and the lanes are pretty commonly plowed. Last few years (when the infrastructure has been best) just really haven't been too snowy.

[@mindstalk]

I never saw the little plow, but a few years ago I would walk in the bike path along a Cambridge street, because it clearly was plowed, unlike the sidewalk.

[@JustATrippyDuck]

Being from the south, it is nice to see at least one city does it right in the us

[@BigCrowsVideos]

It seems like, that "HaNdS aWaY fRoM CARS" is an international narrative. I live in Tbilisi, Georgia, for now we only have a few km's of a bike lines and the main theme of the so called "bike opposition" has the same lame excuse, word to word. Sadly it's widespread and forms the majority of public opinion. For now at least

[@MissMoontree]

Guess some people really want to be stuck in traffic.

[@KirbyGamer64]

I wish we had something like this in the Salem area

[@jordanrabinowitz6052]

Great Video! I love the analysis of Cambridge and Somerville which are really important parts of the Boston urban fabric but don't always get the same attention as Boston proper. (FYI, As a Somerville resident I have to note that your analysis of Cambridge bike lanes includes quite a few shots of Davis Square, which is actually in Somerville, just a block over from the Cambridge border)

[@gregvassilakos]

Wow! This almost makes me want to move back to Boston. Perhaps if I had a condo in Miami to live in during the winter ...

[@timwalks]

Yeah Boston winters can be quite brutal

[@philippejoseph8604]

I'm definively pro bike lanes but without the slipery-on-the-dry-just-don't-think-when-wet green painted areas. I do think it's OK a thick white lines on both sides and the bike log each time it's important.

[@zoepaulastrassfield2664]

Bike commuter currently living in Charlestown and working in Downtown by Government Center- I really was blown away coming back to Boston for the first time since undergrad 8 years ago and seeing how easy it is to bike around. With a clip basket I can do all my shopping just on my bike as long as I don’t buy anything too big. I think NoVA-DC might be the only place I’ve lived that compares.

[@timwalks]

wow yeah, I bet after 8 years it would be quite a transformation. Thats awesome that you can do groceries on a bike. Is finding parking every an issue for you? Ive also been wanting to do a Nova-DC trip. Ive hear good things about their bike infra

[@zetsuXitachi]

This channel rocks

[@saranbhatia8809]

Good content and presentation!

[@noneofmynameswork1]

Did you just call Arlington an exurb?!

[@nathanbeaumont5088]

Boston had an advantage, we have old colonial streets, it's a pain in the ass to get around by car anyhow. Car was never the king of transportation, so adding bike lanes probably didn't have as much opposition compared to other cities.

[@timwalks]

Thats a good point! Historically the Boston Metro Area also has the T, although that seems to have hit a rough patch

[@GoldnPea]

This makes me want Detroit to copy Boston with this

[@D.J.Themeparkvideos]

Me reads 'Amazing Bike Lane Network'. *Starts laughing hysterically in Dutch*

[@timwalks]

we're fighting different battles in America

[@user-uc5tc1yp9e]

@@timwalks that shouldn't be a reason to keep standards so incredibly low! else we'll see proper bike lanes on mars first!

[@micosstar]

came from youtube recommend

[@thezonemtb]

Sounds like the leaders in tulsa need to visit the Boston area

[@timwalks]

That rough over there?

[@christophertan9571]

awesome video. makes me proud to be from Boston!

[@DI-uk9rj]

great video!

[@BalaenicepsRex3]

Great video, I'd love to see more like this coming 😊 Keep it up! (Pls note these are MXN and not USD, people have had some confusions before!)

[@timwalks]

Woah!!! Thank you thank you. This means so much and the feedback is super helpful!

[@muscleman125]

If only boston had absorbed the surrounding satellite cities like New York did with Brooklyn, Queens, etc. The actual city of Boston is such a small part of the greater Boston region, unlike NYC which is a huge swath of land by itself, and the greater metro region extends from all of New Jersey to Poughkeepsie, NY to New Haven, CT.

[@GegoXaren]

I like the clip from Monster Track 2022, where the bike racer slams into a car. 😂 Can see full race over at Terry B's channel.

[@drjustino]

Very surprised by this video, i guess it's just the concept of the "outside looking in." I would never call Boston, or even Cambridge/Somerville as "bike-friendly," and definitely do not think of them as "leaders" in expansion. Biking in the Boston area is generally a scary experience and the number of bike-fatalities is alarming. What does come up is Cambridge's plan to remove street parking in many neighborhoods (e.g. Inman Square) which then pits business owners against the general Cambridge-hippie-progressive vibe. I think THOUGHTFUL bike lane expansion, when done well, is obviously a good thing, but with Cambridge there is a significant amount of traffic planning that is just dictated since the Department of Streets just moves forward with little to no public input.

[@timwalks]

Totally respectable response. I've gotten several people point out that Boston's bike infrastructure is not that great. Admittedly, most of my positive biking experiences were in Somerville and Cambridge. This has been echoed by several comments I have received in this video and comments on reddit threads I've shared this too. Unfortunately, not too many people, outside of Massachusetts are familiar with these two cities.

[@carlg5838]

@drjustino as a longtime resident, driver, pedestrian, transit rider, and bicycle commuter in Boston and all of the surrounding communities mentioned in this video, my experience has been quite different than yours! When I was a 20-something I always felt riding in Boston traffic here was often scary yet I managed to rely on my bike for nearly a decade without serious incident. By contrast, today the network of bike lanes and paths feels worlds safer and more fun to get around on, and I've been stunned by the significant growth in new riders using them in just the last few years. At the same time, I've recently completed a rail/bike tour of about 10 major cities across the US, and had a chance to observe how bike infrastructure has developed in those cities. To be honest, it left me even more impressed with the progress that's been made at home. I now consider the Boston metro area almost at the top of the list of bike friendly cities in the US, and definitely leaders in the expansion of urban bicycling infrastructure.

[@nathanbeaumont5088]

Cambridge has relatively low density??? As of 2021, Cambridge is the tenth most densely populated city in the United States.

[@timwalks]

Addressed this point several times in other comments and in the video sources

[@yay-cat]

In cities where bike / train networks are successfully rolled out; I would like see interviews with the NIMBYs who initially opposed it. Is it as bad as they thought?

[@nicoresnik2943]

In Somerville our attitude toward drivers, especially the ones who use the city as a through way is “slow down or crash” and as long as you don’t hurt anybody other then your self we sure don’t give a fuck if you crash

[@nicolaslaino7504]

This is awesome! I think you would like to check out Buenos Aires policies over the past few years on this.

[@lyssasletters3232]

Thanks for making this video. I biked in Boston and Cambridge last summer to test out the bike lanes, and I found them to be very confusing. Surprising, since the roads in Boston are not at all confusing for cars!!!!! JK JK. Boston is a maze. I hope improvements continue to be made in the greater Boston area, and I especially hope that the suburbs of Boston start creating better-quality bike lanes (and I mean REAL suburbs. Cambridge and Somerville are cities, not suburbs).

[@joshmccorkle4297]

I'm confused at why you refer to Cambridge as having "a relatively low population density." It has a higher population density than Boston.

[@timwalks]

Yeah, I addressed this in the corrigendum of the sources. "Cambridge is the 25th most dense city in the United States. Admittedly I state vaguely, “Relatively Low Population Density”. Relative to most United States cities, Cambridge is pretty dense. Relative to cities globally, it’s not dense. The main point is that Cambridge has the room to develop bike infrastructure."

[@GB-ez6ge]

@@timwalks I disagree. I was born in Mt. Auburn hospital near Harvard Sq. and people always tell me that I'm the densest person they know.

[@ChrisDevers]

> “…has the room to develop bike infrastructure.” That’s a bit of a stretch, too. The whole Boston urban area, including Cambridge & Somerville, has been intensively developed for 400 years now. Yeah, it’s not Paris or Barcelona or Istanbul or Tokyo, but sheesh. When people talk about low density North American cities, they’re referring to sprawling suburbs, stroads, strip malls, etc. There’s a pocket of that here or there in the Boston area, but not much. It’s very much the case that building out most of the bike infrastructure in the region has meant carving out space from two or *maybe* three lane roads, and that’s absolutely the right thing to do, of course. But it’s not like there’s lots of untapped land just waiting for the bike lanes to be built. Your video mentions the new Somerville Community Path extension, and it is indeed great, but there are solid reasons why it took decades (plural) for the vision to become a reality, and while the long term plan is for there to be a lot more routes like this, it still takes a lot of creative effort make these places happen. Also: it can be argued the the fact that the Boston area *is* so dense is part of *why* it’s a favorable place for a solid bike environment to emerge. When the places people need to get to are relatively nearby, it’s easier to get people to realize that driving isn't necessarily a good way to get around. A lot of us were already biking around the area years before the current wave of lane construction kicked in, because the reality is that nine times out of ten, biking is the fastest way to get around the city. The Boston Globe, for example, used to have an annual event where they’d have three commuters start at the same spot in north Cambridge (Porter Square, I think?), and see which one got to downtown Boston the fastest: the driver, the subway rider, or the cyclist. Most of the time, the cyclist won, and often it wasn't that close. I don't know if that would be as true in, say, Houston or Atlanta or Los Angeles.

[@seantroy3172]

still needs improvements but hopefully will continue in the right direction!

[@timwalks]

Absolutely! Boston Metro Area is still a ways out before its Amsterdam or even Minneopolis. But its got a lead over many American cities

[@wilwulpje5684]

A famous Dutch poster from the 1970s: I think, therefore I cycle.

[@TheBostonUrbanist]

Exellent video!

[@johnhurley8918]

3:20 I need to push back on this point. While the Boston area has had/still has some major problems with segregation, The reason Boston Metro is so fragmented into smaller towns is because Boston allowed several of it's neighborhoods to charter into separate towns early in its history before it put an end to the practice when too many started asking for it. The towns surrounding Boston are some of the most densely populated in the entire country and contrary to your "white flight" hypothesis, that's where most of the minority neighborhoods actually are. Boston Metro is more comparable to other US cities than Boston proper.

[@freddiegagging6116]

Tim, your opening graphic of Bostons bike network is the vision! Not the real. Casein point Charlestown only has two on street bike paths that’s that little bit at the top!

[@alastairhewitt380]

Just looked at rents, damn, now they need to fix housing... and also the T

[@HowToADU]

We were just talking about how Boston is weirdly progressive in missing middle housing too. Even though the policy isn't wonderful, practically, a lot of middle housing exists. I already like and subscribe. Gimme something else to do :)

[@timwalks]

Yeah, I honestly was surprised visting the Boston Metro area. I can totally see this region becoming very "Dutch" in another 20-30 years.

[@nicoresnik2943]

“I visited cambridge two weeks ago” -first B roll shot is in Davis square😂

[@andrimufid2195]

Finally, a true leader with real vision to make his city a better place

[@edwardmiessner6502]

Google maps sent you into the city? 😨 When I lived in Arlington and visited friends in Forest Hills, Jamaica Plain the best route on bike was the Minutemen Bikeway to Alewife, then Fresh Pond Parkway to Memorial Drive to the BU Bridge to Park Drive to the Riverway to the Jamaicaway to the Arborway.

[@timwalks]

Yeah, maybe there were better routes, but the other routes seemed to be very minimally protected.

[@mindstalk]

Funny to call Cambridge "relatively low population density". Cambridge is denser than Boston itself. From a few years ago: Cambridge 6600 people/km2 Somerville 6900 Boston 5500 Chicago 4600

[@timwalks]

already addressed this in the episode sources

[@user-iw4jl6bc8h]

Good work Boston . You are not far from Montreal , the best biking city and the top city in the Copenhagen index . Montreal has 1,000 km ( 600 miles ) of bike lanes . Montreal is built on an island d 10 times the size of Manhattan . Extension curbs are used to slow down cars at intersection. Montreal has an express lane (REV réseau express vélo, express bike path ) and it is amazing . You may may get some ideas on how it is done in Montreal : channel : Shifter ,The 'secret sauce' transforming this cycling city and Can a city have a cycling "culture" if its bike lanes suck? I have thoughts..... have a happy holliday

[@GB-ez6ge]

What about East Boston, Charlestown, Chelsea?

[@drjustino]

In Chelsea our bike "lanes" are paint on the right lane designating as the bike path. No separation, no protection, nothing. I don't think I've ever seen bikes on it, it's terrifying since it's just in the vehicular traffic

[@timwalks]

Unfortunately cant speak much to most of those towns. Charlestown has one cool bike lane, but not much of a network. Granted, its a pretty small town.

[@chriskovach5826]

How does Brookline's bike plans look compared to Boston? I'm surprised you talked about Malden and not Brookline since Brookline is surrounded by Boston.

[@timwalks]

I havent looked much into Brookline, will definetly have to do a follow up! I mainly brought up Malden as an example of Boston Metro opposition to lane diversification and it was a recent example I remembered.

[@chriskovach5826]

Sounds good. Nice job on the video

[@NikVargaLiverpool4ever]

Not great, their city council structure moves really slow so bike infrastructure does too. They have been making some decent strides in safe routes to school and major capital projects tho

[@nicelol5241]

that old lady calling bike lanes “stupid planning” is hilarious like if our cities didn’t build some madness freeways

[@jOoomOooo]

voice is too low compared to background music

[@timwalks]

Thanks for the tip. At any specific points?

[@rsytube]

@@timwalks overall lower the music

[@bikinginboston]

The anti-cycling culture has changed a lot in Boston. But it still has a long way to go.

[@t3hAlien]

Whoaaaa, wait - the clip at 0:24-0:28 is from one of TerryB's videos (MonsterTrack 2023). Super, super not representative - this race is for fixies only, no brakes, and that guy was riding really aggressively in the seconds leading up to that crash (presumably to take a lead in the race). >:( Color me Mad on the Internet.

[@timwalks]

Lol, I knew that someone would point that out! Yeah it was more of a extreme clip that went with the intros vibe.

[@t3hAlien]

@@timwalks also lol - I was grumpy this morning about that clip (smh at myself), but watched later: I appreciate the research and background info here, esp as we head into election season! Still need to take a look at the Cambridge Bike Safety voter guide.

[@lordfubar1]

If only Joe Biden pushed for E-Bikes instead of EV's, we all might have been better off. I sold my car 14 years ago and bought a new bicycle instead. Since I retired 2 years ago I bought a shiny new E-Bike which I still do all my chores with except load on public transportation. It took some trial and error to make the switch, but it has been well worth the effort.

[@greghart6310]

Cities - PLEASE STOP painting the road surface, I dont care how much grip you put in the paint, wet paint is death to cyclists, super slippery and vastly increases the chance skidding. Look to the Netherlands for solutions, they have been doing this for ages with great success

[@andrewbesold3872]

Sad that most of the “excellent” infrastructure you show has all the manufactured conflicts and hazards of sidewalk cycling and a host without enough actual cycling experience to know better. Want to see a city that actually got it right, go to Davis! You’ll see lots of white paint that actually works.

[@brauljo]

5:06 ¿How is that a protected intersection?

[@aubrey2047]

Food delivery services has ruined a lot of this progress. Can’t bike in Allston without feeling completely unsafe. If you are pro bike, be anti food delivery apps.

[@aubrey2047]

*Due to double parking and unsafe, distracted driving.

[@Bedrockbrendan]

Bike lanes are still pretty controversial in Boston and the Boston area. Most people I know were surprised when they went up during the shutdowns, and are not happy with the result (I don't think Boston is much of a bike city, particularly with our winter weather and smaller roads).It felt like there was not much public discussion about it, like it was just being forced on everyone. It definitely hasn't helped traffic. Also people would probably prefer that money go into repairing and expanding our dangerous and failing public transit system (and towards funding affordable housing as the cost of living is difficult for people struggling).

[@user-uc5tc1yp9e]

it's a bike network. the roads are horrible quality. simply laughable. full of cracks, potholes, obstacles, random objects, plastic broken poles etc. dangerous. it's very clear that the lanes were done with minimum concern for what a bike rider needs.

[@davidblanc458]

In 30 years mining new iron will be globally banned, bikers will keep their old bike like the Cubans keep their old 1940's cars. The environmental solution isn't there I think, It'd be more like planting a public garden in the current airport

[@ofsevit]

There are a lot of reasons why Cambridge, Somerville, Brookline and beyond are independent cities and towns, but it's not "suburban sprawl and white flight." Here's something to get you started: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boston%E2%80%93Brookline_annexation_debate_of_1873 Also, Cambridge has a "relatively low population density." Compared to Mumbai, sure. But of cities over 100,000 in the US it trails just NYC, Jersey City, Paterson NJ and San Francisco. It's a good deal denser than Boston.

[@MrBenumea]

So very, much $hit ...so, but so little time!!!