If they can have handicap parking, wheelchair ramps, and other accessibility features (rightfully so!), what’s the problem with helping businesses to make their stores accessible by bike?
Everyone wants to support “buy local”, and there’s no better way to do it than by bike!
Seems like installing a simple bike rack would be a win-win-win all around. What exactly is the difficulty?
I don’t believe for a second that it’s a “they don’t know unless you tell them” problem, because I’ve contacted many, MANY stores and plaza management to let them know that they are losing business. Nothing changes.
And it’s not like they can’t see people locking their bikes to signs, trees, fences, or cluttering up the walkways because they have no other options when visiting their business.
Backstory: Over the last two years, I’ve been adding cycling infrastructure to OpenStreetMap. Stuff like bike lanes, bike parking, repair stands, etc. I’ve spent dozens of hours checking plazas in a 30 km radius, local storefronts, malls, etc., to see what options they offer. It’s SHOCKING to see how many have absolutely no bike parking. Large stores, post offices, coffee shops, or even gyms. I try to contact as many as I can, but almost never receive replies or acknowledgement. Contacting local representatives is even more futile, as they have no control over what these businesses do. This means I’m either going far out of my way to visit stores that have bike parking, or I take a car, which seems like madness either way.
They only have handicap parking because they were forced to by law. They only have wheelchair ramps because they were forced to by law. They only have accessibility features because they were forced to by law. See where I’m going with this?
Shit, they have a fuckload more parking than they need because it is mandated by law. Remove car parking minimums and set up bike parking minimums instead.
Then you get voted out by car people who shriek that you hate cars and are trying to create a hostile environment for drivers by having a single bike rack somewhere out of the way.
Sucks to say but hopefully some climate change policy will eventually incentivize by law to have businesses to accomodate more things on 2-wheels.
See where I’m going with this?
For sure.
Unfortunately, I spoke with local council members about this, and they said they can’t force a company to add bike parking. There are no laws that require them to do so, even though I would STRONGLY argue that it falls into the same accessibility category as wheelchair/pregnant/handicap parking accommodations.
I think you’d be laughed out of the room, if you tried to use disability law to force bicycle accommodations, and the people with disabilities would probably be angry with you. But there’s no reason whatsoever that they can’t make a new law or bylaw, mandating bicycle stuff.
Well, I also represent the disabled community, so they’d probably be told they were bigots for laughing. LOL
But in seriousness, accessibility had a broad scope.
It’s not always about accommodating someone in a wheelchair.
Accessibility could mean offering more than one language, offering different forms of access (i.e. digital, print, audio, etc.), and in the case of shopping, giving people the ability so safely access your store by bike.
Not having a place for bike parking makes a business inaccessible to a great number of people. So while it would be nice if there are laws forcing this to happen, it still makes no sense why a company wouldn’t voluntarily want to do it. They are losing business for no good reason.
Businesses do the bare minimum unless they have to do more. It’s always been this way. They might make more accommodating voluntarily, but they won’t and never have done that. They need to be compelled to do the right thing.
But it’s to their benefit, too!
I mean, your council member can always pass a bylaw requiring bike parking, same way there are often parking minimums.
They won’t. I may circle this back to our active transportation committee to see what they think.
I guarantee business owners would be up in arms. 🙄
Thanks for mapping OSM! I map a lot of landuse doing things like forests, ponds, farms etc. I know it can be a struggle but I love seeing all the beautiful detailed maps when I’m traveling
Yeah I’ve discovered the non bike-friendly stores and venues in my area recently since getting an ebike in an attempt to be more eco-friendly. I absolutely hate it and I’ll just go to another store - I’m not locking my bike a block away. Tangential rage: bike paths or sidewalks that abruptly end, pushing me out onto a 45mph road in order to continue on my way. Shitty businesses and garbage city planning to blame.
km for km, more cyclists die on the sidewalk than on the road.
Honestly did not know that. I guess this makes sense with cars pulling up to turn onto roadways whereas on the roads you’re already visible.
Would love to use bike lanes more, but also hope they’re at least consistent and have enough of a space buffer from vehicle traffic to feel safe.
Honestly did not know that.
Yup, it’s true.
HOWEVER, that only applies to sidewalks that lead across intersections or have cars entering/exiting driveways/parking lots.
If you have to choose between a road with no shoulder and traffic going 80km/h or a sidewalk with no pedestrians and zero chance of cars crossing it, take the damn sidewalk!
bike paths or sidewalks that abruptly end, pushing me out onto a 45mph road in order to continue on my way.
Yeah, this kills me every time I see it. It’s like leading lambs to slaughter.
Part of the problem is when two municipalities (or the region they are part of) are on different wavelengths or at different stages of planning.
One could have a multiuse path or bike lane spanning across the entire municipality, and then it ends into a death trap once you hit the neighbouring municipality.
We have a section around here where multiuse paths connecting two municipalities ends with no sidewalk, no bike lane, and a highway overpass cross over to get to the other side. Or, you could detour 6KM to avoid 1KM of high-speed traffic… Like WTF?
Let me tell you how much I love to play the game of choices that I have to make very publicly and abruptly on the roads… Ashamed to say, but 9 times out of 10 I’ll make the dangerous, but more convenient one.
Ironically there is a very large trek franchise store near me, No bike rack. lol.
I guess they want you to leave with a bike, not arrive.
Lol. Which I’m sure is the majority of their business. I just wanted to cycle down and grab a bell for my wife’s bike…and not all bike stores have space for you to bring your bike in while you shop.
Actually, I’ve come across quite a few bike shops that don’t have bike racks! Bizarre!
It’s generally accepted practice that you can bring your bike into any bike shop. There is therefore no need to lock up your bike to a rack. In fact, people who have the fanciest bikes probably don’t even own a bike lock.
Right, I get it. But the place I bought my bike was a narrow store front with 3 rows of bikes back to front of store and a single path in. There was no way anyone is parking A single bike, only could bring in a bike and walk it through to repair bay. And during winter rides nobody wants my snow and salt dripping bike on their showroom floor
Ours has one, but it’s not secured to anything, so it’s functionality useless.
If there is no bike parking, then just take the bike into the shop with you. If it’s a small shop where you can keep your eye on it, leave it near the entrance. If it’s a large shop, roll it around with you — it’s not much different from a wheelchair. If the management complains, tell them they’re being illogical and take your business elsewhere.
I’ve been forced to do this a few time, and did it all the time when I was riding my e-scooter more.
In one case, I apologized to the cashier as I approach the checkout, and she said something along the lines of, “it’s better to bring your bike in the store! I had my catalytic converter stolen from my truck parked in front of the store while I was working.”
Jeeesus!
While I’m all for this, I think the main issue with plazas is that a majority aren’t in bike friendly areas, at least the ones I can think of. I mean if by plaza you also include strip malls, those aren’t usually in areas with good pedestrian sidewalks or safe cycle lanes. Even in nicer, pedestrian plazas that aren’t in a city centre, those still tend to encourage customers to arrive by car before walking around the path. There needs to be substantial improvements before these plazas can really encourage cycling. Bike racks alone won’t be enough.
Though purchasing bike racks at the very least or as a start would be a step in the right direction.
I can only speak for my region, which consists of eight municipalities totaling around 700,000 people, but most plazas and strip malls are quite accessible by bike, especially newer ones, which have bike infrastructure leading up to them.
Regardless, for such a small investment in a bike rack, even one customer on a bike per week will make it worth while.
I, myself, live downtown Toronto so bike infrastructure is plenty (though of course can always be better). That said, the further from downtown the less hospitable it can be biking with large roads and less road law enforcement that has some priority for biking. Then there’s the suburb towns that are only now considering really bike infrastructure and areas outside the GTA that are nowhere near building it. I agree it wouldn’t hurt anyone to have bike racks around as a start, but it shouldn’t be the only starting point if we want people to really use them.
Yeah, the few times that I’ve biked to Toronto, I’m amazed by how many people are riding and how robust (not perfect, though) the bike infrastructure is.
I will say that newer development here (Durham Region) often have cycling infrastructure baked in. So multiuse paths, bike parking at bus stops, bike lanes, etc. are more and more common.
Cycling these days is always a tradeoff. I don’t mind not riding in protected lanes, if my destination has bike parking; and my entire ride could be on cycling infrastructure right until I get to my destination, then nothing. There needs to be consistency and continuity for anything to work right.
Yeah, for real. I don’t bike, but it’s definitely weird that stores don’t cater to bicyclists.
Where’s this?
I’m seeing this all over Ontario, Canada.
I’m asking in case we’re mapping the same area. 😄
When you do see a bike rack in front of a store, how often is it occupied? Simply putting a bike rack on the sidewalk is a waste of time and money if it isn’t a location likely to be visited by bike. The store owners know this.
As an anecdotal example, a few of my local grocery and hardware stores have bike racks out front, but no sane person is going to risk pedaling through the surrounding 5-lane suburban stroads to get to them.
How often do you see an empty parking spot? You can fit 6-12 bikes in the average space a parking spot takes up.
My point is that bike racks are the last piece of the puzzle. First we need major changes in urban infrastructure. An empty parking spot at a suburban Wal-Mart will occasionally be used, but an empty bike rack at the same place will never be used because nobody will bike there.
Edit for wording.
While I can see your point, I think it’s a chicken vs egg scenario. Major changes to infrastructure don’t come about unless theres a need to be legally compliant, or there’s a societal change driving the need. I really do think that if half of my neighborhood started biking in some capacity on a regular basis there’d be bike racks on store fronts in a matter of weeks, followed by the necessary infrastructure change. But I don’t necessarily see it working the other way as quickly. Trust me though, I’d rather the infrastructure changed first as you said because it’s kind of a nightmare riding around safely in some parts of my town.
True, at one Walmart I went to the area had a significant amount of Amish shoppers. They had horse hitches complete with roofs over them. If enough bike traffic comes through it’s a much easier sell for the business owners.
When you do see a bike rack in front of a store, how often is it occupied?
I go to Walmart several times a week, and their two racks always have bikes on them. Every single time I go.
A local grocery store that I’ve biked to had one rack and it’s FULL most of the time.
Stores that don’t have bike racks end up with bikes tied up to random spots outside.
The need is there.
I’ll also add that these same places have 50% of their parking lots empty. We’re talking at least 50 spots no matter the time of day, empty at our walmart.
Simply putting a bike rack on the sidewalk is a waste of time and money if it isn’t a location likely to be visited by bike.
I can’t think of many places where a bike rack wouldn’t be useful. In these plazas you have coffee shops, optometrists, a convenience store, maybe a cell phone shop, etc. In and out type places. In a plaza, at least one store would benefit. But likely more than one.
but no sane person is going to risk pedaling through the surrounding 5-lane suburban stroads to get to them.
That’s not a problem caused by a lack or inclusion of bike lanes. Those areas (we have them too) need balance, and you wont get that if cars win.
For so many people (like most people), the stores they shop at are close enough to make bike use an option the majority of the time, but only if the destination accommodates them better.
