The funny thing about Tulsa is that our "radical thoughts" are actually completely mundane, ordinary thoughts that have already been implemented in cities around the country and throughout the world. I guess we're just slow.
For those of you concerned about snow, well, bike lanes work in Chicago, Minneapolis, Milwaukee, NYC, Boston... Gosh, you're right. There's NO WAY Tulsa could handle that!
Just like we have street sweepers and snowplows for sidewalks downtown, other cities have street sweepers and snowplows that run down the bike lanes every now and then. If it's not a protected bike lane (with a physical barrier between the cycle lane and the cars) a simple street sweeper does the trick.
Related to the finances. Yes, protected bike lanes cost money, but not compared to a simple rehab of any city street. Instead of millions, it's more like $30k per mile for the flex posts on both sides of the road (used instead of curbs to remind drivers where they belong), and if you factor in the milling and re-striping the entire road, protected bike lanes run about $120 k / mile. If you add the bike lane at the same time you're rehabbing the streets, the cost is nominal. Compare that to any road rehab or expansion project on the Improve Our Tulsa website. How much did they say it would cost to widen a couple miles of Mingo for cars? $40 million? More?
Yeah, we can't afford bike lanes.
Another fun fact: drivers only pay for about half of the cost to build and maintain roads (gas taxes, vehicle taxes, etc). This means that to fully pay for the roads for cars, we need 54% of road users to be cyclists...people who could pay for the roads without destroying them. Essentially, for every driver, you need another non-driver to subsidize the cost of the streets.
In Tulsa, where our streets are maintained and widened using sales taxes, I am quite certain that I have more than paid my share for that little sliver of asphalt that I need... which would last 20 times longer if people didn't crush it with SUVs every day.
Blah, blah, blah. This is one of those threads where nobody's going to listen to the arguments of the other side. We've all heard them before.
But just remember that Tulsa is falling behind every day. Quality of life matters. Just sayin'.
Here are a few photos, so cyclists can dream of other places to live...