Jacob Cohn Photo
Gov. Dannel Malloy reads a letter from New Haven cyclists.
New Haven’s intrepid cyclists politely crashed an I‑95 groundbreaking with a show of pedal power and a written plea to the governor: While you prepare to spend another $357 million on cars, consider spending some more money on bike paths too.
Eight members of the Elm City Cycling (ECC) advocacy group rode en masse to the event Monday afternoon on Brewery Street and succeeded in delivering their plea in letter form to Gov. Dannel P. Malloy.
Malloy was in town for the groundbreaking on a project to rebuild the I‑95/I‑91 interchange to fit in with the new Q Bridge and wipe out left-hand exits and entrances. It’s a $357 million part of the overall ongoing $2.2 billion billion I‑95 New Haven Harbor Crossing Corridor Improvement Program. (Click here to read about the height-scaling most recent portion that was completed, and here for another part that activists succeeded in stalling.)
ECC board member David Streever presented the letter to Malloy as the governor arrived onto the site. The letter advocated for a network of bicycle paths and lanes crisscrossing New Haven, providing residents with an alternative to driving and ultimately saving money. It urged Malloy to “take an active role in guiding” future projects for cyclists and pedestrians in New Haven.
“It seemed like this was an opportunity to show Governor Malloy some force of cyclists,” ECC board member Rob Rocke said. Rocke said the cyclists wanted to show Malloy that “we exist and we’d like to call for him to mandate at the state level that cyclist and pedestrian concerns are important.”
The ceremony, held at the site of the future I‑95/I‑91/Route 34 interchange off Brewery Street, inaugurated the last major phase of the highway improvement program. Besides Malloy, speakers at the event included Mayor John DeStefano, U.S. Rep. Rosa DeLauro, Federal Highway Administrator Victor Mendez and James Redeker, the acting commissioner of the Connecticut Department of Transportation.
Malloy thanked Streever for the letter. Later, while other officials gabbed at the podium, Malloy was seen reading the letter (pictured above).
All of the speakers at the ceremony touted job growth, with Redeker claiming the interchange would create 12,500 jobs over five years. (The project is scheduled for completion in 2017.) DeLauro and Malloy cited the project as an example of investment in infrastructure and efficient transportation. The new interchange will “make the difference in Connecticut” by allowing the state to invest in the “movement of people and products in a timely fashion,” Malloy said.
Streever said he believes that “the state needs highways.” But he argued that a greater investment in cycling and alternative forms of transportation would be fiscally as well as ecologically sound.
In his letter to Malloy, Streever noted that one study found that the construction of bicycle and pedestrian infrastructure creates twice as many jobs per million dollars spent as highway construction. He added that these projects have “been demonstrated to improve safety, save lives, and increase the economic health of municipalities.”
Streever (at center, in green) and fellow bikers en route to the groundbreaking.
Streever said he was pleased that Malloy had read his letter and called it a “nice introduction to our group.”
In his speech, DeStefano sounded a similar sentiment to the cyclists’. “I’m not a fan of highways” since they have “not always been kind to communities,” the mayor said. However, DeStefano lauded the NHCC improvement project as “not just a highway project,” with multimodal improvements including the construction (already completed) of a downtown New Haven commuter rail station.
DeLauro acclaimed a plan to build a commuter rail line connecting New Haven, Hartford and Springfield, while DeStefano referred to plans to bring streetcars back to New Haven.
DOT spokesman Judd Everhart said the agency regularly considers bicycle/pedestrian access for both road and transit projects in Connecticut. He estimated that the state has spent around $70 million on bicycle and pedestrian projects between 1991 and 2009.
“In general, the DOT considers bike-pedestrian access issues for every project,” Everhart said. “Sometimes it’s feasible, sometimes it’s not.”
New Haven activists roundly deplored the DOT’s currently widening of upper Whalley Avenue as hostile to cyclists and pedestrians.
Malloy (third from right) participates in the groundbreaking.
The governor, responding to a question about Streever’s letter, said he accepts the need to include bicycle and pedestrian infrastructure in DOT plans.
“I’ve always been a proponent of biking, so that’s an ongoing commitment,” Malloy said. “It works in some places and it doesn’t fit everywhere, so we just have to figure out where it’s appropriate.”
The full text of the letter follows:
Dear Governor Malloy,
We wanted to take this moment to encourage you to re-focus the efforts of your Department of Transportation on pedestrians, cyclists and the urban infrastructure they need to enjoy safe travel around and between Connecticut’s cities and towns.
When we compare the cost and benefit of infrastructure spending, we see that road construction provides 7 jobs per million dollars spent. Bicycle and pedestrian infrastructure not only creates twice as many jobs (11 – 14 per million) but also has been demonstrated to improve safety, save lives, and increase the economic health of municipalities.
Continual expansion of highway and road infrastructure creates an unfunded mandate to maintain this infrastructure. As bridges crumble and municipalities fail to resurface dangerously potholed roads, Connecticut has to ask: Do we continue to build out excessive road capacity, or do we encourage a mode shift by building pedestrian, bike, and mass transit infrastructure?
You may be familiar with the results of a recent shift in transportation spending in Seville, Spain. A city of 700,000, Seville had some of the lowest levels of bike commuting world-wide. Only .2% of all trips were made by bicycle. In 2007, Seville began an ambitious program to build an 87 mile network of connected bike lanes — separated from traffic and designed to be safe enough that “a 65-year old woman with groceries” could safely ride a bicycle between any two points in the city.
The result is nothing short of incredible. In two years the project was completed, and Seville now boasts that 7% of all trips are made by bicycle. Ray LaHood, President Obama’s Secretary of Transportation, has signaled that this shift is the way of the future. He has pointed out that we spend 1% of transportation spending on bicycle and pedestrian infrastructure, which account for 12% of all trips. He also points out that 14% of all injuries are suffered by bicyclists and pedestrians.
It is clear that this dynamic is both unjust and unfair, and more needs to be done for bicyclists and pedestrians. The economic benefits of doing so are clear and have been demonstrated repeatedly in independent studies. The consequence of not doing more is clear — over 150,000 preventable injuries and over 5,000 preventable deaths per year. An impressive number of people stand ready to work with you to bridge this divide and work toward greater safety for all road users — Bike Walk Connecticut, Elm City Cycling, Transit for America, and many more are ready to help.
Your administration has come out solidly in favor of these types of projects, and we congratulate you on your vision. We believe that opportunities are being missed, however, and wish to encourage you to take an active role in guiding these projects and ensuring that the State Department of Transportation shares the values held by both your administration and our federal administration.
Thank you,
David Streever
Elm City Cycling Board of Directors
Bravo, ECC!!