Cycling Up on Spring Street & 2011 City of LA Bike Count Report is Out!

We’ve got some good news from Spring Street in Downtown Los Angeles. We conducted bicycle counts on Spring Street before and after the installation of the buffered green lane so we could see how this infrastructure investment affected bicycle riding in Downtown and cycling is up 52%! 

The most encouraging news from this count is the strong gains in the number of women riding bicycles on the Spring Street lane.   As we report in our newly-released 2011 Bicycle and Pedestrian Count Report (see below), the state of female ridership for the city as a whole is not good.  The proportion of women who ride bikes in Los Angeles has remained virtually unchanged at below 20% for the past two years.  Spring Street, on the other hand, is an indicator of how in just a short while bicycle infrastructure that provides a buffer between auto traffic and the bike lane can make a big difference in the number of women who ride bicycles.  Even accounting for the overall increase in ridership on Spring Street, the gains in female ridership are impressive.  The number of female cyclists on the weekday went up 100% after the green lane was installed.  On the weekend, the percentage increase was a massive 650%. 

We also have are pleased to announce the 2011 City of Los Angeles Bicycle & Pedestrian Count Report is finished and available. We shared results from the 2011 count late last year. Read more about the results of the Spring Street count and the 2011 City of LA Bike & Ped Count here.