Almost nine of 10 Kansas City residents who participated in a recent survey ride bikes, and a fifth of those ride them for transportation, not simple fun.
That transportation number “is huge” and has implications for city policy, Laura Machala, project manager with Active Living KC, reported to the mayor Tuesday.
In other preliminary results of the survey, many say they would ride more if there were more bike lanes and sharrows, shared bike and car lanes.
A third big reason given for not riding more is that intersections are not safe enough and the next reason is not enough bike racks to lock bikes.
Machala also quoted results of the Alliance for Biking & Walking’s Biking and Walking Benchmark Report: Kansas City ranked 41 out of 51 cities in the percentage of people who bike and walk to work.
“There’s a lot of room for improvement in terms of biking and walking,” she said.
The new city survey also asked what determines a person’s route for a bike trip.
By far the main factor was low traffic, with bike lanes or sharrow markings coming in second and most direct route third.
She also noted that the city now has a list of most of the current bike rack locations (click bike parking map), with 502 racks that make 1,358 spaces.
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