[BikeLongmont] LAB Bicycling Friendly Communities

[Nenad]

I tend to agree with Rich. I think the city is doing a fine job. Sure,
they could do better (I am sure folks in Boulder can also find things to
complain about), but the effort is being made to accommodate the
cyclists.

I looked at the application and my impression is that this is not
something that our group can nominate the city for, it is something the
city applies for. There seem to be a number of criteria, first a
"general filter" to pre-qualify online and then a detailed
questionnaire.

I noticed that both Denver and Fort Collins got "Silver" ranking. I used
to live in Fort Collins until 1995 and, at the time I moved to Longmont,
they had much better bike path network. Looking from the commuting
perspective, I think Longmont is better - try riding in rush hour down
College or Shields and you'll see what I mean. *Surely* Longmont would
qualify for a "Bronze" at the very least...

The bottom line, in my opinion, is that the city should definitely
apply. Regardless of whether the application succeeds of fails, the
process will tell us something about the improvements we need to work
on, since it will identify the deficiencies. We would all benefit from
this insight.

So, Phil, Len, how about it? I am speaking as a "private individual",
not in my awesome mantle of the group coordinator :).

So far the comments seem relatively evenly split with three comments
against and two for. What to other folks think? Share your thoughts,
there's no postage due on email!

Regards, Nenad
P.S. As an illustration how well we are doing, when the city asked for a
"top 5 wish list" for improvement projects, almost all we could think of
was either already in plan/funded (Pace bike bridge), or minor
maintenance work (striping, etc.) or under CDOT control (Hover/119). If
the city was not doing well, we'd have a long list.