2013-14 Bicycle Transit Planning Team (Melissa Ott and Alyssa Tyree)
Bicycle Commuting Workshops

The team collaborated with Amelia Conlen, Director of People Power of Santa Cruz County to co-design and co-facilitate bicycle commuter workshops for local businesses and the Santa Cruz community from March-July 2014. These workshops were designed to encourage more people to bike to work or school, and you can learn more about them on the People Power website here. The team developed a survey to assess current and future bicycle ridership trends that was conducted before and after the workshops for participants. A modified version of the survey was conducted at various other events like Earth Summit (March 2014) and the Sanctuary Celebration at the Municipal Wharf (May 2014).

Bicycle, Car, and Pedestrian Counting

To support the recently funded Monterey Bay Sanctuary Scenic Trail segment ("the Rail Trail") that will run from Davenport to the Santa Cruz Wharf, the BTPT conducted a parking lot count to assess the percentage of use of a number of parking lots along this corridor. This will allow the City to identify parking lots that could be utilized for Rail Trail visitors who arrive by car and then use the trail to bike or walk through Santa Cruz.

In May, the team conducted a one-day mode split traffic count for the City's Public Works Department at the intersection of Soquel, Dakota, and Riverside Avenues. The City is applying for funding to construct a connecting bridge under the Soquel Avenue bridge that will connect the levee path in this location. Currently bicyclists and pedestrians walking on the east side of the levee path must leave the path and cross Soquel Avenue at this intersection before reconnecting on the other side. A bridge over Branciforte Creek that connects to the levee path would complete the final segment of the loop trail of the levee path.

The team also made recommendations to the City of Santa Cruz for automated bicycle counters that would allow City planners and local bicycle advocacy organizations to have access to consistent and automatically acquired data about how many people are biking at key locations in Santa Cruz. Having reliable data provides key evidence for funding grant applications and provides a more accurate depiction of bicycle ridership trends. Though funding has been a challenge this year, it is likely that at least one bicycle and pedestrian counter will be installed at the new Arana Gulh Multi-Use Trail later this year.

In addition to this work, the team also supported bicycle advocacy and education in Santa Cruz through a number of events and programs, such as Ecology Action's Bike Smart! Program, BIke to Work Day, and other Bike Week events. The team also created and produced a bi-monthly e-newsletter about all things bicycle in Santa Cruz, which was promoted to the public during numerous tabling events throughout the year. This newsletter, The Pedaling Periodical, will continue beyond this project's duration, and you can sign up for the e-newsletter and read archived issues here.

Originally, this year's team hoped to acquire data from a number of sources to create a more comprehensive map of bicycle ridership that would include information from last year's project (see History below). Due to lack of funding, this aspect was removed from the project scope. In the process of looking into data sources, however, the team was able to connect the City of Santa Cruz Public Works Department with a source of data from the Association of Monterey Bay Area Governments' (AMBAG) Cycle Tracks program that may be included in the upcoming Santa Cruz Bike Plan Update of 2015.

History

2012-13

To help the City of Santa Cruz meet the needs of current and future bicyclists in Santa Cruz, an isolated study of transit to and from the University of California Santa Cruz was conducted by the BTPT in the 2012-13 academic year. Last year, the three students on the team, Brenden Fant, Austin Seller, and Anthony Siao, worked with Ross Clark, the City of Santa Cruz Climate Change Action Manager. The team collected data from three sources: frequency of bicycle use for roads on the Westside (acquired through a survey), the condition of the roads (using a Bicycle Environmental Quality Index), and the locations and severity of collisions in Santa Cruz (acquired from the Santa Cruz Police Department). The team then worked with the UCSC Center for Integrated Spatial Research to create Geographic Information Systems (GIS) maps that overlaid these three sets of data. These maps and their analysis of the results were presented at a number of public events and meetings in the following months, including at the UCSC End of Year Sustainability Celebration, a Santa Cruz City Council meeting, a Santa Cruz County Regional Transportation Commission's Bike Committee meeting, and a People Power of Santa Cruz County Steering Committee meeting. To read the full story, click here. Also, click here to read the 2012-2013 BTPT final report.

2011-12

The 2011-12 bicycle transit project through IDEASS was headed by one student, Ryan Heywood, who collaborated with the Santa Cruz County Regional Transportation Commission and the Traffic Safety Coalition to design and complete a bike and pedestrian count. His final report can be found here.

If you have comments or questions regarding the 2013-2014 BTPT's progression, please email Aly Tyree.