August
2003

Coalition pursues Ellwood bikepaths



The Ellwood-Devereux area is currently a very popular place to appreciate nature on foot and bicycle. Photo by Ralph Fertig.

• If you haven't been to the Ellwood-Devereux area, go! It's a superb 665-acre open space between Sandpiper Golf Course and Isla Vista, with over two miles of beaches. For ten years, people have been fighting proposed homes on those oceanfront acres, and a recent goal to purchase and protect the land was met.
• Planning for the space is moving ahead. A Joint Proposal for the Ellwood-Devereux Coast by the County and UCSB was published in early 2002. Recently, the City of Goleta became a new partner in the process. The study details current use, sensitive habitats, regional impacts, and proposed amenities such as trails. A 42-hour survey of users found that 13% of the people visited the area on bicycles.

This map shows the proposed Joint Proposal bikepaths within the Ellwood-Devereux area.

• A well-attended public workshop was held on June 25. Many people, including Bicycle Coalition members, spoke in favor of bicycle/pedestrian paths and trails. Vie Obern noted that since 1966, people have been trying to create a California Coastal Trail, and this is the perfect opportunity to forge a link through the area. Ralph Fertig spoke for including a path that will give Ellwood Elementary School children a safe means to walk and bike to school. Robert Bernstein hoped that various trail proposals will be combined into one that is part of the de Anza National Historic Trail.
• The subject of bicyclist access to the Ellwood-Devereux area was discussed at our July 1st meeting. It was agreed that we write a letter from the Bicycle Coalition expressing the need for bicyclist access. The resultant July 10 letter, from Coalition president Wilson Hubbell, stressed two aspects:
• All-Weather Commuter Trails. One part would connect bikelanes on west end of Phelps Road with the Ellwood community to provide access to UCSB. The other would connect Ellwood residents with Hollister bikelanes and Ellwood Elementary School
• Unpaved Recreational Trails. Noting that the Ellwood Mesa is a favorite destination for recreational cyclists seeking a quiet and relaxing ride away from traffic, unpaved trails should be planned as long as they stay away from environmentally-sensitive areas. A decomposed granite surface or similar naturally-colored pathway could be installed to focus biking activity.
• In addition to the Bicycle Coalition's letter, member Michael Kwan wrote separately to advocate saving a place away from traffic for kids to develop their bike-handling skills. He cited current dirt-trail use in the Elwood-Devereux area by both Boy Scouts and Santa Barbara Middle School students. With access to South County mountain trails threatened, it's more important to save trails in the Elwood-Devereux area.
• What's next? A Preliminary Plan will be released in October 2003, followed by another public workshop. Then a Draft Plan will be released in January 2004, followed by a final public workshop and comment period. Then, the Final Plan should be finished by early summer 2004. We'll be watching.

Member Appreciation Barbecue on August 10

• It's coming. Mark your calendars for Sunday, August 10th, 1:00-4:00 PM. Last year 70 Bicycle Coalition members showed up for an afternoon of eating and fun and meeting one another. It was so good that we decided to repeat it. Watch for an invitation with details coming soon to your mailbox. We'll be returning to Goleta Beach County Park, same Area D as last year. Look for the big blue bike flag. See you there!

Taking it with you
Word from the President, by Wilson Hubbell

• Messengerbags and backpacks are a common way to carry a load on a bicycle, but long distance tourists (and old-time paperboys) know that the best place to carry weight is on your bike and not your back. It's too bad that many contemporary bicycles have little or no provision for mounting a rear rack to carry the load, and so bikies choose messenger bags and backpacks because they see no alternatives.
• The good news is that some newer model racks can be easily mounted on bikes without conventional mounting eyelets. For example: Old Man Mountain Works is local manufacturer of high quality bicycle racks. Their Sherpa model is made in Goleta and can even be mounted on the back of Lance Armstrong's Trek to carry a static load of 40 pounds! Do you want a rack on your bike and see no way of mounting one? Go to www.oldmanmountain.com and you'll likely find the solution.
• There is also an excellent way of carrying weight on a bike with no rack at all: The British have long been known for old-school leather and black canvas saddlebags that mount to the back of a saddle. The Carradice Company of Nelson, England still makes these beauties in a number of different sizes (including a really big one called the Camper), and all of them need no frame-mounted rack. I use a model called the Nelson Longflap (is that British or what!) to carry work clothes for the commute to and from the office. It works sweet and the price is not bad either. You won't find these at your local bike shop so go to www.peterwhitecycles.com or www.wallbike.com for a look-see. I've dealt with both these guys and they're prompt, honest and priced right.

A crash is not an accident

• Words can mislead people when talking about bicyclist crashes. We should not call them "accidents" because it implies that they're unpreventable. It suggests that these events are outside human influence or control, and nobody is responsible for them. Instead of "accident" use terms like "crash," "collision" and "incident." And be careful not to have any.

Bicycle transportation for the people
by Jamey Wagner



Harry Nelson at work. Photo by Lillian Kuroaka, UCSB.

• Harry Nelson lives in West Campus Housing and rides his internal-hub beach cruiser outfitted with a HUGE front basket the mile and a half to his job as a physics professor at UCSB. He reports that it did not take long for him to figure out that he could get closer to his building, faster, when he bikes to work. He noted that "It would be embarrassing if I did not bike to work. If I do not bike to work, I feel strange." Even though bike commuting may be obvious to Harry, he reports that only about a third of the residents of West Campus Housing bike to campus.
• Harry started biking and walking more during the Arab Oil Embargo in 1973. In the US, the car serves as an extension of our living rooms where people do everything from eat to make love. Here cars are primarily for transportation and bikes are too frequently considered kids' toys used for leisure or for sporting events rather than transportation.
• He has traveled extensively and noted how he tends to evaluate each country's use of bicycles. He lived for a time in Europe and noted that Europeans tend to view bikes and cars differently than we do. Cars are for sporting (like on the autobahn) in Europe and bikes are often used for short trips and shopping. Harry would like to see the US become more European with regard to land use planning and infrastructure that encourages bicycle and transit use.
• Our "petroleum economy" has a stranglehold on us, lamented Harry. He does have a balanced view and acknowledges that not all trips can be made by bicycle. For example he totes his two children around by car when bike or bus will not fit the bill.
• Harry wants bike infrastructure upgrades linked to upgrades for cars. For example he lobbied for planning on Highway 217 that included alternative transportation such as bike, bus and carpool options. Unfortunately his lone voice on this topic never gained traction with the planners.
• Harry commented that Isla Vista (IV) resembles Amsterdam in terms of how the roads in IV are not primarily for cars. Today the prevalence of folks getting around on bikes and skateboards intimidates cars in IV. He has researched early (1970s) IV planning efforts and even then, plans were laid to accommodate bikes as the primary transportation mode. Picasso and Pardall were both identified early on as bicycle corridors. Harry now envisions bicycle/car separation measures on Camino Pescadero linked with a bicycle-underpass at El Colegio to accommodate the 10,000 bicycle commuters living in IV.
• Closer to his own home, Harry would like to help create a Class I bikepath linking the beauty of Ellwood Mesa to UCSB and Isla Vista. Perhaps low impact lighting or water-permeable glow-in-the-dark paving could be used to reduce light pollution in this open space. "There would be an incentive to ride this path because it would be so beautiful," comments Harry.

Semana Nautica bike events attract hundreds

• Semana Nautica in Santa Barbara included two bike events this year: the Semana Nautica Criterium on June 28th and the Super D Races on July 12th. They were organized by Mike Hecker and Ed Cox, respectively. The Criterium took place on City streets and attracted over 200 racers. It included a Kid's Race (right photo) that brought out families and pretty excited young riders. The Super D races (left photo) were at Elings Park and attracted lots of enthusiastic racers.

House committee cuts $600 million projects

• On July 24, the House of Representatives' Appropriations Committee cut $600 million in "Transportation Enhancements" like bicycling projects from the 2004 budget. Instead of bike, walking, landscaping, historic preservation and other projects that enrich our lives and help make alternatives to the car feasible, they voted to use the money for more roads and bridges. This is not final, the entire House has to vote on it and the Senate has its say too, but it is a scary precedent at this time because the reauthorization of the entire 6-year transportation act to replace "TEA-21" is being considered this year.
• In Santa Barbara County, we have received $12.5 million over the past 11 years from Transportation Enhancement funds. Losing funds for 2004 means over a million dollars to us. Our bikeway TE projects—those finished and those currently being planned—include:
• California Coastal Trail, Carpinteria
• SB City College Pathways, Santa Barbara
• UNOCAL Pipeline Bikepath, Santa Maria
• California Coastal Bicycle Route, SB County
• Santa Ynez River Bridge Bikeway, Lompoc
• Santa Maria/Guadalupe Bikeway, Santa Maria
• El Capitan Ranch Bikeway, SB County
• Santa Maria Valley RR Bikeway, Santa Maria
• Los Carneros Road Bikepath, SB County
• California Coastal Trail, SB County
• Los Carneros Road Bikelanes, SB County
• Ellwood Bike/Ped Overcrossing, SB County
• Shoreline Drive Park Expansion, Santa Barbara
• Riverbend Park Bikeway, Lompoc.
• Many other Enhancement projects have been funded locally, such as the Carpinteria Salt Marsh restoration, Buellton Pedestrian Gateway, Santa Maria Union Valley Parkway landscaping, Los Carneros Road landscaping, and land acquisition for the Wilcox Property, Carpinteria Bluffs, and El Capitan Ranch.
• What can we do? Contact your Representative and tell them that we want the $600 million Transportation Enhancements restored to the TEA-21 budget. The House will consider this bill in September, so act this month:
• Lois Capps, Representative, 730-1710
  1216 State Street, Suite 403
  Santa Barbara, CA 93101
• Elton Gallegly, Representative, 485-2300
  2829 Townsgate Road, Suite 315
  Westlake Village, CA 91361
• "Transportation Enhancements account for less than 2¢ of every Federal surface transportation dollar," says Keith Laughlin, president of the Rails-to-Trails Conservancy. "For less than 2¢ per dollar we get a popular program that supports locally-initiated transportation projects in communities across America."

Highway 101 and bikeways in Carpinteria

• The City of Carpinteria and Caltrans are planning changes for us with two new projects:
• Caltrans will replace and widen two Highway 101 bridges at Linden Avenue and Casitas Pass Road, and reconfigure their access ramps
• Carpinteria will complete Via Real between Linden and Bailard Avenues.
• As bicyclists, our concerns are convenience and safety, especially for children biking to nearby schools.
• Preliminary drawings for the projects were available at a public forum on July 8th, attended by Bicycle Coalition's VP Ralph Fertig. The intent of the meeting was to get public comments about alternate ramp locations. It was hard, however, to envision how bicycle crossings and lanes will be marked eventually. Rob Miller from Caltrans assured us that both new bridges will have sidewalks and bikelanes on both sides.
• For Carpinteria's project on Via Real, one of the reasons for connecting it is to reduce traffic on 101. Since Via Real is discontinuous now, people use 101 more than they would otherwise. So motorized traffic is expected to increase on Via Real when it closes the Linden-Bailard gap—making it less appealing to bicyclists who now use the existing parts.
• Currently there is a great bikepath that connects Via Real with Carpinteria Avenue. It crosses Carpinteria Creek and swoops under 101. People use it all the time. However, because it deters steelhead trout from swimming upstream to spawn, the old path will be removed and a new one will be built entirely on the west side of the creek. The new path entrance will be off the south side of a new segment of Via Real. That path and Via Real connection will enable more employees who work on one side of 101 and live on the other to bike commute.
• Via Real will still have a gap between Linden and Santa Ynez Avenues, so the projects won't offer cyclists a faster alternative to the popular Carpinteria Avenue bikelanes.
• What's next? You can make comments on this early phase to Caltrans' Lisa Johnson before July 30: lisa_johnson@dot.ca.gov. Project details will be online in the future as details become available. However you can find out more from Johnson at 805-549-3095. A draft Environmental Impact Report will be available for comment in summer 2004. A final EIR will be out summer 2005. Construction will take place 2008-2012.

Andy Singer

July meeting topics

• Our July 1st Bicycle Coalition meeting was a successful evening event at Taffy's Pizza, attracting members whom we rarely meet. It included these topics:
• Erika Lindemann reported on Bike to Work Day events that have drawn steady numbers for 3 years. The possibility of charging for T-shirts was considered.
• Mike Hecker reported that his new Semana Nautica Criterium attracted 205 racers.
• Goleta City Council voted to halt consideration of changing Los Carneros bridge at Highway 101.
• Our Member Appreciation Barbecue is set for August 10, Ralph Fertig and Erika Lindemann will work on details.
• There was no report from our Nominating Committee.
• The Coalition voted to support trails for transportation and recreation in the Ellwood-Devereux area; a letter will be written by Wilson Hubbell.
• Ralph Fertig reported that SB City bicyclist counts declined for 2003, but were apparently influenced by our poor weather.

Carpinteria pioneers stabilized DG paths



The Carpinteria DG trails are edged with either concrete, extruded plastic edging, or stones. Photo by Ralph Fertig.

• A new trail approach has come to our area. The City of Carpinteria has installed paths around its 52-acre Carpinteria Bluffs preserve, just dedicated on July 3rd. According to Parks and Recreation's Matt Roberts, what's new is that they're made with decomposed granite—think very coarse sand—bound with a polymer.
• The result is a hard but natural-looking surface that meets ADA standards for wheelchair use. The polymer is made by Soil Stabilization Products and was used extensively for paths around the Golden Gate National Recreation Area. It can be strewn with loose decomposed granite, but then it becomes too slippery for inline skaters—and speeding cyclists.

Walk/Bike California

• A new walking and bicycling conference will be held October 15-18 in Oakland, California. Sponsored by the California Bicycle Coalition and the City of Oakland, the conference will feature speakers and presenters that include nationally-recognized experts, state legislators, local, regional and state agency representatives, planners and engineers, public health promoters, plus pedestrian and bicyclist advocates.
• The conference will highlight walking-and-bicycling's ability to relieve congestion, stimulate economic activity, increase safety, and forge healthier communities throughout California and the Western US.
• Register by August 15th for $199 before the price increases. Presentation proposals are being accepted through August 8th. You'll find conference details and online registration at www.walkbikecalifornia.net. Or phone Chris Morfas at 916-446-7558.

Bikepath reopens



Take a spin on the new bikepath just west of the Biltmore Hotel in Montecito. Photo by Ralph Fertig.

• At $500,000, the Channel Drive bikepath is undoubtedly the most expensive—and maybe the most beautiful—one in our County. Paid totally by adjacent resident Ty Warner, it is now lower, extensively landscaped, repaved, and sports a wood rail fence. In addition, several trees that constantly grew into the path have been removed. The ocean views are superb now that they are no longer interrupted by a chain-link fence. Our thanks to Warner for his generous contribution, and to Wilson Hubbell who insisted on an adjacent Fairway Road bike detour rather than a distant one through Montecito's busy Coast Village Road.

Bikestation update

• Georgia Case from the Bikestation Coalition visited Santa Barbara on July 24 and outlined a cooperative process with the Bicycle Coalition. Speaking before the City's Transportation and Circulation Committee, Case described various services that other bikestations here and overseas offer, like self-serve bike lockers, memberships, electric vehicle rentals, bike rentals, bike repair, and equipment sales. In order to assess local possibilities, the Bicycle Coalition will co-host a workshop, probably in October, to gather public comments.
• The Santa Barbara Bikestation is to be part of the Granada Garage parking structure on Anacapa behind the Granada Theater. That project was delayed when bids for construction came in over expectations, but the differences are being resolved, and the Bikestation will remain part of the project.

Implementation Plan

• While some think that the issue of whether or not to widen Highway 101 between Santa Barbara and Carpinteria has nothing to do with people on bicycles, they should consider the proposed Highway 101 Implementation Plan.
• These are times of limited funding and the "IP" will consider costs and all options to contend with single-occupant-vehicle congestion through the entire South Coast, not just on one road. If hundreds of millions of our transportation dollars are concentrated on one mode of travel, then we'll have no choice.
• The IP offers a process to explore ways to facilitate the movement of people and goods, with the goal of an informed consensus on a mix of projects that will most efficiently serve us. The 2-year process will involve an extensive public outreach effort and, according to Caltrans District Director Gregg Albright, will speed up widening if that's the best choice.
• The South Coast Sub-Regional Committee has been considering the IP, but has been unable to agree on recommendations to send to the whole SBCAG Board for vote. They will meet again on August 6th, 3:00-5:00 PM at the MTD conference room, 550 Olive Street, Santa Barbara. You might consider attending.

Active members

• Please thank and support the following businesses that are Bicycle Coalition members:
• King Cycle Group Shasta Lake
• MarBorg Industries, Santa Barbara
• Nett & Champion Insurance, Santa Barbara
• Rincon Cycles, Carpinteria
• Tri Paradise Sports, Santa Barbara
• Lightning Cycle Dynamics, Lompoc
• We're very grateful to the following who renewed their memberships: Ann & Mike Lawler, Robert Young, Neal Turner, Glenn Reinhart, Annemarie Horner, David Madajian, Al Leydecker, Ann Paff and Bill Powell.

Bicyclist count shows that weather matters

• Thanks to Bicycle Coalition members and other volunteers, we helped the City of Santa Barbara and ourselves with data on bicyclist numbers and behavior. This is the seventh year in a row that we have done the six-day June count.
• What are the results? We counted 3145 bicyclists at 25 intersections — that's over a bicyclist a minute on the average. The counts were all 4:00-6:00 PM on mid-week days in mid-June. Because the intersections that we count vary slightly from one year to another, for overall trends we examine 13 intersections that have been counted each year. The year-to-year results for those 13 intersections show a 10% decrease in 2003 over the average of 1997-2002, as seen in the above graph.

• Are bicyclist numbers really declining? Perhaps. However, a look at the 2003 weather suggests otherwise. Counts were made over six mid-week days between June 10-19. On June 10th, we had light rain/drizzle through the morning. On June 17th, it was sunny, warm and beautiful all day. On the other four days, it was cloudy and cool until late afternoon. If the 2003 data are separated into those three weather categories, a distinct pattern emerges as shown at the right where percent change from 2002 to 2003 is presented. It seems very clear that weather conditions—especially light rain—effect the number of people who choose to bicycle on a given day. And if the days had all been sunny, the total counts would have matched the 1997-2002 average.
• From other data collected, 22% of bicyclists wore helmets, 18% rode on sidewalks, and 4% rode the wrong way on the street. These numbers are all within one percent of prior averages.
• Out special thanks to all volunteer counters: Bob Burgess, Eileen Daley, Pierre Delong, Ralph Fertig, Tricia Guifoyle, Ken Hughes, Drew Hunter, Eva Inbar, Ann Lawler, Jim Marshall, Owen Patmor, Doris Phinney, Dru van Hengel, and Gary Wissman.

Isla Vista plan advances



Pardall Road in IV may get roundabouts and new buildings that combine shops with apartments. Photo by Ralph Fertig.

• On July 22, the Board of Supervisors unanimously voted to move the Isla Vista Master Plan into its next phase. The Plan has been developed over the past several years through meetings and community changes urged by consultant Opticos Design. The current draft plan will now enter an environmental review process. It will then go to the Planning Commission in the spring 2004, back to the Board for final approval in fall 2004, and to the Coastal Commission in spring 2005. You can read the plan at www.islavistaplan.org or get details from Heather Baker at 568-2000.