Federally funded program aims to increase biking convenience, cut down on driving miles
Biking around town or into the mountains will soon become easier for Boulder residents.
Boulder will be one of the first cities to install a revolutionary Web-based bike routing system for bikers that is set to hit the Internet in November.
“Our goal is to offer a convenient online bike routing tool to make it easier for people trying to bike around Boulder,” said Marni Ratzel, the Bicycle and Pedestrian Transportation Planner for
The Web site will be similar to MapQuest’s. This navigation tool will help all types of bikers get around streets and paths. The biker will type in their location and desired destination, and the system will spit out directions.
The program, initially dubbed “BikeQuest,” was supposed to launch this summer, but has been postponed until November 2006 because the project is federally funded, and communication among all entities around the country needs to be finalized.
The program is projected to cost $140,000, according to Boulder’s Daily Camera, and 70 percent of that will come from an enhancement grant called CMAC (Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality).
Ratzel said this type of grant helps to “minimize the impact of pollution caused by vehicular traffic.”
The Camera also reported that GO Boulder had to show how many motor vehicle miles would be saved due to the program. Ratzel said the city would save up to 4.4 million vehicle miles in five years.
The City of Boulder hopes to have all logistical kinks worked out so the program will be up and running on time, and the full-blown hard launch will take place in spring 2007 when bikers really start hitting the road and the demand is expected to be higher.
The difference between most vehicle navigation sites and Boulder’s site is that it will offer turn-by-turn directions, making sure the directions are suitable for each particular user.
There are over 200 miles of bike routes in Boulder, and “we are giving people the tool to better know the system that is in place,” Ratzel said.
The system will be programmed to depict the quickest and least dangerous route according to the abilities and preferences of the biker giving options like “maximize on-street bike routes” or “maximize off-street bike routes.” It will offer more multi-use paths and roads with bike lanes.
It will accommodate recreational-style bikers who would rather use paths to avoid vehicle traffic. According to Ratzel, recreational bikers are usually families on leisure rides that don’t want to deal with cars.
The Web site will also oblige commuter-style bikers who feel comfortable mingling with cars on the road.
In order to launch this project, GO Boulder will have to make sure all lanes and paths are documented in the system. Ratzel said there are consultants working both in-house and out of state to make sure the site will be complete and fully functional.
Consultants will work on rating the transportation facilities by the type of user that will need them. Others will help with the geographic technology of the site, specifically rating the algorithms that do the functionality.
“A large part of that job will be making up functions to not compromise the performance,” Ratzel said.
ESRI, a company that designs and develops geographic information systems (GIS), is a major player in providing the workability of the site.
“ESRI staff has provided some assistance and direction on technology options,” said Terry Stonich, the Planning & Development Services Information Resources Manager for the City of Boulder.
Stonich said ESRI has also contracted with Rod Kuhns and Associates on some developmental work.
GO Boulder has yet to decide the exact technology the system will run on, but an ESRI ArcIMS solution, which publishes maps, data and metadata on the Web, or an ESRI ArcGIS Server Solution, a GIS that allows users to have GIS anywhere on their computer, are two options.
Ratzel and team hope to develop this as a pilot program to be used for the Denver Metro area and later going national when the concept proves itself.
“We’re documenting the GIS scripting, data model schema and hardware/software system architecture so that this information can be shared with other communities throughout the Denver metro region as well as nationally,” Ratzel wrote in an e-mail.
A few other U.S. communities already use similar systems. Los Angeles County, Orange County, San Bernadino County and Riverside County, in Calif., all use bikemetro.com and the greater Portland, Ore., area uses Bycycle.org. Chicago and Philadelphia are in the construction phases of their programs as well, according to Ratzel.
After all is said and done, Stonich hopes these programs will “educate folks about the bike system and get more people biking more often.”
