Orange barrel shuffle

         The temps are cooling, the leaves are changing, the colors are vibrant in the forests and the road projects are blossoming.  This year was remarkable in our area as the towns  townships and villages come closer to the network of bike infrastructure which has been planned over the years.

One of the most important was the north/south corridor

 on Portage street which was dieted and bike lanes added.  

Lanes were buffered wherever road width allowed, 

Bus Boxes were painted in red at bus stops

and bike boxes painted in green at the appropriate intersections. This is a project which has been planned more than 10 years.  Most projects are that or longer from planning to implimentation.  This will extend farther south to the interstate in the next couple of years 

and the city of Portage is adding a trail extension south of I94  to connect with with their  trail network which will finally extend to the village of Vicksburg 

using the newly completed trail east of Austin Lake.

    That's not all the City of Portage is doing. They've continued the improvements on the south end of Portage Rd and developed new MUP's leading from the residential areas  to the retail area between Austin and West Lakes.

    Things keep developing with the KRVT trail extension to Battle Creek and the Fruit Belt Trail on the other side of town.  Most of the work is a significant part of scheduled road improvements which have been planned for years.  As a cyclist who has been engaged in urban cycling for over 50 years I am ecstatic to see these improvements.  Hell, I still think ADA curb cuts are a luxury.  Watching this interconnected network developing is overwhelming and can only lead to better and more practical cycling while the cities develop safer driving corridors.

Quick trip to see friends

   Most of June and July was eaten up with some home improvement rather than cycling adventure but I did take a bit of a trip to my hometown of Galesburg, Ill.  It's on the rail lines so I learned long ago that the train ride is better than driving through Chicago.

I rode the Brompton to our station and, after playing with my tablet for a couple hours on the train, camped out in Union Station for a couple hours for the train change. 

I was sitting watching hundreds of young women fnding their way through Union Station dressed in very suggestive, revealing outfits.

There were so many I began to wonder if there was a hooker convention in town.

Darn, no such luck, Lollipalooza was going on in Grant's Park.  These were the suburban chicks dressin" up for the day and catching a train to avoid traffic.

Oh well, thanks for the eye candy girls!  

    I went on my way to Galesburg, Il. where I spent an evening with a group of high school friends for drinks and dinner.  We had a night of plasant remembrance and catch up on our grand kids and golf scores.  A number asked abut my cycling and were incredulous that I continued to ride as I do.  My only answer is that I can because I do.  Of course at my age it's easier to ride 50 miles than get off the couch.  I'm glad people thought far enough ahead to organize an evening together.

    I can't ignore the craziness of the bike news the past couple weeks.  The goofball in charge of DOT has declared bike lanes to be DEI and withdrew future funding.  Now this is stupid on a couple levels. Bike lanes have nothing to do with race or gender (the subject of DEI policy) but it's even more ludicrous than that.  There are 10's of millions  of cyclists in this country (I've heard as much as 70m), the vast majority of whom, based on my 50 years of experience, are white men.  I thought these Bozo's were advocating the interests...oops! I'm sorry, the SACRED privileges of white men.  It looks like, once again, the administration has stepped on a rake and bonked themselves in the face.

Summertime

May and June got eaten alive by minor remodel projects.  Glad that's over and I can get out for a little bit of recreational riding. I visited some of the ongoing upgrades to our local non-motorized infrastructure.  

A new trail is under construction along the east and south sides of Austin Lake which is going to connect the Vicksburg trail to the Portage trail system.  That connection has been 10 years in the process between construction delays and property issues.  It looks like a great project through a small forested area which will be a boon for both communities.

Portage is also continuing with the diet and redesign of the business area on Portage Rd between Centre Ave and Bacon Ave, which will slow down the dragstrip and improve access to the retail business between Austin and West Lakes.  That has been kicked around for at least a decade and will be finished this fall, finally.

Also, work is ongoing on Westnedge south of Centre avenue in conjunction with some water main replacement which will upgrade the street configurations and extend the existing cycling infrastructure.  That is planned to be complete this summer.

Also, in Kalamazoo, we are finally scheduled to see the road diet on Portage St south from the Edison neighborhood to Cork St.  That piece of the puzzle was planned years ago but got snaffued by a bureaucratic glich. In my opnion it should be more, but I'm glad to see it happening.  

The KRVT is finally going to extend from Galesburg to Augusta and is intended to be complete before the snow flies again. 

A lot of good things are happening to develop our network of cycling infrastructure, it feels like we're constantly crawling uphill, but things are getting done.  The powers that be see the need and are developing a real network of cycling along with all the other road projects.

Google's view of our cycling network (the green lines) is way behind the times

compared to the reality on the ground today.

Our local MPO has an interactive map of the projects planned for the coming year, hopefully other areas have the same available across the country.

Worlds of Fun

March in Michigan is like a really moist roller coaster,

we went from single digit temps

to robust sunshine and fifty degrees

back to the freezer

back to summertime warmth and listening 

to the wetlands waking

onward to bask in the sunshine

with the daffodils rising in the background.

Maybe we've reached the end of the ride 

and won't have to worry 

about snow tires for a while.

It's time to enjoy some longer rides

and plan some adventures.