Honolulu ranks 8th out of the 70-largest cities with the most number of bike to work commuters with about 3,000 daily bike to work commuters. They are a section of the population that doesn’t want to be left out of Honolulu’s $5.3 billion rail project.
"They are starting construction now, assuming that it’s built, it must be built the right way to handle pedestrians, cyclists, wheelchairs, people coming by car, people coming by bus," says Chad Taniguchi, Hawaii Bicycling League.
The Hawaii Bicycling League called on the city Thursday night to provide their plans for incorporating bicycles onboard the trains.
"Our preference is to first allow the bikes on and as time goes on we want to see how that interacts with the people that are onboard," says Wayne Yoshioka, Department of Transportation Services.
That means allowing bikes during both peak and non-peak hours, something that wasn’t part of the plan years ago.
"We made a strong pitch for that several years ago, so we’re happy they have incorporated that concept in their planning," says Taniguchi.
But, where will the bikes go? One idea, is to have vertical racks to hold them in place. Bike racks on city buses have proven very successful.
"Wee have the bike racks on buses, and when we started that no one was using it at the beginning, now we have 30,000 loadings a month with those bike racks on the busses," says City Bicycle Coordinator.
The only difference with the proposed rail plan is that they are considering allowing surfboards onboard too, something TheBus currently does not permit.
A design team has begun working on station layouts to also making space for bike racks and lockers – the current plan is for 20 per station.
"It doesn’t seem like enough at this point, as long as they have space for expansion I think that’s a good start," says Taniguchi.
And there’s no plan to charge extra to carry-on a bike or board.
"Yeah, it has to be bike friendly, we’re going to try to keep on top of them to make sure they are," says Taniguchi.
See the original article at: KHON2 Local News
