- Portland, OR: Leading the charge with 36%
- Chicago, IL: A close second at 37%
what
Interesting that they rank New York 5th, but omit the apparent rank order metric, % of commuters.
Minneapolis may be lower, but if weโre considering other metrics that commuter %, then it should rank higher by sheer mileage of dedicated off-street paved bike paths. That number nearly doubles if you count the paths that are also double-lane, but are maintained packed sand, instead of paving. And it triples if you start including streets with bike lanes.
Why do they count the San Francisco Bay Area as one city? The area includes over a hundred municipalities.
Because political jurisdictions are completely arbitrary. The Bay Area is largely one continuous conglomeration of cities. It makes sense when youโre examining the whole country to lump similar areas together.
Political jurisdictions arenโt arbitrary if youโre considering things like bike lanes, street repair, etc. (And having lived in several locations around the area, thereโs also a lot of variation in terrain, weather, traffic behavior, and number and kinds of cyclists.)
It might still make sense to group cities into metropolitan areas in spite of those factors, but then why didnโt they do it for any of the other cities?
They did though. The Bay Area is a lot more Balkanized than most urban areas for topographic reasons but for example they include St. Paul and Minneapolis one city despite being separated legally. Iโm sure the other major cities have lots of little satellite cities included in the analysis too, theyโre just not famous enough to be called out that way.
And yes there are some differences but there are a lot of similarities. Especially culture, weather, etc. When looking at the different places across the country, Bay Area cities are relatively similar with a few outlier exceptions.
