Pro-cycling efforts making progress

Spokane’s Howard Street received designted bike lanes recently, part of ongoing efforts to improve safety and accessibility to cyclists.

Spokane and Coeur d’Alene aren’t quite Portland when it comes to bike lanes, trails and parking, but they are making progress on the road to making bike travel more feasible and friendly.

“We’ve go a ways to go to catch up with Portland,” said Grant Wencel, bike-pedestrian coordinator for the City of Spokane. “But we have good progress this past year, thanks largely to a grant from the state that allowed us to do some things.”

The $619,000 grant from WSDOT Highway Safety and Improvement Projects enabled the city to implement new bike lanes and a shared use path, as well as a small collection of locally designed and built racks in the downtown core. Some 90 percent of the grant-related construction was completed in 2010, with a few small projects to come in 2011. Full story. Pete Dunlop, Down to Earth NW

How long has it been since you rode a bike?