For the first time, a
Sonoma County employer has earned certification as a Bicycle Friendly Business by the League of American Bicyclists. (This welcome news comes via the Sonoma County Bicycle Coalition.)
Dare we hope that more businesses follow the example of Sutter Santa Rosa Regional Hospital?
My husband and I live and travel throughout a city that’s a
Bicycle Friendly Community — but too often, sidewalks are the only safe place to ride along roads that were only built for cars. It’s vitally important to have safe and complete routes to get us where we need to go.
When we reach our destinations, we frequently find no secure place to lock up our bicycles. Too often, around town, we’ll see a bicycle still attached via a lock through its frame to a rack — only to see that someone has stolen one or more tires. Or a reflector. Or the seat.
What sort of message does a business think it sends when it posts a sign proclaiming itself “not responsible” for the theft of your bicycle?
In addition to exposing our bikes to weather and possible theft, many of the racks appear designed and installed by someone who doesn’t ride — someone who, therefore, doesn’t understand the practical needs of cyclists.
For example, we’ll find racks that were placed too close to a wall or other barrier — so there isn’t any room to attach a bike to the now-useless, solely decorative rack.
This absence of safe, usable, bike parking at the majority of Santa Rosa businesses really shows in glaring contrast to what Sutter is doing right ... specifically, providing “secure covered parking” for its employees who ride bicycles.
Personally, we’d love to see more
BikeLink® lockers at business and government buildings. For a few cents per hour, we can lock up our bikes safe from thieves and inclement weather. Sadly, however, BikeLink® locations are still few and far between; we find them mainly at SMART Train stations and on the Santa Rosa Junior College campus.
