The Upper West Side should be an ideal place to get around on a bicycle or scooter, also known as ‘micromobility’.
But a century of planning focused on the automobile means motor vehicles dominate the street at the expense of other transportation modes.
Meanwhile, micromobility infrastructure hasn’t kept pace with a surge in riders and proliferation of new devices.
This leaves neighborhoods like the Upper West Side decades behind global peer cities with thriving, multi-modal communities.
Welcome to Getting There
Let’s say you live on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, and your preferred commute is to grab a Citi Bike near your home in the far West 90s and drop it off near your office in Midtown [0.1]. Or perhaps your children go to school on the Upper West Side, and since 2020, you’ve chosen to take them there on the back of an electric pedal-assist cargo bike, a device that has revolutionized the way you and your family move around the city [0.2]. Or maybe you’re a delivery worker tasked with swiftly crisscrossing the Upper West Side dozens of times per shift with ever-changing routes and destinations [0.3].
Everyone above is using micromobility for transportation, and every time they set off, they are faced with the same vexing question: How do I get there? Despite decades of incremental progress, micromobility infrastructure on the Upper West Side remains a patchwork of semi-protected lanes, painted lines, and altogether missing infrastructure.
In other words, there is no predictably safe way to access destinations on the Upper West Side using micromobility. For most riders, the barriers of inadequate infrastructure keep them from riding more often. For many others, it keeps them from riding at all. [0.4]
One’s personal risk tolerance should not be the limiting factor in one’s choice of transportation, but that’s the current state of affairs on the Upper West Side. Let’s take a step back and assess where we are and how we got here.
What’s the issue?
The past few years have seen a profound increase in micromobility use on the Upper West Side, and around the city. [0.5] The pandemic supercharged a trend that was already underway, inviting many new riders, and many new types of devices, onto incomplete infrastructure that doesn’t meet current, much less future, needs.
Whatever your relationship to bicycles, scooters, and other modes of micromobility, these devices are here to stay. That’s a good thing. Micromobility is broadly accessible, environmentally sustainable, and spatially efficient. It offers the promise of equitable personal transportation to children and seniors and everyone in between, connecting people to economic and social opportunity. [0.6]
The Upper West Side is ideally suited to support a door-to-door micromobility network. It’s dense, diverse, and vibrant, flanked by large urban parks, and a vital connection between lower and upper Manhattan.
Why this project?
Our aim is to demystify micromobility use on the Upper West Side. We asked people who use bikes and other small wheeled devices what they use them for and how infrastructure affects their motivations and needs.
To do this, we partnered with Council Member Gale Brewer’s office to develop and distribute a questionnaire that reached over 350 respondents. [See our user survey methodology here].
We also recruited over three dozen volunteers to ride every block of every designated bike lane on the official New York City Bike Map to better understand the issues riders face when navigating the existing infrastructure. [See our field survey methodology here].
Who is this for?
This report is for everyone with a stake in safe, sustainable, and equitable transportation choices on the Upper West Side, and around New York City. In other words, all of us.
Advocates will find useful, actionable information to further their work toward livable, equitable streets.
Elected officials will glean deeper insights into the issues that affect their constituents.
The DOT will find clear evidence of where and how to invest scarce resources.
And everyday people might see their lived experience reflected in the data and realize that their needs and apprehensions are not unique.
We hope it provides a better understanding of where we are, how we got here, and where we can go.
What did we learn?
If users perceive infrastructure to be low quality, they use it less, especially women and people over sixty-six years of age. Users in every demographic told us they would use micromobility more often if the infrastructure was better.
Safety is the most important issue for micromobility users. Moving vehicles and obstructed bike lanes cause concern for nearly 95% of riders, and a desire for more protected bike lanes and separation from motor vehicles were by far the most common comments.
None of the existing bike lanes on the Upper West Side support micromobility users of all ages, abilities, based on our assessment of six key elements. Inconsistent design types, poor maintenance, and frequent obstructions create unsafe and uncomfortable conditions for most users.
Micromobility users have a difficult time getting where they need to go under current conditions. Gaps between protection, lack of protection at intersections, and little to no connection between protected lanes means there is no predictably safe way to get to most destinations by scooter or bicycle on the Upper West Side, particularly for vulnerable riders.