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Neo Jang November 28, 2023

Where the Bicycle Racks Are

In February 2023, Amsterdam opened a new underwater bicycle parking facility. Image Credit (Bicycle Dutch)

If we knew the places we plan to visit have reasonably secure and convenient bike racks, then the decision to pedal there would be an easy one. On the contrary, if there’s no good place to park the bike, we would choose (a) a different equivalent service with a better bike parking, or (b) drive a car if the said service had no substitute. Below is a list of different local maps for Bryan/College Station area, that could tell us this bit of useful information.

  • Laurel’s BCS Bike Map (https://www.google.com/maps/)
  • City of College Station (https://cstx.maps.arcgis.com)
  • City of Bryan (https://maps.bryantx.gov/bike/)
  • TAMU Bike Parking Map (https://transport.tamu.edu/parkingmap/bike/)

Laurel’s BCS Bike Map

Our friend, Laurel, took it upon herself the immense task of cataloging the bicycle racks across twin cities over the past year. She took such care as to even include the photos, to show what these racks look like in real life, along with the time of last confirmation. Shown below is the resulting interactive map.

  • Different layers can be toggled on/off, such as Bike Lanes, Bike Routes, Multi-Use Paths, and Bike Parking.
  • Clicking on Bike Parking spots shows more detailed info, including photos on many, as well as last confirmed date.
  • If starred, this map will be available to view on your Google Maps, desktop or mobile. Follow this instruction: View your My Maps using Google Maps (support.google.com)

A static map with infrequent updates would be less helpful than a crowd-sourced one that has many eyes and hands on continuously. Laurel’s map invites users to add missing or update outdated information, by submitting this form. (https://forms.gle/yeYJQgzHhBkz9Zkd9)

City of College Station – Bike Map

City of College Station offers a similar Bicycle Map, which includes bike rack locations throughout the city, as well as bike lanes & bike routes.

Image Credit: City of College Station (https://cstx.maps.arcgis.com)

Credit must be given to the city of College Station that dataset exported from their source gave a rich starting point for Laurel to build on. Especially the data for “Proposed, Planned & Funded” gives us a hopeful glimpse of better connected network.

City of Bryan – Bicycle Routes

City of Bryan also offers the map of Bicycle Routes. It serves the titled purpose, and does not yet include locations of bicycle racks.

Image Credit: City of Bryan (https://maps.bryantx.gov/bike/)

Please leave comment below if Bryan does have more relevant data available. The motivation behind Laurel’s map was to have a consolidated map that would cover both cities and the campus, for a seamless travel across these articifial boundaries.

Texas A&M University – Bike Map

Speaking of the campus, TAMU Bike Parking Map appears inactive at the time of this writing. Perhaps it used to work at some point in the past, and is no longer maintained or offered.

Image Credit: Texas A&M University (https://transport.tamu.edu/parkingmap/bike/)

Subjectively speaking, cycling on-campus is a comparatively more relaxed experience compared to off-campus. With few exceptions, almost all buildings have up-to-date, conveniently-located, and well-utilized bicycle parking. As the Sustainable Transportation team work diligently to ensure this quality service, I would encourage them should give themselves more credit by making this achievement readily visible.

What do you think about these maps? How can they be made more useful?

Filed Under: Advocacy, Bryan/College Station, Commuting, Safety Tagged With: Advocacy, Bryan, College Station, Cycling, Social, TAMU

Neo Jang November 17, 2023

Bike Park is coming to Aggieland!

A mapview showing the Southeast Park on Rock Prairie Road
Satellite view of Southeast Park on Rock Prairie road East. (Nov. 2023)

How it began

  • August 24, 2023: College Station City Council discontinues Texas Independence Ballpark project – The Eagle (PDF)
    • Due to soil deficiencies discovered at the site, constructing large paved surfaces, such as parking lots, is not practically or financially feasible.
  • October 25, 2023: First presentation to the City Council. Kim spoke for the middle- and high school MTB team, and having safe spaces to allow more kids on bikes. Her impassioned speech, an act impossible to follow, starts at 16:25 of this video recording. (https://collegestationtx.portal.civicclerk.com/event/3580/media)
Map view of Southeast park and Lick Creek Trail with green scribble lines for possible network of trails
Kim’s history making doodle of trails all across Southeast park and Lick Creek Trail (Oct. 2023)

Where things are now

  • October 30, 2023: Capital Projects held an open house public meeting. Among many great ideas presented, bike park/trails option received a strong support.
  • November 9, 2023: City Council meeting > Capital Projects Update. Site stabilization effort was deemed as an opportunity to quickly put together a prototype pump track/skills park. (Skip to 1:30:30: https://collegestationtx.portal.civicclerk.com/event/3601/media)
  • November 20, 2023: (TBD) a follow-up presentation to the city council is planned, to emphasize that this bike park plan will be for All Ages & Abilities, instead of a niche sport need.
  • December 11, 2023: Capital Projects will update the council with a much broader plan.

Where we could go

Railyard Bike Park in Rogers, AR (Image credit: Arkansas.com)
  • Skills park for all levels: a bike playground for toddlers on balance bikes, and a pump track for intermediate to advanced level riders
  • Accessible by bike: Connect to Lick Creek Hike & Bike trail, as well as multi-use path being built along Rock Prarie Road
  • Integrate with other uses: a dog park, frisbee golf, running trails, and a greater greenspace. Perhaps even a coffee shop in the woods!
Airship Coffee at Coler MTB Preserve is located in the middle of a forest, within a half mile walk/bike from nearest parking lot. (Image credit: visitbentonville.com)

How You can help

  • Reach out and tell us! There are many interest groups already united in this shared vision.
    • College Station Composite Mountain Bike Team (bcsbiketeam.com)
    • Brazos Valley Mountainbike Association (bvmba.net)
    • Trek store College Station (trekbikes.com/us/en_US/retail/college_station)
    • Aggieland Cycling (aggieland-cycling.com)
  • Tell your family, friends, neighbors and co-workers.
  • Talk to the city officials. If you don’t know how, we can help.

Thanks and more soon!

Filed Under: Advocacy, Government Engagement, Just For Fun Tagged With: Beginner, College Station, Cycling, Intermediate, MTB, Social, youth

brazoscyclists April 5, 2016 Leave a Comment

Karbach Bike Pub Crawl

Start varies- check Facebook

Tagged With: Beginner, pub-crawl, Social

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