Caltrain's Bike Master Plan
2008-06-11 08:44PM PDT/Home
I took a quick look at Caltrain's Bike Master Plan. The "plan" is a multi-page pdf file I'll summarize for you:
- No more space can and will be devoted to bikes even though demand currently exceeds supply.
- We'll be nicer to cyclists.
- We have to do something, lets put in more bike racks.
Okay, yes, I'm being bit snippy. There are some interesting tidbits hinting that perhaps they understand the underlying issues. Unfortunately they don't come out and state them. For example, under "Are We Doing Enough" they list:
- Real-time Information
- Demand Management
- Bike-sharing Program
- Folding Bike Subsidy
On any given day cyclists start lining up informally at stations. They don't know if there will be one or two bike cars on the coming train. They also don't know how full the bike cars already are. When the train arrives, they all have to file into any available spaces and that takes time. Caltrain lists 250 hours worth of delays attributed to bikes getting on and off the train.
The first two items are critical. They absolutely need to make real-time information about how many bike cars are on a train, and how full the car is available over the web. And at least have some mechanism in place for reserving a spot.
My suggestion for addressing the main issue of increasing bike carrying capacity which Caltrain ignores would be to eliminate designated bike cars, and simply go to a "cargo" area near the center of every car where the first two rows of seats are currently. This area would be designated for bikes, luggage, strollers etc. By having bikes load and unload all along the train, you reduce delays. It also makes the cars more uniform, so that emergency maintenance doesn't create a critical shortage of any particular type of car.
Getting even more inventive, there's a lot more available room on the train in the center "vestibule" if passengers load and unload on one side only. Once the station improvements are complete at Burlingame and California Ave, trains will no longer let passengers off into the center/opposite side of the car from the other stations. That's a lot of unused space in every entrance vestibule of every car. For safety reasons, obviously, you can't have bikes piled haphazardly and you need to have emergency egress. But I wonder if a portable rack couldn't be built to fit half of the unused side. When the train reaches the end, the racks could be slid to the opposite side of the car for the return trip.
If the portable vestibule rack could hold 2 bikes, and we could hold, say 4 bikes in what's the first two rows of seats. That's 10 bikes in every car except the handicap car and the bathroom car. But it significantly upgrades the carrying capacity of the train, decreases load/unload times and doesn't materially impact the carrying capacity of passengers.
Another alternative might be to install fold down seats so that the mix of passenger and bike carrying space could be more flexible. This is a solvable problem. I just wish Caltrain hadn't already made up their mind on this issue.