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The Boston Cyclists Union had a major win last week, when the vote on the Casey Overpass came back with the decision to build at at-grade roadway. 

The Casey Overpass is a crumbling bridge in the Jamaica Plains neighborhood of Boston. The bridge has to be torn down, and the debate raged over what to replace it with: a new bridge, or a new street-level road?

Replacing the old bridge with a new bridge seems like the easiest solution, however building that bridge would not include bike lanes, while the at-grade solutions would include greenery, bike lanes, and a generally more pedestrian-friendly atmosphere.

The Boston Cyclsits’ Union worked hard to see this happen. “We had a working advisory group and a neighborhood that was pretty divided as the process inched forward over the last year, but we were able to pull together a wide coalition of neighborhood and interest groups and dozens of passionate neighborhood activists to get the information out there on the project’s potential benefits for active transportation, economic development and even increased social activity,” Pete Stidman said of the efforts over the past year.

As the project moves forward, Pete is hopeful about what this means for the rest of Boston and active transportation. “The really exciting thing about the project is that it signals the beginning of a very different paradigm in street design in Boston and maybe Massachusetts altogether, which will now join several other urban areas around the nation that are moving away from elevate highways toward pedestrian and bike friendly boulevards. Hopefully this is the first in a long line of major reconstruction projects that will gradually make Boston’s streets among the safest and most beautiful in the country.”

Read more about the project here.

This morning the daily commute for many Boston bicyclists became a whole lot safer and more comfortable — thanks in large part to advocates at the LivableStreets Alliance.

In December 2010, LivableStreets executive director, Jackie Douglas, was a panelist on an Alliance Mutual Aid Call, sharing insight and progress from the organization’s Better Bridges Campaign. Three years ago, the advocates launched the initiative to ensure that a $3 billion investment from the state to shore up dilapidated bridges didn’t bypass accommodations for bicyclists, pedestrians and transit users. Today, LivableStreets celebrated the completion of bike lanes and pedestrian crossing improvements to the BU Bridge over the Charles River.

“This is a major victory,” Douglas said in the announcement this morning — a victory built on wide participation from LivableStreets members and a strong and diverse campaign coalition. “Improvements to the BU Bridge have created a new vital link, providing more transportation options and new opportunities to integrate physical activity into our daily lives. We are witnessing a growing wave of interest in walking, bicycling, public transit and livable communities.”

One commuter who will make use of that new, vital link is LivableStreets member Emily Blood: ““The BU Bridge used to be the major obstacle in my commute to the Longwood Medical Area,” she said. “Now I’ll bike more often, and it will be so much safer to cross.”

The savvy advocates at LivableStreets aren’t letting the victory pass silently. To highlight the improvements, engage potential members and leverage the victory into a stronger relationship with decisionmakers, they’ll be out on the bridge today and tomorrow giving out goodie bags and getting excited users to sign thank-you postcards to transportation officials.

Learn more about the Better Bridges campaign and other bridge initiatives in last year’s Advocacy Advance report — Bridging the Gaps in Bicycling Networks: An Advocate’s Guide to Getting Bikes on Bridges.

And don’t forget: LivableStreets is the host of our Winning Campaigns Training in Boston this April. Register now to secure your spot and take advantage of these winning advocates’ insight.

Photo: BU Bridge with new bike lanes and pedestrian crossings. (LivableStreets)

Winning Campaigns Trainings give you more than tips and tactics to plan a successful campaign. The Alliance’s three-day boot camp for advocates leaves participants energized, excited and prepared to take on new campaigns that reshape their communities.

Since 2009, the Alliance has worked with nearly 300 advocates from across the continent at our signature workshops. By working through the Winning Campaigns Training curriculum, those participants tweaked or launched hundreds of different campaigns to boost biking and walking in their communities.

Over the past few months, as we’ve held the first half of our 2011 series, we tried to give you a taste of this energy by sharing the rave reviews of participants. But, while we can give you a hundred testimonials, you have to experience the training yourself to understand its impact on how you plan and execute your campaigns.

In 2012, we’re giving you four opportunities to jumpstart your next winning campaign with the guidance of our expert facilitators and the assistance of your bike-ped peers. As you begin to plan out your 2012 budget, don’t forget to include space to attend this transformative training.

• January 13-15 in Tucson, AZ; Hosted by Living Streets Alliance
• April 27-29 in Boston, MA; Hosted by Livable Streets Alliance
• June 8-10 in Houston, TX; Hosted by Citizens’ Transportation Coalition
• October 19-21 in Kansas City, MO; Hosted by BikeWalkKC

Registration for each training is already open. Reserve your spot today.

And don’t forget about our final two training in 2011. The Alliance will be in Los Angeles, October 14-16, and in Columbia, SC, November 4-6.

This month, Boston joins the ranks of cities like Denver, Minneapolis, Chicago and Washington DC as it rolls out a new citywide bike sharing program called Hubway Bikeshare. As more U.S. cities consider these popular programs and the number of bike users on the streets increases, one of the biggest concerns in city officials’ minds is safety. As voiced in a recent Boston Globe article, concern is particularly high in Boston, due to the city’s skinny lanes, cobblestone roads, and unpredictable drivers.

Lucky for Boston, MassBike is on top of this concern.

As part of the Hubway Bikeshare program, advocates at MassBike are ramping up bicycle safety efforts, teaming with the City of Boston to offer free bike safety classes for all Hubway users. The idea behind this new initiative is to quickly get Hubway riders up to speed on all aspects of bike commuting.

The one-hour workshops will go over the rules of the road, strategies for staying safe and tips for staying comfortable. According to Price Armstrong, MassBike’s education program manager, the class will be an adapted version of the group’s proven Commuter Workshop Series and will reflect the themes embodied in the Same Roads Same Rules campaign.

“We at MassBike are really excited to be working with the City of Boston to offer these free classes,” Armstrong says. “There will be 600 shared bikes and thousands of bicyclists out on the streets of Boston that might not have been there before. We’re trying to make sure these bicyclists get where they are heading safely, with confidence, and cooperatively with the other users of the road.”

Information about the free classes is currently available on the Hubway safety page. Stay tuned to MassBike’s newsfeed for up-to-date information about this initiative.

To kick off National Bike Month with some serious national buzz, the League of American Bicyclists announced the latest round of Bicycle Friendly Community designations yesterday.

According to the League: “The BFC program recognizes communities that promote bicycling and provides technical assistance in the form of a roadmap to help cities build great communities for bicycling. The League has identified projects, policies, programs and plans that most effectively improve cycling conditions and make up the foundation of a bicycle-friendly community.” The lure of bronze, silver, gold or platinum designation has helped and inspired hundreds of municipalities to improve conditions for bicyclists. In fact, since the program’s inception, the League has received 452 applications and designated 179 BFCs in 44 states.

In the latest round announced yesterday, Minneapolis took gold, while Boston, New York City, and Washington, D.C., earned silver. A number of new cities were added to the list with bronze status, too, including Kansas City, MO; Harrisonburg, VA; and Juneau, AK to name a few. While BFC designations give government leaders well-earned recognition, these awards aren’t confined to City Hall. In many (if not most) communities, bicycle advocates play a pivotal role, pressing policymakers to pursue BFC status and providing the public backing to execute the projects and programs that get them there. As we noted in our 2010 Benchmarking Report: “Strong advocacy organizations are often necessary to local jurisdictions with hopes of passing and implementing progressive policies for biking and walking. Government and elected officials passionate about these issues often promote or work with emerging advocates, recognizing the need for increased citizen involvement in policy discourse.”

So kudos to visionary leaders like Mayor R.T. Rybak in Minneapolis, Mayor Thomas Menino in Boston and Janette Sadik-Khan, the commissioner of the New York City Department of Transportation. But congratulations to advocacy organizations, like the Minneapolis Bicycle Coalition, Bicycle Alliance of Minnesota, Boston Cyclists Union, LivableStreets Alliance (Boston), MassBike, Transportation Alternatives (NYC) and so many more for working with their government representatives to boost biking and walking in their communities, too.

Read all about the BFC program and latest winners on the League’s blog.

A few months ago, we told you about an innovative idea from SRAM and Bikes Belong to award scholarships to Spanish-speaking elected officials to attend Velo-City 2011.

Next month, the world’s premiere bicycle conference will bring together top leaders from around the globe and, thanks to nominations from Alliance member organizations, and a handful of Latino officials from across the United States will have a front row — and back room — ticket to the proceedings in Seville, Spain.

The Boston Cyclists Union was just one organization that nominated a local, Spanish-speaking official for this unique opportunity. Last week, the BCU celebrated the Velo-City scholarship awarded to Felix G. Arroyo, a city councilmember with family roots in Puerto Rico. Pete Stidman, the BCU’s executive director, says Arroyo has been a leader on issues related to asthma and a supporter of the BCU since its inception. Having Arroyo on the ground in Seville, talking to fellow city-level officials who have installed 75 miles of bikeways since 2007 and boosted its bicycle ridership from .6 to 6 percent, could plant the seeds of progress back home in Boston.

“Witnessing Seville’s transformation firsthand and absorbing the information from around the world at Velo-City could be a very enriching experience, giving Arroyo cutting-edge knowledge and tools to help move our city toward a safer and more enjoyable cycling environment,” Stidman says.

Arroyo certainly sounds excited about the experience. “I’m grateful for this opportunity brought to me by the Boston Cyclists Union,” he wrote in BCU’s latest newsletter. “By participating in this program, I can learn additional ways the city can further enhance Boston Bikes and other programs to facilitate bike usage in the city.”

We’ll keep you posted as other organizations — from cities like Los Angeles, Chicago and Dallas — announce their Seville-bound officials. But, we’d wager all them share Stidman’s sentiment: “We’re grateful to SRAM and Bikes Belong,” he says, “for this brilliant idea and the money to make it happen.”

Click here to read more about the Boston Cyclists Union or here to get green with envy learn more about Velo-City 2011.

In August 2008, the state of Massachusetts embarked on a massive $3 billion effort to shore up more than 100 dilapidated bridges. Advocates at LivableStreets in Boston seized the opportunity to bring the needs of bicyclists and pedestrians to the surface.

It just so happened that the most visible and badly deteriorated bridge was right in their backyard. The Longfellow Bridge connecting Boston and Cambridge was the centerpiece of MassDOT’s Accelerated Bridge Program. But, according to the Boston Globe, transportation planners didn’t have any intention of addressing the on-street design elements. Until they started getting an earful from advocates at Alliance organizations, like LivableStreets.

“Officials had been proceeding with plans to rebuild the Longfellow largely as is, but they put those plans on hold in May, acknowledging a growing chorus calling for something bolder — to make the Longfellow more of a bike-and-pedestrian-friendly extension of the Esplanade,” the newspaper reported last month.

LivableStreets was a key player in growing that chorus for a better, more bike-ped-friendly bridge. Since the start of the Accelerate Bridge Program, they organized supporters to write letters, attend public meetings and add their input. Because of that visible interest, the DOT established a task force to study the issues and make recommendations. Steven Miller, a board member for LivableStreets, was among those invited to the table.

It turned out, the task force wasn’t just for public show. In that same November article, Miller told the Globe that “the Department of Transportation deserves real credit for being open and listening and ending up much more flexible than anyone had anticipated in the beginning.’’ Last month, the task force released a raft of recommendations, many of which recognize the needs of non-motorized users.

Luisa Paiewonsky, the Department of Transportation’s highway administrator, told the Globe that the task force had prodded the DOT to take a more “modern outlook” on the bridge work and “substantially improve” conditions for folks commuting on two wheels and two feet. “There was strong consensus on the task force that the bridge needed to be able to better serve all of the groups and get them across the bridge safely,’’ Paiewonsky told the newspaper.

That’s the kind of language LivableStreets likes to hear. But their campaign is far from over. More details outlining how they’ve come this far and how they plan to move forward are included in the latest Advocacy Advance Report — Bridging the Gaps in Bicycling Networks: An Advocate’s Guide to Getting Bikes on Bridges.

Not to sound like a broken record, but the report is a must-read. And once you’ve put it down, we’re thinking you might want to chat with the report authors and inspiring advocates. So join us tomorrow for the “Learn from the Bridge Access Report” Mutual Aid Call at 3 p.m. EST. Jackie Douglas (pictured), the director of LivableStreets, will join us as a panelist, along with Eric Rogers of the Missouri Bicycle and Pedestrian Federation and Don Sparks from Charleston Moves.

Add your ideas and experiences to the discussion on this critical topic. Click here to register.

It started in 2005 as a single patch of sod on a metered parking space in California.

That’s when the creative minds at Rebar, an art and design company in San Francisco, realized the absurdity that so much public space is gobbled up by the movement and storage of private vehicles. So they decided to put a single parking space to a different use, as a temporary park.

“Our original PARK stood for two hours — the term of the lease offered on the face of the parking meter,” the group explains on its website. “When the meter expired, we rolled up the sod, packed away the bench and the tree, and gave the block a good sweep, and left. A few weeks later, as a single iconic photo of the intervention (above) traveled across the web, Rebar began receiving requests to create the PARK(ing) project in other cities. Rather than replicate the same installation, we decided to promote it as an “open-source” project, and created a how-to manual to empower people to create their own parks without the active participation of Rebar. And thus ‘PARK(ing) Day’ was born.”

In just a few years, it’s taken off. Park(ing) Day has grown into a global event that challenges people to rethink the way roads are used and reinforces the need for broad-based changes to urban infrastructure. This year, on September 17th, plenty of Alliance organizations took part in the creative, temporary redesign of their communities’ streets.

In the Steel City, Bike Pittsburgh pimped out the pavement by creating an urban lounge, complete with wooden furniture and a fancy throw rug, where cyclists could kick back and hang out. BikePGH didn’t just have its own space, though. Some volunteers also offered a bike tour of the more than two dozens oases across the city. Check out pictures from the ride here.

Out west, in California, the Silicon Valley Bicycle Coalition got comfortable next to the curb, too. “Couches, tables and chairs, potted plants, hammocks, and sod adorned the streets of San José as places where people normally dump their abandoned cars were converted to places for people to meet and mingle. Some were lured by SVBC’s offer of a $100 Sports Basement gift certificate, though most probably wanted to see the city made a bit more welcoming to humans for a couple of hours.” More from the SVBC blog here.

And up in the Northeast, Boston’s Livable Streets saw the Park(ing) Day tradition expand into double-digit participation: “Boston saw its first spot in 2008. In 2009 there were five spots in Boston and Cambridge, and this year it was expanded to 10 spots across Boston, Brookline and Cambridge. It was a huge success, and there’s a lot of energy and enthusiasm to expand to more spots next year.” Get the full story in Livable Streets’ newsletter.

How did you spend your Park(ing) Day?

Beginning this week, thousands of public transit users are hearing the voice of David Watson (pictured right), executive director of MassBike, over the loud speaker.

For decades, the leaders at MassBike have been pressing officials at the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority for better bike access to Boston-area bus, train and ferry service. But the group’s latest success — a series of bike-promoting public service announcements now airing on platforms across the metro — came from an unlikely source.

“Strange but true story,” Watson says. “At the first Boston Bike Safety Summit last month, a masked bicyclist — Biker Boy — stood up and asked the assembled officials to create bike safety PSAs. The general manager of the MBTA said ‘Yes’ on the spot and invited Biker Boy to record them. The GM later asked me to help. We had asked the T to help us promote biking and safety before, but the charged atmosphere of the summit made it happen. Having a masked superhero make the ask apparently helped, too!”

Though the Bike Week announcement expires on Friday, Watson says the MBTA has committed to airing the other PSAs at least through the end of the summer. Click on the links below to listen. (For later reference, you’ll be able to find them in our Resource Library, too.)

Bay State Bike Week PSA

Biking on the T PSA

Folding Bike PSA

Livable Streets, MassBike, and other bicycling and walking advocates claimed a victory when the Massachusetts Department of Transportation (MassDOT) agreed to modify its plans to remove a portion of the bike lane on the Longfellow Bridge last week. Removal of the bike lane would have allowed for the installation of sidewalks where none currently exist. After much persistence from advocacy groups MassDOT chose to both build the sidewalks and keep the bike lane by implementing an alternative proposal submitted by MassBike, LivableStreets, WalkBoston, and the Institute for Human Centered Design.

According to MassBike, “MassDOT also agreed to perform further analysis of the traffic patterns on the bridge in order to determine whether the lane configuration currently planned for the long-term reconstruction of the bridge is necessary, or if alternative proposals to provide even more space for bicycles and pedestrians are feasible. Finally, MassDOT agreed to continue the discussion with the advocates about the future configuration of the Longfellow Bridge. “

Livable Streets, MassBike, and their partners will remain active throughout the process continuing to promote biking and walking throughout the state.  For more information and to view the rehabilitation proposal visit www.massbike.org or www.livablestreets.info