I want to ride my bike, I want to ride it where I like – The Arkansas Traveler
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I want to ride my bike, I want to ride it where I like

By • September 3rd, 2009 • 12:39 am.

opinonlogo2By: Samuel Letchworth

In a world going green, the University of Arkansas seems to be interested in a different variety of “green.” While ostensibly portraying an image of environmental consciousness, the UA has sent a loud and clear message that it would rather you ride your car, not your bike, to class. It doesn’t take a college graduate to figure out why.

The stated purpose for the upcoming bicycle registration policy is that people are locking their bikes to trees, an understandable concern, but also to light posts, rails and other places where, and I quote, “the bicycle is blocking a path or walkway.”

I’ve been going to this school for five years and never has my path been blocked by a bicycle – mostly just by people doing what I call the “serpentine text walk.”

When the proposal was made to require bicycle registration, a fee of $15 was associated with acquiring a parking permit, the idea being that the fee would help fund the building of more bicycle loops on campus. There was such public outcry against the fee that the Transit and Parking Department agreed to provide the permits for free, while still fining non-permitted malefactors.

A bike loop costs just less than $300 to make. The new, and third, parking deck’s construction is estimated at $26 million… Yeah.

So, now, Joe the Cyclist, who rides a Specialized Rockhopper, has to take his bike in to the TPD office and fill out a form identifying his bicycle down to the serial number. He may even be required to provide proof of purchase. After filling out the form, he gets his sticker, affixes it permanently to the front of the vertical seat tube and rides back up Razorback Road to campus to park it legally on a bike loop.

Joe has a road bike, as well – a 1971 black Peugeot. He has to fill the form out for the Peugeot, too, and affix the permanent sticker to it. Years later he tries to sell his Peugeot, but he can’t get the sticker off, devaluing the Peugeot and otherwise ruining a vintage bicycle.

Joe’s girlfriend, Jane, rides a pink beach cruiser. It’s a one-speed, but she has strong legs. Jane is a busy girl and didn’t have the time to get the permit, but she rides it to class anyway and locks it up outside of the Chemistry building to go to her biology class.

When she gets out of class, she finds her bicycle gone. Jane calls the TPD and they inform her that it has been impounded, even though it was on a bike loop. She walks all the way to the parking office, has to provide a receipt for the purchase of her bike and then pays the $20 fee for not having a permit, in addition to a $10 impounding fee.

This sucks because that money was going toward her cell phone bill so she can call Joe when he goes out on Dickson Street to make sure he isn’t doing anything too stupid.

Their friend Jack rides a BMX. He’s one of those guys you see jumping up onto the handrails in front of the library and bouncing from one to the other as if attached to strings. He locks his bike up at the Union, but BMXs don’t have seats, so he can’t affix a permanent sticker to it. When the TPD impounds his bike, Jack is S.O.L., especially because he has a trials competition that afternoon.

Jill is an alumni with her bachelor’s in anthropology. Having paid her alumni fee, Jill decides to visit campus on her Schwinn. She didn’t know about the new bicycle registration policy, so after visiting an old professor she finds her bike gone and assumes it stolen, when really it has been impounded by the TPD.

Jim rides his Cannondale to the Razorback Transit station to catch the bus to work. His tire gets a flat so he leaves it there for a few days until he can afford a tube. He gets off work one day and his bike is gone.

Jen is a Fayetteville resident who rides her Trek to Carnall Hall on a Tuesday for the Indian buffet, finishes her lunch and … well, you get the idea.

I spoke with Gary Smith, director of the TPD, who seems like a nice guy. When he explained to me how the registration process works, he attempted to illustrate a hypothetical situation wherein a person would describe their bike for the record, saying, “It’s a blue, 27-inch, well, whatever, I don’t know bikes.” That’s like the butcher not knowing what cut of cow the sirloin is.

Noam Chomsky, world-renowned linguist and philosopher, has called the invention of the bicycle the pinnacle and symbol of man’s evolution, the “most practically energy-efficient machine man has conceived.”

He also said, “The most effective way to restrict democracy is to transfer decision-making from the public arena to unaccountable institutions.”

I’ve always liked ol’ Noam.

To be part of the community of cyclists, you can join the Facebook group “U of A Students Against Bicycle Parking Fees on Campus,” even if you don’t ride a bike. It’s already more than 1,000 members strong. They can’t impound them all.

Absurdity is the word of the day.

  • Tom

    Very persuasive and very well-written. Hurrah!

  • http://ironsidephotography.com Stephen Ironside

    If only the higher-ups would read and realize what you’ve written. Well-said.

  • http://asg.uark.edu Mattie Bookhout
  • http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=36835418&id=20609913&comments=&alert=#/beehatchin?ref=name Angela Moore

    Well-placed Chomsky quotes.

    A lot of my friends enjoyed reading your op-ed via facebook, keep on providing everyone with quality reporting.

  • http://asg.uark.edu Billy Fleming

    Sam,

    Once again, a very well written article. I’m glad to see so many students enthused about this subject. I fear, however, that the argument against registration may be misplaced. While I helped lead the fight last semester against the registration fee, I am actually pro-registration if its free/reasonable.

    When Gary Smith tells you that TPD needs to know how many bikes are on campus to be able to justify the bike racks, he’s not lying. In order to know how many bike racks are required and what area of campus merits their placement, we need empirical data that tells how many bike commuters we have, where on campus most attend class/live, etc. When you examine the progressive Universities in the country, such as Stanford, Colorado-Boulder, Pepperdine, etc., you see that they in fact require bicycles to be registered on campus. They also provide incentives for non-motorized commuters, such as a $150 rebate at Stanford for pedestrian and alternative transportation commuters.

    So what am I saying? I think its that I agree it’s a difficult transition from parking your bike anywhere on campus without repurcussion to having to register and legally park under threat of impoundment. However, if this university is ever going to provide the adequate bicycle infrastructure, they have to be able to justify the investment in bike racks, razorbikes depots, etc. Like all other things in life, the University is always going to be concerned, and rightfully so, with the bottom line. I think that we should be fighting for free and incentive based bicycle registration, as at Stanford.

    This still leaves holes in the policy that you pointed out quite well in your article, such as: What happens to non-student bicylcists on campus? What happens to your sweet vintage bike when you put a parking decal on it? I’m not sure on the answer to that, and that’s why we need your help in figuring out a policy that works for everyone on campus, students and staff alike. Please feel free to contact me about this issue anytime, and take part in the process of shaping this crucial policy on campus.

    Billy Fleming
    ASG Director of Sustainability
    UA Sustainability Council Student Chair

  • http://asg.uark.edu Billy Fleming
  • Toni

    “When Gary Smith tells you that TPD needs to know how many bikes are on campus to be able to justify the bike racks, he’s not lying. In order to know how many bike racks are required and what area of campus merits their placement, we need empirical data that tells how many bike commuters we have, where on campus most attend class/live, etc.”

    With respect Billy, this statement is misguided. If you want empirical data, you need to go out in the field. A bike registry is NOT an effective way of gathering empirical data. It is incomplete because not everybody will register, it is not up-to-date because each bike is only registered once. Information provided by people about their own behavior, as opposed to information obtained from observing people’s behavior, is notoriously unreliable. E.g. some people will say they ride their bike every day even though they don’t. Class schedules change and localities change.

    This is a university, we know about empirical research. We know this. I don’t expect the P&T department to be expert in empirical research but somebody needs to tell them that their grand schemes are flawed.

    “to know how many bike racks are required and what area of campus merits their placement”: There is one and only one way of getting this information, and that is walking over campus and observing where the number of bikes exceeds the available parking space. Everything else is BS and frankly, an insult to our intelligence. Samuel mentions that Gary Smith freely admits to not knowing anything about bikes. If P&T wants to be taken seriously, please start acting like grownups. Think before you talk. Know what you are talking about. Get informed before you make decisions. That is what we try to teach students at this University and frankly, one would hope that this also applies to the administration.

  • Billy Fleming

    Toni,

    I can only assume that you are the some Toni I’ve spoken with via email since you did not list your full name on here.

    As far as empirical data goes, a grounds survey of bicycles is not data that can presented alone to justify grant or even existing funding sources, as they are often more interested in your projected bicyclists number anyway. Perhaps a combination of the two would work, but either way I think the point is moot. Permits won’t encompass all of the bikes on campus and a simple walk around the grounds is a subjective study depending on time of survey, day of week, etc. that simply won’t be definitive.

    I think installing bike racks where we know we need them (which honestly is pretty much everywhere) in conjunction with a registration drive is a much more reasonable solution. If we can come up with $29 million for a parking deck, surely we can come up with $100k to finance the necessary infrastructure for bikes.

    Also, in closing, just be careful about the approach you take on issues like this. As a student, I don’t appreciate administrators, faculty members, etc. speaking condescendingly to me about issues they presume to comprehend better then i do. So if students expect to have a seat at the table when it comes to forming this policy and future planning policies on campus, we have to be willing to deal amicably, not adversarially, with groups that may not have returned the favor in the past. They need to know were upset about all of this, but they also need to know we’re willing to pull up a chair and do the work alongside them to improve our university.

    Again thanks for your comments and please keep them coming.

    Billy Fleming
    ASG Director of Sustainability

  • Toni

    Billy,

    I am not speaking condescendingly when quoting Gary Smith admitting that he knows nothing about bikes. I am simply quoting him. And when administrators publicly denounce me, as a member of a campus minority, as somebody who “tears up the landscape”, the “condescension” is hard to deny. As to the rest of your post, I am sorry but you fail to bring any supporting arguments to the table. Just making assertions without giving reasons for them is not going to convince anybody otherwise. One starts having the feeling that there is no meaningful debate here, as all the decisions have already been made and no matter how good the argument that critics make, they won’t make any difference. Yyou very clearly have made up your mind for a bike registry no matter what arguments are made against it and I am getting tired trying to debate a wall.

  • Toni

    It is of course fitting that my comment was removed from this board. Is that the quality of free speech allowed at this University? How pathetic.

  • Billy Fleming

    Well Toni, I’m sorry to hear that it sounds like you’ve given up on the process. Its true that there aren’t many options for overturning a policy that was passed in the last few months, so while we need to be voicing our disgust over that process, we also need to be pushing our way to the front of the line to make sure we’re involved as the University’s planning processes continue.

    Its always much easier to criticize than to offer constructive solutions (something I learned over my 3+ years in a design curriculum). We need people throwing grenades about these kinds of issues, but its people who are willing to move the needle instead that are given opportunities to influence policies like this one. As it is easy to the misconstrue written word, this is the last response I will give you on here. I again encourage you to contact me directly, as I would encourage any student to do, about these issues so that there can be more to this discussion than internet sniping, and we can perhaps find areas of comprimise between students and faculty/staff.

    Billy Fleming
    ASG Director of Sustainability
    [email protected]

  • http://metropolistimes.blogspot.com/ Adam

    I mostly agree with Toni here (although thank you Billy for all of the hard work you’re putting into this). It’s not the job of the general study body to ‘be nice’. One of the main reasons I’ve never run for ASG is because I don’t think I’m capable of going on a camping trip with administration officials and not yelling at them about the new parking deck between bites of s’mores.

    I just know I’ve been here for 6 years and I haven’t seen the administration change its mind on anything due to ASGers being nice. The only policy reversal I can think of right now that could possibly be traced to ASG action is the computer programs in modular math, and that was only an indirect effect.

    Town halls are great but if genuine change doesn’t result, they’re just a waste of time.

  • Billy Fleming

    Adam,

    I literally just spit out my coffee laughing at the s’mores comment. Thanks for injecting some humor into all of this. I certainly share your frustrations, and thats why i spent the majority of my time on campus without much faith in ASG of the process either. I’ve actually only been involved with the group for a few months, but I think this group is different from the less productive ones of the past. I know several of us, our president included, have recently been booted from University Committee meetings for being to critical or opionated or whatever you want to call it.

    So please don’t think its all sunshine and lollipops in these meetings. I am more than happy to tell someone I think they’re policy or process sucks when it does, but I’m not going to stop with that. Criticism is absolutely necessary of things like half-empty parking decks, lack of student input, and anything else on the laundry list of complaints that are rightfully directed at some of the departments on campus.

    But criticism alone isn’t enough. The wheels of change are in motion, and for the first time in my tenure on campus, we are actually being solicited for input. So be critical and be upset about this. You should be. But lets also be constructive and offer solutions that don’t revolve around pretending like a $29 million parking deck monstrosity isn’t already built and paid for.

    Billy Fleming
    ASG Director of Sustainability
    [email protected]

  • Zach Jordan

    Toni – I am the Web Editor for the Arkansas Traveler, and, unless I am mistaken, all of your comments are still posted. We do not have a policy of censoring opinion.

  • Toni

    “all of your comments are still posted.”

    I don’t know why they were not displayed when I wrote my last comment. It must have been the cache of the web browser. Sincerely sorry for the wrong accusation.

  • Toni

    Adam: “I mostly agree with Toni here (although thank you Billy for all of the hard work you’re putting into this).”

    I would like to join you in thanking Billy for his hard work, despite whatever disagreements we may have.

  • Emily

    It’s hard to jump on the poor bicyclists’ bandwagon when those of us on foot are being constantly run down by someone on a bicycle speeding down the sidewalks through campus. I don’t know how many times I have been walking through campus on a sidewalk, which last time I checked was for pedestrians, when someone on a bicycle has come from behind and almost ran over me. It is, in my opinion, so very rude. You never hear a courteous “hey I am behind you! Or Excuse me! Or In coming!”. I am not saying that getting hit by a bicycle is going to do irreparable harm, but getting passed to close for comfort by a bicycle speeding down a campus sidewalk while your hoofing it is both startling and obnoxious. It seems odd to me that here on campus you are safer crossing the street than you are walking down a sidewalk in the middle of campus. Drivers of vehicles are so cautious of pedestrians that the “look both ways before you cross the street” rule no longer really applies because motorized vehicles are always so mindful to stop for pedestrians. So I vote charge the bicyclists a registration fee, but use it to build a bike path through campus. Fifteen dollars is not much compared to the many other fees we pay for on campus amenities, and if the bicyclists do not like stickers I am sure there are other ways of identifying a registered bike.