A common refrain heard by Seattle bicyclists: You can’t ride here. It’s too rainy. And those hills.
Tell that to The League of American Bicyclists , which has returned Washington to the top of its list as the most bicycle friendly state in the nation.
After slipping to third the last go around in 2022 — behind Massachusetts and Oregon — a series of investments and new policies put Washington over the top. Criteria for the ranking changes some every cycle, but it generally looks at each state’s traffic laws, planning, education and infrastructure.
“We’re No. 1 again. Yea!” said Vicky Clarke, deputy director of Cascade Bicycle Club, who acknowledged that the list is more about recognition than anything else.
“The benefits are it’s better to bike here,” Clarke said. “You don’t get a crown. You don’t get a feather in your bow.” Traffic Lab is a Seattle Times project that digs into the region’s transportation issues to explore the policies and politics that determine how we get around and how billions of dollars in public money are spent.
In 2022, when Washington placed third on the list, advocates were annoyed, especially considering the slate of funding that came from Olympia that year, which Clarke said wasn’t factored into that year’s ranking.
In 2022, state lawmakers passed nearly $17 billion in new transportation spending over 16 years. While much of the package was dedicated to highways, it included more than $1.2 billion for “active transportation,” including both bike and pedestrian projects.That spending — funded by […]
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