Bicycle Friendly Community

Chicago, IL | Silver Level

Encouragement: Mayor Richard Daley has made it his goal to “make the City of Chicago the most bicycle-friendly city in the United States.” Mayor Daley’s Bicycling Ambassadors, with eight full-time staff members, particularly impressed the judges with its clever and effective advertising campaign. The Bicycling Ambassadors teach drivers how to interact safely with cyclists, reach out to children with a child safety campaign, and attend community events to deliver bike safety and road sharing information. Bike Chicago is an annual three-month long series of hundreds of fun and educational events in Chicago neighborhoods — a great way to promote bicycling. Chicago also offers Bike the Drive, Critical Mass, and the Lakefront Tour, which draw more than 33,000 people annually. The city’s pro-bicycling policies and growing bike culture (which encourages new bicyclists and positively reinforces pro-bicycling governmental officeholders) have resulted in a steadily increasing rate of bicycling. This has become especially evident in the increasing number of winter bike riders.

Engineering: The Millennium Park Bicycle Station, a new, $3 million facility in the central business district that provides indoor bike parking, showers, repairs, bike rentals, car sharing services, Internet access, guided bike tours, children’s bicycle camps, and bike registration. Other positive developments in Chicago include the new Major Taylor & Burnham Trails and the installation of Dutch stairs at the Lakefront Trail. Chicago has greatly expanded its trail network, growing from 50 miles to 350 miles in the past 10 years; and has a strong partnership with Chicago’s cycling community, especially the Chicagoland Bicycle Federation. The city recently adopted a Complete Streets policy to ensure bicyclists’ needs are addressed in all future highway and transit projects.

Evaluation: The city recently adopted an ambitious 2015 Bike Plan that documents the specific role of each city department and outside agencies in achieving a goal of having 5 percent of all short trips (five miles or less) made by bicycle.