MassBike And MBTA Team Up To Create Awesome New Bike Racks
Written by Boston Biker on Aug 22From MassBike
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MassBike has been working with the MBTA to evaluate bike rack designs for the new Pedal & Park secure bike parking facilities coming soon to stations including Braintree, Ashmont, Davis Square, Oak Grove, and Malden Center. (The South Station Pedal & Park, which already has racks, will also be completed soon.) These great bike parking facilities will encourage more people to take the T instead of driving, by giving them the confidence to leave their bikes at stations that have suffered from insufficient bike parking and bike thefts in the past. Pedal & Parks have already made a big difference at Alewife and Forest Hills.
To maximize the number of bikes that can fit in each Pedal & Park, the T plans to use bi-level racks. The existing racks at Alewife, Forest Hills, and South Station are OK, but those racks are either unavailable now, or have not worked that well in actual use. So the T asked for feedback from actual bicyclists on bike rack prototypes from two vendors. We reported back that all the designs had significant drawbacks.
A few weeks later, when the T asked us to try out another design, we were pleased to see that most of our concerns had been addressed.
The T took our feedback seriously, asking the manufacturers to address the problems we identified. The new design works much better, and needs just a few more modifications before going into production for the new Pedal & Parks.
We really appreciate the T asking for our input and taking the time to get this right!
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