In an April Community Voices opinion piece mostly focused on tax increment financing, authors Schultz and Mannillo made the argument that people who bike are somehow shirking their responsibility for street costs. Nothing could be farther from the truth. This argument has a foundation as weak as many St. Paul street beds, with even more (pot)holes than Shepard Road.
Research shows it is actually drivers who don’t come close to paying for the cost of streets and people who bike significantly subsidize those who drive by several hundred dollars. Why is this? Most damage to our streets is caused by heavy vehicles driving on them, not just winter or freeze-thaw cycles. Cars are far bigger and heavier, so require not only more space and more robust materials, but cause the vast majority of damage to our streets. Sidewalks are often decades or even a century old and not filled with potholes, because winter alone is slow to create potholes and people walking aren’t damaging them. Similarly, a person biking causes virtually no damage to our streets.
Gas taxes alone do not come close to covering the cost of our streets and roads. Motor vehicle registration fees also cover some costs (a similar amount to state gas taxes in Minnesota). A person who owns a car but primarily rides a bike still pays the registration fee, which costs the same no matter how much they drive. So, by usually biking, they’re paying proportionately more of those costs.
How else do people biking subsidize those driving? Perhaps the largest is that the majority of street/road spending in Minnesota, especially at the city level, comes from general fund money, like property and income taxes which are paid by everyone, regardless of whether they drive or how little damage they cause to our streets.
Additionally, someone who rides a bike to a business is usually subsidizing those who drive, because car parking is extremely expensive. Surface parking generally costs $5,000-10,000 per spot, with underground/structured parking costing five to 10 times more. By comparison, installing good bike parking costs about $100/bike and takes up a tiny fraction of the space of car parking. That person biking pays the same price at the store though, which incorporates the overall cost of the business, including those expensive parking lots. The huge amount of space required for car parking also promotes low-value, low-tax-base land use. Comparing two nearby, similarly sized lots, the former Seestedt Carpet building in Lowertown to a surface parking lot across the street, the former brings in ten times the amount of property taxes.
Of course, in addition to the more direct subsidies that people riding bikes provide, giving more people the freedom to choose to bike has numerous other benefits and lower externalized costs than driving. These include more active lifestyles that lead to healthier people and lower healthcare costs; bikes are non-polluting, so going to the store doesn’t involve aggravating your neighbor’s asthma; quality bike infrastructure usually increases spending at nearby businesses; reducing our reliance on fossil fuels and the largest source of climate disrupting emissions and improved street safety for all users, reducing the number of people killed and injured on our roadways.
[image_caption]Zack Mensinger[/image_caption]
In all, there are many things that have contributed to the terrible state of our streets in St. Paul, but people riding bikes aren’t one of them. The reality is that the more people we can empower to choose cycling, the better our chances of actually getting better streets. To fix our streets, we need to take in more money or spend less. Since no one likes higher property taxes, the best way to achieve better streets is through having to spend less, which means giving people safe, accessible alternatives to the most expensive, damaging, dangerous and space-inefficient form of transportation – private cars.
Zack Mensinger rides a bike year-round for fun and function and is the current co-chair of the St. Paul Bicycle Coalition.
I suspect some of your bikers, also have vehicles and use the roads. I wouldn’t go so far as to hang halo’s on them. Anything to push a narrative.
From the article:
> A person who owns a car but primarily rides a bike still pays the registration fee, which costs the same no matter how much they drive. So, by usually biking, they’re paying proportionately more of those costs.
Your comment is addressed in the article:
“Gas taxes alone do not come close to covering the cost of our streets and roads. Motor vehicle registration fees also cover some costs (a similar amount to state gas taxes in Minnesota). A person who owns a car but primarily rides a bike still pays the registration fee, which costs the same no matter how much they drive. So, by usually biking, they’re paying proportionately more of those costs.”
Of course they do, but they drive them far fewer miles, I’d guess.
By the way, the term is “bicyclists.” “Bikers” is a term used to describe people who ride motorcycles, most of whom laugh at the folks in tight pants.
True. I always try to refer to myself as a bicyclist, so I am not lumped in with the noise and air polluting bikers, who often drive very erratically. And often without helmets, because that’s apparently more macho. Or something.
It sounds like the motorcyclists you know have significant insecurity issues.
You meant to say conservative bikers mock bicyclists – and I am not sure even that is true. I suspect bikers are more careful around bicycles than many driving big trucks and SUVs. because their greatest fear is being hit and killed by a car or truck.
By the way, the term is “cyclist”
“Bikers” refers to bike gangs like Hell’s Angels, or people who pretend to be on weekends. Motorcyclists is a broader category that includes riders of all types. Of course, regarding stereotypes, not all cyclists wear lycra. In fact, some I know dress more like “bikers,” including the tattoos.
And, to drift back to topicality, motorcyclists that ride for transportation similarly subsidize drivers of larger vehicles, for the same reasons as cyclists.
Love the photo Zack, and the analysis. And I would point out that even in the recent hoopla over the Summit Ave. design… the cost of the road is many times that of the adjacent bike lane and sidewalk, yet who’s paying for it? We’ll have to talk about the explosion of e-bikes sometime, that’s going to be an issue.
Where the biggest savings occur are in lower healthcare costs of those who are more fit and likely turn off calories, in contrast to those drivers who cannot even be bothered to lift a finger to use their turn signal.
Good argument, but it needs actual numbers. Another factor that should be in the mix: truck traffic, much of it necessary for the functioning of a city. Skewed to represent this as an unbalanced equation of car drivers vs. bicyclists.
Everything in this opinion piece is technically correct, but the problem with transportation is that it need to be intensely practical – it has to get people where they want to go when they want to go. The car-induced sprawl built into our current system makes it inherently more challenging to get around efficiently on a bike. Low density construction makes everything farther apart, incentivizing driving over bicycling. Then along comes winter, which makes everything worse for everyone, but especially bad for pedestrians and bicyclists. This is where practicality rules: people still need to get around, even if it is snowing and the sun sets in mid-afternoon. In winter, the most stalwart bicyclist with a cargo bike will find a trip to the supermarket daunting. So yes, bike when and where you can, but don’t forget to support more dense development and changes in zoning to allow for infilling of the wasted space in our cities that makes getting around without a car so hard.
Given the negative impacts involved, we shouldn’t be subsidizing automotive use or, more generally, sprawl. Ensuring existing local streets are as accessible to other modes is more than reasonable. It acknowledges that local streets need to be universally accessible and are not there simply for cars. After all, streets existed far before cars did, something that years of freeways and other heavily subsidized car infrastructure seems to have wiped from some folk’s memory.
However, I would take issue with some of the rationale used in the article. Standard passenger vehicles don’t put significant stress on roadways. Heavy vehicles like delivery or garbage trucks and buses are multiple times more damaging, and reducing passenger car traffic won’t impact that and therefore doesn’t represent any savings. Also, sidewalks last a long time largely because they don’t need to be very smooth, so heaves don’t matter much. Try biking at any speed on most sidewalks, and you will see how limited they are for cycling. Similarly, the issue of parking is heavily overblown. On the one hand, the article says parking is expensive to build, but at the same time, it points out that parking spaces have such little value the property taxes (based on property value)they generate are small. There is also no reason to think privately held parking structures represent any “subsidy.” Either the owner has found the demand to pay for the structure or it is the code requirements for parking mean that to get the best value out of the property, the cost makes sense. In short, private parking structures don’t really represent a subsidy for cars because they are paid for by people who drive cars.
One thing where parking policy represents a type of subsidy is when there are minimum parking requirements. Something that both Minneapolis and St. Paul have correctly eliminated. Post-WW2 zoning and its impact is a much bigger nut to crack. Areas that were zoned and designed specifically for cars aren’t easily modified. Mostly because the distances involved make walking or biking much less attractive. I can walk to two grocery stores, a dozen restaurants, and just about any business I would need. If I get on a bike, the options grow exponentially. In the 1950s suburb where I grew up, walking or biking gave you maybe twelve businesses within reach. The most common of which was a gas station. Better bike lanes and sidewalks won’t do much for transportation in those areas, even if they do make outdoor activities more pleasant.
Standard vehicles are a lot heavier than they used to be, a lot of SUVs, van/mini vans, and trucks, not to mention EVs. And there are a LOT of them. Even so, regular traffic can do a lot of damage once the pavement is compromised, 1.5 tons is more than enough to knock holes in the pavement.
True, stuff like the new EV Hummer (sounds like an Onion article) can be over 9000lbs and in heavy truck terretory weight wise. Still, any road that allows bus or truck traffic isn’t going to have substansially less wear from a reduction in passanger vehicles due to better biking infrustructure.
“[T]he article says parking is expensive to build, but at the same time, it points out that parking spaces have such little value the property taxes (based on property value) they generate are small.”
Parking (especially surface parking) is undertaxed because property taxes penalize owners for for building stuff on their properties. If the state permitted land-value taxation (HF1342/SF 175), then, taking the example in the article, St. Paul could shift the taxes from structures including the Seestedt Carpet building to all lots based on land values. The nearby surface lot owner would pay much more in taxes and would likely sell or improve the property.
Not really bicycling related, but it’s an illustration of how the tax code subsidizes sprawl/car culture, etc.
“property taxes penalize owners for for building stuff on their properties”
Penalize?
Developed properties require more services than undeveloped properties. Property taxes are how we collect compensation for that additional burden. To call this a ‘penalty’ is to argue that gov’t services should be free. But the cops, firefighters, public works dept, etc all deserve to make a living too.
If we taxed property differently, the case could be made but under the current method, it can’t. Taxing owners on “potential” value that the land can hold has lots of potential issues. Primarily, it would drasticlly increase the incentive for gentrification. Pushing out long standing owners and putting financial pressure on lower income communities. There are much better ways to discourage surface parking lots.
Zoning is by far the bigger issue and most powerful tool. However it isn’t very effective after an area has been developed. In those areas we can make improvments and encourage anything new is more sustainable but we can’t assume the solution that works in a denser area will see results in exsiting sprawl. For those areas we just need to ensure drivers pay the full cost of driving. Much of which is currently a cost drivers don’t see.
For most cyclists , riding a bike is recreation not transportation. Like mass transit , it is not convenient and in this state it is seasonal.
Let’s be real. Cyclists are not impacting climate, saving roads or subsidizing anyone by bicycling.
Taxpayers are funding the trails just like the roads. Only difference is roads are necessary and used by everyone on a bike , a bus or a car.
For most, but not for all. Pre WFH, I bike commuted about 5000 miles per year. Many of my coworkers did too. That represents a lot of unburned gas, undamaged roads, and reduced congestion. You’re welcome.
Sigh. The same-old same-old, of how bicycles and their riders represent heaven on urban earth, and all would be well if all of us would ditch cars and either walk everywhere, or ride bicycles everywhere; all ills would be cured in society.
One longs for nuance when these ads for bikes appear, yet again. One longs for context, for understanding that not everyone is a fit, under-40 male who lives in certain safe area of Mpls-St. Paul where bad weather or “iffy” environments don’t impede their bike nirvana. And one longs for a realization that, for many, transit–not a bicycle–is the real solution, but the Metro transit system is rapidly becoming somewhere no one wants to be, even for short rides, because there is no security on it.
Sigh… the same old exaggerations and false claims whenever someone makes some common sense, non-controversial, and demonstrably true statements about the benefits of riding a bike. A guy who owns and drives a car but ALSO rides a bike writes a story filled with demonstrably true observations and someone has to accuse him of promoting a carless universe filled with miserable people deprived of transit and delivery forced to peddle their way around though winter storms and cardiac arrests. The horror.
If it’s not a divisive all or nothing commentary… we can always turn it into one eh?
Most residential streets provide parking space to the side of the driving lanes. I have lived in cities where residents pay to use that street parking. Much the same as we do in the commercial areas of St.Paul and Minneapolis.
According to this article by a member of the bike coalition fringe, the existence and expenses of roads are mostly due to private car drivers . The bus system uses the roads as do the vehicles that deliver goods and people across the city. By presenting roads as a problem caused by private cars, the bike coalition fringe misrepresents reality. Personally, if I have to buy a 20 pound bag of dog food for Pupsie, I’ll take a bus before I do so on a bike. That’s reality.
p.s. According to “How Are Your State’s Roads Funded” Minnesota is #42 in using gas taxes and tolls to pay for roads. That means the rest comes via local and federal taxes.https://taxfoundation.org/states-road-funding-2019/ This seems fair since everyone benefits from food delivery, busses, etc. I bet some people even get jobs that require they use the roads. Drivers of wheelchair vans, for example.
Maybe it’s different in your neighborhood. Where I live, the vast majority of traffic on residential streets is single-occupant private vehicles. Yes, UPS and Fedex go by once or twice a day too. But city busses never do.
Well, all the commentary is pointing out is that cyclists DO pay for streets and roads.
Cool. But as mentioned by others, transportation still needs to get you where you need to go in a practical manner. Yay for cyclists “subsidizing” motor vehicle drivers. But maybe the answer is to make motor vehicle drivers pay closer to what they’re actually using. It’s ridiculous that a vehicle that causes WAY more damage to the infrastructure pays no more than one that causes much less damage. We need to start making people pay based on weight and mileage to make up for the fact that, even if the gas tax paid for any small portion, electric vehicles don’t use gas. We need to make people who drive giant trucks for…masculinity? (it’s certainly not for utility)…pay for the extra damage their conceit causes. We need to make commuters that live in the boonies or across the metro to get to their jobs (myself included) pay for what it actually costs to use those roads to get to work or groceries or entertainment. The gas tax should be extra and should really just be to clean up the mess and pollution that can be attributed to the use of gasoline, not for maintenance of the roads. Maybe, once we’re all paying what it actually costs to drive, developers and planners will start designing our environments to make it more practical to walk or ride a bike to the necessities of life instead of driving. THEN we can all pat ourselves on the back. Until then…don’t get too smug. A cyclist that owns a car and rides a bike isn’t making any measurable difference (a cyclist that doesn’t own a car doesn’t subsidize anything, by the way), and being condescending to everyone else doesn’t win any support.
“(a cyclist that doesn’t own a car doesn’t subsidize anything, by the way)”
Not true. As the author points out general fund money is used to pay for construction and maintenance, and we all pay into that car or no car. Here in my suburban paradise of St. Louis Park, our ongoing street, sewer, and water main replacement project is financed by an additional fee that was tacked onto our garbage collection fees, which we all pay car or no car. Furthermore, in some cities homeowners are charged assessments for street replacement or upgrades whether they own a car or not. I could go on with a plethora of other examples. We’re getting a new roundabout intersection at Louisiana and Cedar Lake Road that just got a big chunk of money from the State’s surplus… that surplus was NOT generated by gas and license taxes. I don’t know why these basic non-controversial facts seem to challenge so many people?
Whatever… you don’t want to ride a bike, don’t; no one is trying to force you ride a bike.
These claims that cyclists have no positive measurable effect on air quality are likewise specious. First, show me your data on that. During the lockdown our air quality improved significantly when cars were taken off the road, while cycling and pedestrian traffic increased significantly. While that trend wasn’t permanent, it still proves that a sustainable movement towards that kind of transportation mix would reduce air pollution and improve air quality without destroying public transit or making it impossible to deliver Amazon packages. Cities like Amsterdam with much higher levels of cycling vs. autos already have measurably cleaner air quality. Even in American cities where auto traffic is limited by street fees and parking limits we see local improvements in air quality. And at any rate, to whatever extent we have poor air quality, it is almost entirely caused by automobile traffic, NOT bicycles. More cycling can’t contribute to this problem… more cars certainly contributes to the problem. How is this confusing or unclear?
Way to miss the entire point of my post.
This article is deeply flawed. It is based on false assertions and false premises.
The author claims bike lanes are “basically free to install”. False. Bike lanes like the ones to come up on Summit Ave requite a lot more engineering and preparation. Bike lanes have to account for more finely tuned chip sealing, finer grate alignment than for cars, in-ground pavement markers, separation barriers, more frequent cleaning etc.
He says gas taxes don’t pay for all the road. Correct. Taxes from the general fund are used to fund roads. Those taxes come from economic activity that can be conducted primarily by roads. What is the economic output of those who commute by bike and how does that compare with that by road using vehicles. If you do that computation one is likely to find that bike lanes that use up about 15 percent of the road hardly pay for their share.
A couple of issues with your thinking. The first is that the main issue involved is that if you want to use the economic impact as a measure, you should also be willing to have that activity directly support the required infrastructure. The second is that different types of streets/roads have different roles to play. Local residential streets need to provide universal access, so designing them in a way that favors one mode to the exclusion of others is both inequitable and simply lousy design. There is a reason people like houses with limited and slow traffic, residential streets are not simply about moving as many things as quickly as possible and to trat them as such is the topics ultimate bad premise.
If you want to talk about how people get longer distances that is a different topic. But we should avoid using general funds to subsidize traveling longer distances because it discourages effeciency. If people want to take advantage of cheap land further from where they work and do things they should need to account for the transportation cost of that choice. Including its environmental impact.
This article was about how bicyclists subsidize roads. My response was about how false and misleading that statement is. Economic activity made possible by roads funds the General Fund and other Federal taxes. I asked for a relative comparison of economic activity made possible by bicyclists that contribute to the fund
I wasn’t commenting on road design in neighborhoods, source of funds or any of that sort.
Avoiding all sides of the equation is fundamentally dishonest. You purposefully ignore the costs cars impose on the spaces through which they pass, like the damage they do to the environment. Damage which is paid for by everyone, especially the young and future generations. Every mile on a bike is effectively a subsidy to those who choose to use high-impact transportation.
You are the one that claimed that economic activity was the sole measurement that should be used when that is obviously, not true. A design that prioritizes cars at the expense of general usability and quality of life factors for the people who live on (and pay the majority of the cost for) a street is most certainly a subsidy. Either you spoke out of ignorance or, If you knew better, dishonesty. Either way, you destroyed any credibility you might have had.
But the biggest thing you seem to ignore wilfully is that cyclists pay the same amount to support local streets as everyone else. Therefore they are currently subsidizing car-centric designs.
Indeed, a specious narrative, comment by Raj is much closer to reality. Next time you take the track team to Des Moines or Duluth or Fargo try a cycle for transport….
Ya know, I get it… I really do. Cyclists, as a predominately white male population in the United States can be confrontational, territorial, privileged, and entitled. As such cyclists can overestimate their own importance, and superiority in a variety of ways, I frequently find that to be quite annoying. And yes, I get it… there have been circumstances when some cycling groups and organization have mounted unsustainable and borderline irrational efforts to promote cycling beyond reason.
But THIS article is about as non-controversial or confrontational as you can get, and yet so many people simply cannot contain their impulse to respond with hostility and derision? What’s up with that? THAT’S not about cyclists with exaggerated senses of entitlement. I know cycling radicals… THIS author is NO radical. Enthusiasm is NOT colonization, hostility, or aggression. Cyclists are not trying to take your car away or interfere with your UPS deliveries.
I’m not here to psychoanalyze anyone, but seriously if THIS article “triggers” you in some way, that’s about you and your insecurities and entitlement.
This article is filled with falsehoods. That’s a problem.
Raj, the article is not filled with falsehoods. When the author points to “free” bike lanes he’s specifically discussing those that are painted in during street resurfacing; there’s nothing misleading about that, those lines have to be painted anyways and they use the same paint for bike lanes as the do anything else. As far the comparative expense of any other bike lane; anyone who watched someone install a sidewalk compared to a street or road can tell you how much more expensive a street or road is. There’s nothing false or misleading about that observation.
Your economic theory regarding “contribution” is specious. Are sidewalks and skyways and pedestrians economically irrelevant? Do all those people walking around in the Mall of America make ZERO contribution to the economy simply because their on foot instead in a truck? Cycling and cyclists are a multi-multi million dollar economic contribution to our local economies in a variety of ways, that is not a false claim, it’s simply an economic fact. For a fraction of what it would cost to build new highways we’ve converted hundreds of miles of rail road beds into bike trails in this state and those trails have millions of new dollars into a economically struggling area with little or no adverse ecological impact.
Anyone can point to something that is a larger economic factor, but that doesn’t render anything else irrelevant. We move almost twice as much freight by rail compared to trucks… does that mean semi trucks are less valuable to the economy?
The variety of ways cyclists contribute to public subsidies is well documented in the article, and in many of the comments here. These are not false claims.
” author points to “free” bike lanes he’s specifically discussing those that are painted in during street resurfacing; ” – Those “free” bike also consume about 10-15 percent of the road ways. Those road ways are paid for by taxes. Those taxes don’t come out of nowhere. They come from economic activity. The economic activity created by bikes is simply nowhere near 10-15 percent.
“Are sidewalks and skyways and pedestrians economically irrelevant?” – What is the economic activity that pays for those. What percent of that economic activity is conducted by roads vs bikes. That is the question you won’t answer. Nobody denies cycling and cyclists contribute to the economy. What you are grossly inflating is the percent of that economic activity. If rail road beds are converted to bike trails, great. Now what is the economic activity that has been offset from roads onto those trails. That pales in comparison to roads
I repeat. The author had posited a complete set of false claims.
“Those “free” bike also consume about 10-15 percent of the road ways.”
Exactly how are the roadways ‘consumed’ by bike lanes?
For example, minnehaha avenue, the diagonal that parallels Hiawatha in Longfellow, has bike lanes in both directions. Combined, the width is less than a complete car lane. As striped today, there are two traffic lanes, two bike lanes and two parking lanes, about 5 total lanes across. In winter, when snow piles into the parking lanes, parked cars encroach on the bike lanes, leaving two traffic lanes & two parking lanes. In other words, for drivers no effective difference.
Raj, your “falsehoods” are simply a product of your imagination rather than anything written by the author in the article. The issue isn’t how much roadway bike lanes occupy, but the percentage of bike lanes that are simply painted on the roadways, which IS in fact a majority of bike lane mile in the Twin cities. The author specifically discusses the origin of funding and taxes so you’re not refuting or correcting anything, you’re just repeating what has already been said as if your making an original observation. The only falsehood is the claim that none of this has been discussed, or that someone is claiming that cyclists pay for everything… those are YOUR falsehoods not the authors.
Your economic activity analysis remains facile since that’s not the subject of the discussion, nor are your comparisons coherent economics. The relative “value” or economic contribution of cycling isn’t the issue, no one here or anywhere is claiming that cycling is the most valuable economic activity we can imagine, we’re simply pointing out the degree to which cyclists help pay for infrastructure. Even if we WERE discussing the relative economic value of different activities your analysis, comparisons, whatever, are facile since economies are the product of aggregate activities. Merchants at the MOA are perfectly willing to sell to customers regardless of how those customers get to the mall, they don’t care if you drove, walked, biked, or flew in on a parachute. Every customer that buys something is participating in the economy. And no matter how much parking space they have, if they don’t have enough space to walk around and shop they won’t go there.
“Do all those people walking around in the Mall of America make ZERO contribution to the economy simply because their on foot instead in a truck?”
The Mall of America provides the rotunda as a convenience for walkers and shoppers. It is paid for by those who arrive there by cars, trains and i guess bicycles (although i have never seen one). Those funds didn’t fall from the sky.
Well, bike lanes are provided for convenience and safety people who ride bikes, and no one anywhere ever claimed they are paid for by money fallen from the sky. Nor are streets and roads financed with sky money. This isn’t a clever observation.
Research shows it is actually drivers who don’t come close to paying for the cost of streets and people who bike significantly subsidize those who drive by several hundred dollars.
You lead into an article with this statement and then make a claim that what the author says is “demonstrably” accurate, but then wonder why that persons who actually pay (by far) the largest share of road costs take umbrage. You are amazed that people would respond to this non-confrontational article with “derision and hostility”, (your words). This is a common tactic liberal, progressives use (my assumption) they accuse someone else of the derogatory statements initiated by themselves.
Alan, I didn’t write this article. The facts presented in the article are demonstrably true and verifiable. Yes, reliable facts are a common liberal “tactic”.
Alan, I didn’t write this article. The facts presented in the article are demonstrably true and verifiable. Yes, reliable facts are a common liberal “tactic”. Yes, some people react to the simple act of presenting facts as if that’s a confrontational approach, but that doesn’t justify hostile responses.
I agree one hundred percent, about the free bike lanes!!! Taking a step further in helping a cause; maintaining the bike lane on Summit Avenue and allocating the $12 million to many bike lanes around the city would be more beneficial. The infrastructure for Summit Avenue can be greatly reduced and preserve the historical aspect of the road as well as tree canopy. More importantly, saving jobs, churches. Community gatherings, schools, parking and keeping it safe for those that need to walk to and from their cars at night; despite your disagreement for those who need to commute long long distances for work because they are disabled or unable to bike. I have epilepsy and I cannot bike due to seizures. I need to take an Uber. All in all, I enjoyed your article; I do agree with the bike lanes. Yay everyone will be happy!! Thank you!