Report: Biking spikes 52% in Twin Cities

A new study says biking in Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minnesota, has increased 52 percent over the past five years and walking is up 18 percent, according to MinnPost.com. Bike Walk Twin Cities, the group which published the study, concludes that new bikeways, high gas prices and health concerns have prompted more people to bike and walk.

"From 2007 to 2011, annual bicycle trips on the Lake Street Bridge (between Minneapolis and Saint Paul) increased by approximately 200,000 to nearly 900,000," the report stated. "Based on 44 percent of these bicyclists reporting that they'd be driving if not bicycling, the 200,000 increase in bicycling translates to 96,000 fewer car trips across the Lake Street Bridge."

Joan Pasiuk, director of Bike Walk Twin Cities, told the website, "Recreational bicycling alone does not account for this increase. Increasingly, Twin Cities residents are choosing to ride a bike or walk to and from work, to run errands or make short trips. Sibley Bike Library clients alone logged more than 30,000 miles in 2011, and, there were more than 200,000 trips in the second year of the Nice Ride Minnesota bike sharing (program)."

Bike Walk Twin Cities is the federal non-motorized transportation pilot program administered by Transit for Livable Communities. It has received $28 million for Twin Cities programs that increase biking and walking.

The group's statistics are based on a count of bicyclists and pedestrians passing 42 designated locations in Minneapolis and St. Paul on weekdays in September 2011, and comparing this data with identical counts conducted each September since 2007.