Campus receives national bicycle-friendly award

IU is one of 20 universities that has been recognized across the nation as a bicycle-friendly university, Director of Sustainability Bill Brown said.

“This recognition will give us some leverage to make progress to being an even more bicycle-friendly university,” he said.

The League of American Bicyclists announced the universities at the National Bike Summit on March 9 in Washington, D.C. IU earned a bronze award, which is good
through 2015.

“The award is good for four years, but as we improve, we will probably not wait that long,” Brown said. “We would like to climb the ladder a little faster than that.”

IU filled out a 93-question questionnaire about the existing facilities, how bicycling is promoted on campus and how it is part of campus culture, Brown said.   
 
“Things like the Little 500 race sort of contribute a lot to our culture — a bicycling-friendly culture,” he said.

By filling out the application, the University was able to see its strengths and weaknesses, said Amy O’Shea, an intern in the Office of Sustainability.

“It sort of showed us where we are doing a pretty good job and where we need to fill in the gap and where we have room to grow,” she said. “The award has the potential power for funding.”

O’Shea said the next step is to create a comprehensive plan and determine how the University can make campus more accessible for bikes.

“We need to determine how this is going to fit in to the University’s sustainability plan and the Campus Master Plan so we can try to get everyone on the same page and try to figure out where we can go from here,” she said.

Brown said the University needs to provide better bicycle amenities such as more covered parking and dedicated routes for bicycling through campus.

Recommendations were given on how to improve bicycle transportation, he said.

“I think this gives us some momentum and some impetus to build on those recommendations and implement some of those plans,” Brown said.

A large part of the sustainability efforts on campus is to get people out of cars, Brown said.

“If you can get people out of their cars and create a pleasant experience for them to walk or ride their bike to class or to work then you definitely cut down on the environmental consequences of all those folks driving their cars,” he said.

O’Shea said the main goal is to recognize that IU is bicycle-friendly.

“We recognize that we still have a long way to go but it is a good start, and now we are really paying more attention to how to make it better,” she said. “Now that we are aware of our shortcomings, it is going to be easier to fix them.”