Charlie Short

Former Lyft driver Charlie Short says he's doubtful that the new fees will convince many customers to switch back to the CTA, since they believe ride-hail is safer, faster, and more reliable.

The good news is that installation is about to start up again, with 500-1,000 racks a year for the next five years.

The city’s Divvy for Everyone (D4E) equity program, which offers one-time $5 annual memberships to low-income Chicagoans, is a great opportunity for residents to enjoy the the mobility, health, and economic benefits of bike-share. But the big, blue bikes don’t do you much good if you don’t know how to ride or don’t feel safe navigating city streets on two wheels.

At yesterday's quarterly meeting of the Mayor's Pedestrian Advisory Council, Chicago Department of Transportation commissioner Rebekah Scheinfeld mentioned the "somber" statistics that there was a significant increase in Chicago pedestrian fatalities in 2015 compared to previous years.

Since the third week of May, 1.55 million Chicagoans (!) have received a double-sided leaflet called "Tips for Motorists" informing people how to "make our streets safer for everyone." The mailing, sent by the City Clerk's office with the car sticker renewal form, was three years in the making and likely has the lowest cost of any outreach that the Chicago Department of Transportation has ever initiated. CDOT paid $8,000 for printing and contributed about $1,000 in postage fees, according to bike and pedestrian safety manager Charlie Short.

Last week while pedaling downtown on Milwaukee, I came across Chicago Department of Transportation Bicycling Ambassadors and 14th District police officers doing safety outreach to people on bikes and people in cars. The ambassadors were handing flyers to motorists and cyclists reminding them not to use phones while driving and to obey traffic signals while biking. The police were flagging down adult cyclists who rode on the sidewalk or who ran red lights and giving them seemingly polite warnings that what they did was illegal.

For weeks, rumors have been circulating that there has been a re-shuffling of job responsibilities at the Chicago Department of Transportation, but the agency hadn’t made an official announcement about the changes. Most notably, word on the street was that Ben Gomberg, Chicago’s bicycle program coordinator since 1996, was no longer managing the day-to-day operations of the bike program but was instead focusing his efforts on the city’s new bike-share system. After we contacted the department for more info, Deputy Commissioner Scott Kubly offered to provide details on the reorganization, which has actually been in effect since late January.