Manhattan Is Among Nation's Best Locations For Cyclists

NEW YORK, NY — Bike lanes may be one of New York City's most hot button topics, but they're making Manhattan one of the nation's best cycling areas, according to the nonprofit group PeopleForBikes.

The group used a scoring system to evaluate cities across the nation on five key areas: ridership, safety, network, acceleration and reach.

The report gave Manhattan 3.4 out of five stars, which represents the top spot on the East Coast, and an impressive fourth overall biking destination in the entire country.

Here's the breakdown for the borough:

• Ridership: 4.5
• Safety: 2.8
• Network: 2.9
• Reach: 1.4
• Acceleration: 2.9

Manhattan scores highly on the list, but Colorado is home to to the two best cities for biking, the report found. With scores of 3.74 and 3.64 out of five, Boulder and Fort Collins out cycled the rest of the country.

Here are the 10 best cities for biking and their scores, NYC was listed by borough:

1. Boulder, CO — 3.7
2. Fort Collins, CO — 3.6
3. Eugene, OR — 3.4
4. Manhattan, NY — 3.4
5. Arlington, VA — 3.4
6. Portland, OR — 3.3
7. Brooklyn, NY — 3.3
8. Lawrence, KS — 3.3
9. Minneapolis, MN — 3.2
10. Madison, WI — 3.2

The cities were scored on a five-point scale. With each category receiving equal weight.

Ridership referred to how many bicyclists were in a community — both recreational and commuters — while safety looked at deaths and injuries to bicyclists, walkers and drivers.

The network score was determined based on the quality of a city’s bike paths — how completely it connects people, both to each other and to local destinations using “comfortable routes,” the authors wrote.

Reach evaluated how well a community’s “low-stress network” served its community members. This score took into account various demographic data to assess gaps in access and connectivity for historically underserved populations.

And lastly, acceleration looked at how fast a community was improving its biking infrastructure and how successful its programs have been at getting more people to ride.

The ratings play a key role in making biking better for everyone, said Tim Blumenthal, president at PeopleForBikes. Efforts this year were focused on engaging more cities to improve the accuracy of the ratings.

“Providing annual ratings helps cities make quick, cost-effective progress toward building a network where people of all ages and bicycling abilities can ride safely and easily to destinations all around town,” said Blumenthal.

The organization also offered city planners tips to improve their biking scores. Among them: designating bike-to-work days (or weeks), installing showers and parking at businesses, establishing year-round school biking programs, lowering residential speed limits to 20 mph or less, and adding comfortable bike lanes to arterial roads.

Patch national staffer Dan Hampton contributed to this report.