Bike/Ped Friendly West Chester Subcommittee

Bike Survey

To find out how people who live and work in the Borough feel about cycling, the Chester County Cycling Coalition (CCCC) created and implemented the West Chester Bicycle Survey in January 2011. The survey answered important questions that will help guide the design of a plan to improve bicycling in the Borough of West Chester. The survey answered some key questions: Why do people bicycle? Why don’t they bicycle? What do we have to do to encourage people to use bicycles as a mode of transportation?

1. Why do people bicycle?

10% of respondents already use bicycles to commute while 18% use them to run errands in and around the Borough. This makes sense. According to businesses that participated in our survey, 15% of their customers lived in the Borough while 12% lived nearby.

2. Why don't people bicycle more?

Of the 837 people who provided additional comments at the end of the survey, 62% were concerned about safety. Over 50% of respondents said that if routes were safe and bicycle parking available, they would use their bicycles to commute and to run errands.

3. Solutions

Over 80% of people taking our survey believe that improving bicycling conditions in the Borough would improve their quality of life.

To find out how strongly people felt about improving bicycling conditions, we asked them if they thought public funds should be spent toward this goal. Surprisingly, even though the survey was conducted soon after the Borough increased taxes, over 75% of respondents voted yes.

The vast majority of people who participated in our survey would bicycle more for transportation, exercise and recreation if bicycling in the Borough was safe. We also learned that many people were unhappy about cyclists who do not obey the rules of the road. In order to improve bicycling conditions in West Chester Borough, the BLUER Transportation Committee in cooperation with the CCCC are working on a bike plan for the Borough: Bike Friendly West Chester. As recommended by the League of American Bicyclists, the plan will include proposals for improving bicycle facilities (bicycle routes and storage), and a plan to educate bicyclists and motorists.

View the full survey summary here. View the detailed survey here.

Safe Routes Bike Map

The Bike Friendly West Chester team put together a fold-up pocket street map of the Borough of West Chester showing what we consider to be the safest routes for getting in, out and between points of interest in the borough. You can open a .pdf file of the map here and print it, or pick one up at many of the sports oriented businesses in the borough - thanks to West Chester BID for printing these maps.

Bike Parking

In 2011 we compiled an inventory of bicycle parking in West Chester: the existing racks, capacity and where we think there should be more bike parking. The existing racks are are marked on the Bike Route Map above, but the full inventory spreadsheet can be found here.

Communicating With Other Groups

Other groups with similar goals (improving the bike and pedestrian experience in West Chester) that we have been or plan to work with are:

• Chester County Cycling Coalition
• Chester County Planning Commission - Bicycle & Ped Circulation Plan (Exton Workshop results posted)
• Bikes Belong
• 2 Mile Challenge
• Safe Routes To School

We plan to have issue specific meetings and cross membership with these groups to help achieve our goals

Latest Developments

Thanks to funding from Greater Philadelphia Cycling Coalition, we have purchased 4 "U-shaped" bike stations. We will be working on a plan for planting them in the Borough, and more in the future.

After discussions with the Central Chester County Bicycle and Pedestrian Circulation Plan Committee, we have decided that the West Chester Bike Plan will be an integral part of the Central Chester County Plan. This will allow us to focus on the issues and communication with WC Borough officials and not get bogged down with documentation efforts.