By Dan Snell
A survey last spring by OU's parking people emerged with an amazing statistic. At any moment of the academic day there were 2,000 bicycles parked in bike racks around the campus. That, the parking people said, was much more than they expected and indicates that a lot of students are actually riding to class.
Presumably some days there is more riding than others. On one of those dreary fall days I could not help but notice that the only bikes in a rack I usually use were my bike and two others, though normally at the hour I'm there it is full. And I must admit that when it is pelting down rain, I also am only a fair-weather biker, though I must say that that rarely pushes me into the ultimate refuge of the internal combustion engine. Sometimes my wife gives me a lift.
Still, if we calculate that there are perhaps 21,000 students in classes on the Norman campus, and if each academic day has about ten possible hours of meeting (though really there are a few more than that), there might be 2,100 students in class at any one moment. But of course not all hours are equally popular, and students take different numbers of hours. Doing the math you can see that there are not only 100 students each hour who do not bike to class. In fact the percentages who do bike are small. But the parking people's findings do indicate that there is a significant number of students and faculty who do bike.
OU's bicycle committee was amazed by the statistic, and the administration has been responding. There are some new bike racks, especially south of Catlett and north of the new Wagner Center. And they are new style contraptions to which one might actually attach a bike lock and not like the old things that are still around where you can sort of push your bike into it, but it may or may not hold it up, and where you lock the thing up is not clear. It is gratifying to note in the student paper that the student congress is kicking in $1000 for more and better bike racks (Wed., Nov. 4, 2009, page 3).
So maybe there will be more bikes better parked. But is this necessarily a good thing? There are continuing complaints about uncaring bikers who zip into walkers, and some horrible stories about quite unnecessary bike-pedestrian accidents. There is no question that as bike density increases, as it seems likely to do, bike rider density should be addressed with education and with punishment where appropriate. And we need dedicated bike paths that separate walkers from riders, not everywhere, but on some key streets. OU has made strides on better racks, but with so many bikes in use, there is more to be done.
Another statistic: The OU Police registered 105 bikes in their 2009BikeBuzz, held on a dreary and drizzly day on the South Oval. If you missed the registration, which is absolutely free of charge, it's a good idea to do since they do recover stolen bikes and can sometimes match them up with owners. And you don't have to be connected to OU to register a bike with them.
Dan Snell has commuted to OU by bike for 26 years, and now his bike is registered.
