The first piece of good news is that biking is on the increase in
New York City, so much so that we have more than 30 bikes for every
bike rack. New Yorkers are resourceful when faced with challenges
like this, but we obviously need more bike racks.

The city’s Department of Transportation has a “CityRacks” program
to install new U-shaped or serpentine bike racks for free. Supplies
are limited and installation is slow, but that just means we need to
show how great the demand is.

Wherever you go in the city, let it be known that you’d like bike
parking out front. You can even make copies of the application form
on the
CityRacks website and bring them along with you.

(If you’re visiting a place that uses delivery bikes,
you might suggest that they apply for several racks.)

Bike Rack/Tree Guards

Cars are the #1 threat to street trees in the city. So overall,
the trees are glad you ride a bike.

Due to the shortage of bike parking in the city, though, people
sometimes lock their bikes to trees, especially young trees, and
this may damage the tree and actually kill it.

The folks at Trees New York came up with an elegant solution:
a tree guard that doubles as a bike rack. With these, installing
protection for trees automatically creates bike parking!

There are two designs, the “X”-style and the circular “Adonis.”
You can find out more information about these at the
Trees New York website.

Bike Rack/Fence

Here’s another good idea from Amsterdam that could be
better-implemented here.

The fence surrounding this Amsterdam park doubles as parking for bikes. Many bikes.		New Yorkers use plain old regular fences for parking bikes. You can’t fit as many in, though.

Fences, particularly those around parks, provide a lot of the bike
parking in New York City. As long as the bikes aren’t in anyone’s way,
this is a fine arrangement. New Yorkers do a very good job parking
bikes like this, where they don’t interfere with anyone.

This could easily be improved, though! A simple policy change could
make reserve stretches of fence for bike parking, and integrating U-racks
racks or Adonis-style loops along the fence would look attractive and
provide even more parking.

D.I.Y. Bike Rack

This photo shows how innovative New Yorkers are in the face of our
bike parking crisis: somebody set up this window guard for use as a
bike rack.

TIME’S UP! celebrates approaches like this. New Yorkers are both
sidewalk-savvy and creative at solving problems when bureacracy fails
them. Good ideas should be embraced and learned from.