After debuting its Capital Bikeshare program in late September, the D.C. Department of Transportation finally installed Georgetown’s very own solar-powered bicycle station earlier this week.

The station, which is located in the House of Sweden parking lot at the intersection of K Street and 29th Street, doesn’t have any bicycles yet. According to Georgetown Metropolitan, a second station should spring up on Wisconsin Avenue next week.

Another station was originally slated to be installed near campus at the intersection of N Street and 37th Street, however, those plans now appear to be up in the air.

GM added that a fourth station is rumored to open in front of the Hardy School, near the Wisconsin Avenue Safeway.

7:30 p.m. update – Commenter “Anon” reports that the bikes are now at the station.

Photo: Google Maps

At approximately 4 p.m. this afternoon, a female cyclist was struck by a Super Shuttle van while riding eastbound on Prospect Street.

According to witnesses at the scene, the cyclist rode through a stop sign and the van, which was traveling northbound on 33rd Street, was unable to stop before colliding with her.

“People riding bicycles in the city need to respect traffic signs,” MPD Officer N.A. Cook, who took witnesses’ statements at the scene, said. “The same accident at the same intersection happened about a week ago.”

Cook later identified the cyclist as a college student.

The woman, who was wearing a helmet, told EMS responders that she did not remember the accident. Although one responder told Vox that she “should be okay,” the woman was nonetheless transported to a nearby hospital.

Photo: Jackson Perry

Got a bike that needs fixing up? Thinking about buying a cheap bike that needs a little TLC? Save yourself a wad of cash by taking advantage of the free bicycle clinic at the Glover Park farmer’s market.

The clinic is at Hardy Middle School (1819 35th St NW) and runs Saturdays from 10am to 1pm through the end of October.

The clinic offers free adjustments, safety inspections, and advice on bicycle care and riding in the DC area. While the weather’s still warm, Vox recommends you take advantage of the free opportunity.

If you’re a bike fix-it wizard and would like to volunteer your services to the clinic, you can do so here.

No bike? No problem.

Starting this fall, the DC Department of Transportation (DDOT) plans to expand its popular bicycle rental program to 100 stations across the city. Building off of the success of the SmartBike DC bicycle sharing program, Capital Bikeshare will bring at least 1000 bicycles to the streets of Washington.

And here’s the best part—Georgetown University snagged itself a station. Earlier today, DDOT posted a map of the preliminary Bikeshare location on its website, only to take it down after noticing some errors. (The heroes over at Greater Greater Washington, however, have an interactive copy.) According to GGW, DDOT is “still tweaking” the map which details all of the bike sharing stations, but plans to formally announce the locations later today. (UPDATE: The map is back on the DDOT site.)

How will this affect Georgetown students? For starters, it will mean that some of us can ditch those long waits for GUTS buses.

Read the rest of this entry »

The Department of Public Safety is on a mission. What kind of mission, you ask? One of the utmost importance to Georgetown University—bicycle removal.

According to DPS Associate Director Joseph Smith, abandoned bicycles that are “in a serious state of disrepair” will be removed this summer.

Since the spring semester ended, “REMOVAL” tags have popped up on the worst offenders across campus. (That is to say, those rusted, old bicycles that haven’t moved in years.)

In an e-mail to Vox, Smith wrote that DPS plans to give owners a “reasonable period of time” to claim tagged bicycles. If a bicycle isn’t claimed, DPS will remove it and the University will donate it to charity.

“[The abandoned bicycles] are an eyesore to the community, they attract thieves who strip them for parts, and they occupy bike rack space,” Smith wrote.

While the University began tagging abandoned bicycles earlier this month, it is unknown when the removal will start. Nonetheless, we know one Jesuit who’ll be happy about the news.

[Editor's Note: Sorry about the late start today, readers. Vox spent the last half hour in awe of Landon Donovan.]

On Monday afternoon, a GUTS bus driver struck a cyclist as he was turning the corner at Reservoir Road. Several sources, including Nick Troiano (COL ’11) and the D.C. Fire and EMS department, reported the accident on Twitter just before 2:00 p.m.

University Spokesperson Andy Pino wrote in an e-mail that the cyclist was not seriously injured, and the GUTS bus driver was not at fault.

“The cyclist was not seriously injured and she admitted to being at fault in the incident,” he wrote. “The GUTS driver called for an ambulance to assure that she was not injured. A police report was taken, and the driver was not cited. EMTs checked out the cyclist and put a bandage on her knee.”

Photo from Washington City Paper

That headline is a little misleading—due to a quarrel between Clear Channel, the administrators of the SmartBike bike-sharing program, and the City, it’s unlikely that Georgetown will get a SmartBike station any time soon.

Nonetheless, two House Republicans,  Rep. Mark Kirk (R-Ill.) and Rep. Tom Price (R-Ga.), are saying that the very idea of providing Georgetown residents with free bicycles was one of the “11 worst pork-barrel projects of the 111th Congress,” according to Fox News.

Kirk and Price don’t have all their facts straight—they allege that the stimulus provided Georgetown with $3 million in funding for bicycle racks, when in fact Georgetown was merely named as one of 40 new SmartBike locations in a $3 million dollar expansion of the program (and the bike racks came with actual bikes)—but something tells me we would have made their worst-of list either way.

Rep. Eric Cantor (R-Va.) and Rep. Jack Kingston (R-Ga.) railed against bikes for wealthy Georgetown residents back in March, too, at which time the League of American Bicyclists made an argument for considering bike funding as a “stimulus project.”

What else made this list? “$550,000 for a skateboard park in Pawtucket, R.I.,” “$3.8 million for an urban art trail in Rochester, N.Y.,” and “$500,000 for fish food in Missouri, to help defray the costs for state fish farmers.”

Photo from Flickr user M “Annie” Gaddis.

The scene at the accident

Several blogs are reporting that on Monday night, a taxi cab struck a cyclist at the intersection of 31st and M Streets in Georgetown, badly injuring the cyclist. WashCycle has an account from someone who came across the aftermath of the accident, when the cyclist was being loaded into an ambulance on a backboard. The latecomer said he or she spoke to an eyewitness who the police had interviewed about the crash:

[The eyewitness said it] was a head on collision between 6:00 and 6:15 tonight. It was well after sundown and dark. Cyclist was eastbound on M Street in the eastbound lanes. Cab was pointed westbound in the eastbound lanes.

Grill was broken in, windshield shattered, hood dented and roof dented. Bike was on the cab’s passenger side pointing west. Witness told me the cab had come to a stop before impact so where the cab was stopped was where the impact was. Witness couldn’t say for sure if cyclist had green, red or yellow light.

The Metropolitan Police Department confirmed for Vox last night that an accident took place at 31st and M, but per their policy, could not give out any information about the accident over the phone.

Via Georgetown Metropolitan

I bet this bike wasn’t registered…

The Department of Public Safety’s bike registration program was introduced in March in with some very noble goals: to help DPS more effectively manage the number of bikes on campus, to make it easier for police to return stolen bikes to their owners, and to deter criminals from stealing bikes in the first place.

Unfortunately, the student response has been pretty underwhelming: a grand total of 20 bikes have been registered and 12 bike locks have been sold through the program since June, according to Associate Director of DPS Joseph Smith.

Smith wrote in an e-mail that the tepid response to the program limits its effectiveness.

It’s too early into the academic year to say how much impact the program has had on theft, but with only 20 students registering their bikes thus far I think it would be safe to conjecture that the program would be a lot more effective if we had greater participation from the students.

Smith said he wasn’t sure making the program mandatory would be a good idea, and that he thought more voluntary participation would be preferable.

Photo from Flickr user Mr. Spinch, used under a Creative Commons license.

When the District Department of Transportation announced in March that SmartBike (the ride-sharing program that began last August) was set to expand to Georgetown this summer, we were pretty pumped.  Turns out the future of Georgetown bike-sharing isn’t quite so bright, though.

According to the Georgetown Metropolitan, Clear Channel, who agreed to run the program in exchange for control over the advertising in new D.C. bus shelters, isn’t being terribly cooperative.  Since they’ve already got their advertising rights shored up, they’re unwilling to add new bike stations.

GM thinks D.C. might have to cut the cord with Clear Channel and find another more accommodating company to run the program.  Either way, looks like this summer’s projected expansion isn’t gonna happen…

Photo from Flickr user Mr. T in DC, used under a Creative Commons license.