Every day a multitude of MSU students living in Brody Neighborhood hop aboard their bicycles, make their way across Harrison Road and scoot on by Kellogg Center.
But there’s something else these very same bicyclists encounter every day in this brief stretch at the beginning of every day’s journey. Just before they reach the bridge behind the Kellogg Center, these students pass a sign suggesting their future and safety as bicyclists at this university are at risk.
“Bicycle Friendly University. 2011-2015” the sign reads.
This sign is just one of a few of its kind located on the campus of MSU, and leaves many questions to the imagination, such as: Are the days of MSU being friendly to bicyclists numbered?
This question is one MSU Bikes Service Center manager Tim Potter has the answers to — and he said the university’s friendliness to bicyclists will not cease in 2016.
That’s because MSU is part of what the League of American Bicyclists call the Bicycle Friendly University program, Potter said.
Previously, there was a program in place to recognize states, communities and businesses as bicycle friendly. But it wasn’t until 2011, when Potter and a nationwide network that included other university bike coordinators got together to put together an assessment that formally recognizes universities as bicycle friendly.
Flash forward to today, and the League of American Bicyclists now recognizes more than 100 universities. And while the recognition doesn’t come with any formal award besides a few signs to put around campus, Potter still believes it’s a great attribute for a university to have.
“It just gives you a bragging point,” Potter said. “It’s a way to say that your university is making efforts to become more bike friendly just to attract more people who care about such things. ... Or as a parent, like me, I’m really into bicycling, if I was sending my kid to a university I don’t know anything about, it’d be nice to kind of know, are they friendly toward bicycling?”
According to the website for the League of American Bicyclists, “the Bicycle Friendly University program recognizes institutions of higher education for promoting and providing a more bikeable campus for students, staff and visitors. The BFU program provides the road map and technical assistance to create great campuses for cycling.”
In order to become a BFU, the university must fill out an application online. From there, the League of American Bicyclists then evaluates these applicants on the following: engineering, encouragement, education, enforcement and evaluation/planning, known as the Five E’s.
Currently MSU falls under the “bronze” category of BFUs, but to be included in the next cohort of Bicycle Friendly Universities, MSU will need to submit an online application by August 20, 2015 to be included in the next review cycle — and to prevent the very (un)likely possibility of widespread bicycle unfriendliness at MSU.
“We’re definitely reapplying. ... The MSU Bike Advisory Committee, we’re working on that application to reapply and hopefully move up to the silver category after we share all the things we’ve done the past four years, which is considerable,” said Potter, going on to bring up many of the things he feels makes MSU bicycle friendly, such as the two-thirds of campus roads now assessable to bicyclists, or the bike lanes recently put in place on the campus River Trail.
Others Potter brought up include the MSU Bikes Service Center -— which Potter says is a very rare thing for a university to have — as well as other things such as bike garages or bike rooms in residence halls.
So bicyclists of East Lansing can rest easy, knowing Potter will assure a smooth ride into 2016.
