A communication transmitted from Louis A. DePasquale, City Manager, relative to Awaiting Report Item Number 20-12, regarding the feasibility of adding bike parking rings to parking meters. CHARTER RIGHT EXERCISED BY COUNCILLOR NOLAN IN COUNCIL DECEMBER 7, 2020

C I T Y O F C A M B R I D G E Community Development Department 1 IRAM FAROOQ Assistant City Manager for Community Development SANDRA CLARKE Deputy Director Chief of Administration KHALIL MOGASSABI Deputy Director Chief Planner To: Louis A. DePasquale, City Manager From: Iram Farooq, Assistant City Manager for Community Development; Joseph Barr, Director, Traffic, Parking, and Transportation Re: Awaiting Report 20-12 dated February 10, 2020 regarding feasibility of adding bike parking rings to parking meters. Date: December 2, 2020 This response addresses the request to examine the feasibility of adding bike parking rings to automobile parking meter poles in order to increase the availability of bike parking without having to add stand-alone bike parking infrastructure. The demand for bike parking continues to rise as the city grows and more people are choosing to bike. The City of Cambridge allocates funds in its capital budget to install up to 150 new post and ring bike racks each year, in addition to providing some larger bike shelters at public facilities and providing seasonal bike parking corrals in priority locations in place of car parking spots. The racks and corrals are placed in places of high demand for bike parking, such as in the city’s main squares, along retail corridors and near educational facilities and high-density housing districts. Racks are also installed upon request from residents or business owners. New development projects are required to provide bike parking on their property not only for employees but also short-term visitor parking, which adds significant numbers of new bike parking spaces throughout the city each year. In combination, these different approaches to increase the availability of bike parking in the city each year are intended to address the growing demand. We recommend not adding bike parking rings to active automobile parking meter poles for several reasons. First, meters are placed closer to the curb than the typical standard for bike racks. This could mean, if one or more bikes are parked at a rack, that vehicles would end up being parked further away from the curb, intruding into bike or travel lanes and reducing overall travel safety. In addition, accessing the meters to empty the coin compartment and service the meters could become more difficult. A larger bike, a badly parked bike, or a tipped over bike would impede the collection of coins or maintenance of the parking meter. However, there are some “orphaned” meter poles where curbside parking has been removed to install bike lanes for other reasons. These poles might be good candidates for attaching rings as they do not affect how cars would park or coin collection/meter servicing. These empty poles will be examined and bike parking rings, or replacement racks, installed where feasible and where demand exists.