Minneapolis and its vanishing twin, St Paul, have been touting its #2 ranking as a cycling city for the last couple of years. Recent efforts along the well-used Greenway bicycle path seem to support this ranking, such as the opening of the Midtown bike center and the Martin Olav Sabo Pedestrian/Bicycle bridge. We also see the popularity of bicycling, in the midst of rising gas prices, through the increased value of used bicycles for sale on Craigslist.
Well, that all said, MSP residents (and notably their suburban commuters) still love the car. In today's NYTimes online, there is a post about the top ranked cities for "commuter pain." I am not sure why IBM of all organizations completed this survey but so be it. The full press release is available here.
My friend Tom who lives in Los Angeles and used to work for CalTrans (CA DOT) once visited MSP and noted how horrible our highway infrastructure was designed. Of course, much can be said about California's freeways but I think their problems have more to do with the sheer number of drivers than the poor routing/planning of highways (granted, the two are interrelated). In MSP, the highways are a tangled mess and were just not built for the heavy flow of commuters, especially people who have no idea how to use the zipper method of merging. MnDOT is just now starting to address these deficiencies, leading to more construction and traffic, and thus adding to our commuter pain.
Of course, in the end, the best way to ease such pain is to reduce outward migration to the 'burbs, encourage city living, and to promote more sustainable methods of transportation, such as walking, bicycling, and buses and light-rail. Oh, and less cold weather would help too (ha!).
An index of commuter pain:
1. Los Angeles
2. Atlanta
3. Miami/Fort Lauderdale
4. Dallas/Fort Worth
5. Chicago and San Francisco (tied)
6. New York
7. Washington, D.C.
8. Boston
9. Minneapolis/St. Paul