Just about every weekday, commuter Matt Galloway rolls out his black Trek mountain bike from his garage in Lake Forest, hops aboard and–burning calories instead of fossil fuels–rides to the Metra station.
There, he locks up the bicycle, boards a train and rides to Evanston, where he unlocks a second bike, a 10-speed, that he keeps parked at the station and rides to work in Evanston.
“It really does frustrate me,” said Galloway, 30, a recent college graduate.
His is a haphazard voyage, a definitive example of suburban bike commuting in a part of the nation where cyclists, already subject to angry battles with drivers and pedestrians, are banned from trains.
Illinois is, after all, no California, where commuters sling bikes over their shoulders when hopping on and off a train or a bus, then cruise down their very own bike lanes charted alongside smoothly paved streets.
But the Chicago area could soon be coasting in that direction.
A renewed effort by bike advocates working with suburban transit officials may mean that bicyclists may soon mix with mass-transit commuters, a possibility that enthuses cyclists like Galloway whose Pace or Metra routes drop them blocks or miles from their destinations.
Citizens advisory groups are meeting with officials from Metra, the agency overseeing suburban train routes, and Pace, which handles suburban bus routes, to hash out whether room can be made for the bikes. Allowing commuters to bring aboard their bikes could solve some problems for both riders and local transportation authorities.
While Galloway worries about dodging cars and getting to the station on time, officials are grappling with ways to put an end to clogged roads and stop-and-go traffic which cough massive amounts of exhaust.
“It takes people out of the traffic mix,” said Karen Shinners, program director for the Chicagoland Bicycle Federation. “It’s definitely a longer-term solution.”
Several suburbs already have signed on to the bike transit program and are working with Pace and Metra to determine which routes are most in need of bike racks.
Officials in Schaumburg, which formed a bicycle advisory committee in 1979, have made presentations to Pace and Metra about the merits of such programs for bikers who ride along the 75 miles of bike paths in the northwest suburb.
“We’ve recognized the need to accommodate and encourage bike riding,” said June Druckman, a village transportation engineer.
Pace recently concluded a trial program in which bike racks were tacked onto the fronts of several buses. The program was for bus drivers, not cyclists, to see whether they would have problems maneuvering with the racks, which increase the length of buses, thus widening their turning radius.
Pace officials are still trying to figure out how to secure bikes on racks and how to instruct passengers how to use the racks, since drivers cannot leave the bus to assist.
“It’s really more complicated than it seems at first,” Pace spokeswoman Mindy Laflamme said. “We think it’s great. That’s why we’ve been testing it. We’re looking at it very openly.”
Metra spokesman Chris Knapton identified space as the main problem in accommodating bikes on suburban trains, which are used by a quarter of a million riders every day. Seats already have been removed to make room for wheelchair users, and that space cannot be turned over for use by bikers as well, he said.
“And even if we carried every bike rider around, it would still be less than 1 percent of the ridership, yet take up the space of three riders,” Knapton said.
Still, riders on at least 80 transit agencies in more than 30 states can already take advantage of buses outfitted with some type of bike rack, according to the National Bicycle and Pedestrian Clearinghouse.
Bus and rail officials in Washington D.C., Boston, Seattle, Atlanta, Austin, Texas, as well as in Japan and the Netherlands have all managed to work around the perceived hassles of bike commuting.
Even in New York City, bikers are allowed on subways any day, any time, given space limitations.
The best option, he said, would be to open to bikers the two or three cars that are tacked on to passenger cars on weekends.
Bikers could buy monthly permits for particular routes to control the number of bikes, he said. Bikes would not be allowed during rush hours or, most likely, weekdays.
Bike advocates estimate a bike transit program could draw a whole new market of riders who normally wouldn’t consider boarding a train or bus.
Chicago Transit Authority officials said the idea of bikes on trains and buses in the city has never even been discussed at an official level.
“It is not really feasible because of safety and inconvenience to other riders,” said spokesman Jeff Stern.
Pace’s plan would allow for just two bikes per bus, but that’s better than nothing, say bike advocates.
“I think that we’re not going to get 100 percent across the board and there’s no need to wait until we can,” said Shinners. “If Pace is willing to invest in enough racks to cover five or six routes, that’s still a significant number.”
The Chicagoland Bicycle Federation has been trying to get bikes on public transit routes since 1985, and recently has renewed its efforts, she said.
Officials from the Regional Transportation Authority previously have set time lines for bikes to be allowed on suburban trains, but have pushed the date back. Metra authorities, for example, had said bikes could go on trains this summer, but the plan never jelled.
Bike advocates say the key to nudging transit officials to work toward a bike transit program is a matter of putting constant pressure on them.
“We’re not going to go away,” said Shinners. “If for whatever reason their answer is `Not this time,’ we’re going to think about other ways to approach this problem.”
Metra’s Knapton said it may take some more time.
“Trains have been around for 100 years. Bikes have been around for 150 years,” Knapton said. “So if we wait another year to see if bikes and trains can be mingled, it’s not going to hurt.”
