Cycling accessibility to employment, schools, and grocery stores in Arizona metropolitan regions

Abstract

The further motivation of bicycling as a utilitarian travel alternative has been identified as a viable solution to address societal concerns regarding physical inactivity, climate change, and transportation inequities. Yet, a profound increase in bicycling activity for many cities remains elusive to policymakers, practitioners, and researchers largely because of the inability to attract new bicyclists via safer bicycling infrastructure provision. To better understand current bicycling barriers to its future adoption, this study describes the advancement of the Cyclist Routing Algorithm for Network Connectivity (CRANC) and its application as an accessibility-oriented transportation planning tool in eight Arizona metropolitan regions. CRANC, an innovative bicyclist routing platform sensitive to bike network conditions and the varying traffic safety concerns of cyclist types (interested but concerned, enthused and confident, strong and fearless), is designed to support utilitarian bicycling promotion by identifying its latent demand. In this application, local and regional discrepancies in bicycling accessibility to jobs, schools, and grocery stores are identified and visualized by integrating the concepts of cyclist types and bicycle level of traffic stress into a new bicycling accessibility metric. Study findings show significant differences in place-based bicycling accessibility across key sociodemographic and economic indicators for the interested but concerned cyclist type, who prefers dedicated bike facilities, slower vehicle speeds, and lower traffic volumes. A recognition of these variations is important for promoting equitable bicycling access to subsistence and maintenance activities for those individuals who do not presently use this sustainable mode but would if barriers to access were removed.