Transportation : Buzz

Connect Minnesota, a public-private partnership designed to accelerate technology in the state, released a report noting that Minnesota is strong when it comes to telework, with 22 percent of Minnesotans doing some form of it. That represents a larger share of employees than any other state surveyed.
 
The report also noted that the average teleworker in Minnesota saves nearly 2,000 miles per year on their commute, which lowers CO2 emissions and can boost a better work/life balance.
 
William Hoffman, state program manager for Connect Minnesota, says that the results of the report show that availability and adoption of high-speed broadband has wide-ranging economic and social impacts on how Minnesotans work and live. He adds: "As we continue to see providers expand their service areas to employers and employees, I believe we will continue to see telework levels increase across the state."

More and more airports are sympathetic to those facing long layovers, and they're adding unique amenities to keep travelers entertained, a recent CNN story notes.
 
The article highlights an interactive touch-screen concept at the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport: Digiboo kiosks, where travelers can download digital versions of more than 500 movies to watch on their laptops or table computers.
 
The movies can be rented or purchased, and since they're digital, there's nothing to return, according to CNN.
 
Other airports highlighted in the story include Schiphol in Amsterdam, Hong Kong International Airport, Zurich Airport, and Taiwan's Taoyuan International Airport.

The Twin Cities are often lauded for their friendliness to bicyclists, and a recent article in the Chicago Tribune highlights some of the top reasons for the region's reputation.
 
The article points out that the parks that circle Minneapolis are laced with bike paths, there's a considerable Rails-to-Trails program, and there's been increasing focus on making streets more bike-friendly.
 
Even the weather works to the city's benefit, the article notes. In an interview with a local bicyclist, the story pointed out that the weather is fairly good for about eight months out of the year. As for the other months, winter bicycling is on the rise as well, making the area even more amenable to bike enthusiasts.

The Twin Cities is already well known for its bike-friendly environment, and this week and weekend we're showing off that reputation.
 
As highlighted in Downtown Journal, the metro is hosting Bike Walk Week June 2 - 10, an annual cavalcade of events and activities promoting walking and bicycling. The week drew nearly 10,000 residents last year, and promoters expect a similar or better turnout this year.
 
One highly anticipated event is the Midtown Greenway Coalition's Greenway Glow, scheduled to start at 9 p.m. on Saturday, June 9th. The Greenway Glow features local food and beer, and a tour of Northern Spark art installations.  

Three Twin Cities companies have made Fortune's "Inner City 100" list of the fastest-growing urban firms in the nation.
 
The magazine singled out data infrastructure provider Atomic Data, bike-rack design firm Dero, and IT consultancy On-Demand Group (see The Line's coverage of On-Demand here).
 
The fastest-growing inner-city company in the nation, according to Fortune, is Coyote Logistics, a Chicago-based transportation firm.
 
Companies were ranked by compound annual growth rate based on their revenue over a five-year period between 2006 and 2010. The survey was part of the Initiative for a Competitive Inner City, a project designed to examine urban economies and spur economic development in cities.
 

Minneapolis joins Hangzhou, China and Amsterdam as cities that could serve as models for better bicycling policies, believes a columnist for Valley Courier, a newspaper in Colorado.
 
The article notes that in addition to the extensive bikeway system in Minneapolis, the area is also home to the founders of Bike Fixtation (see previous coverage in The Line here), a new kind of vending machine that dispenses bike accessories and patch kits.
 
"We could learn something from these models," the article notes. "[W]e'd save a lot of money and a lot of gas, while dropping the pounds that weigh us down."

Readers of Travel + Leisure magazine have picked Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport as the best in the nation.
 
In its first airport survey, the magazine asked readers to rank 22 airports based on categories like food and drink, check-in, security, service, location, and design. The results were published in Travel + Leisure's April issue.
 
The Twin Cities airport was called the "cheeriest and most welcoming" airport in the country, nabbing the top spot thanks to its easy check-in and efficient security process.
 
"T+L voters loved the shopping and food and drink options at this mini-mall of an airport, and when it came to ease of check-in and security, Minneapolis also took the No. 1 spot," the article noted.
 
New York's La Guardia was ranked as the worst on the list, preceded by LAX.

The Huffington Post includes the Twin Cities in its recent list of top 10 places for bicycling.

It recognized cities of over 100,000 residents that “feature an abundance of great rental shops, municipal bike racks, exciting trails, and dedicated bike lanes,” the story states.

“The Twin Cities' emergence as a bike-friendly superstar coincided with a general plan to make the area more livable,” according to the story.

In Minneapolis, the Nice Ride bike-sharing program has seen plenty of use, while bike-friendly events are abundant.

Last year the city “added 37 miles of bikeways, installed hundreds of bike-specific street signs, and created a citywide bike map," says HuffPo.

The Miami Herald recently published a piece by local writer Jay Walljasper, titled, "The surprising rise of Minneapolis as a top bike town." (The article was excerpted in last week's The Line.)

When the city was named by Bicycle magazine as the best place for biking nationwide, "Shock that a place in the heartland could outperform cities on the coasts was matched by widespread disbelief that biking was even possible in a state famous for its ferocious winters."

Wallsjasper provides plenty of reasons why Minneapolis has earned this distinction, including the sheer number of bicyclists, many whom brave the winter temperatures.

Walljasper writes: "'Places famous for biking like Copenhagen and even Portland feel very far away,' remarked Jeff Stephens, Executive Director of the Columbus advocacy organization Consider Biking, who came to Minneapolis looking for ideas he could apply back home. 'It was exciting to see what they've accomplished in Minneapolis, which is a city that seems a lot like Columbus.'"

Minneapolis was one of three cities nationally to achieve a gold award recently from the Pedestrian and Bicycle Information Center, which has a list of 10 Walk Friendly Communities.

Chicago and San Francisco share the gold status ranking.

The cities are "recognized for their success in working to improve a wide range of conditions related to walking, including safety, mobility, access, and comfort," the website states.  

Carl Sundstrom, the program's manager, says, "Through the application process, communities share their best practices and, in turn, we're able to share this information [with] all of the communities who apply through the technical assistance we provide."

A video on the Urban Velo website highlights the benefits of the Midtown Greenway in Minneapolis, as a part of its biking system.

The clip starts out with comments from the city’s mayor, R.T. Rybak, who says, “Biking is a huge part of what we are.”

Several other speakers in the video chime in about how the city’s biking trails that weave around such natural amenities as the Chain of Lakes and the once-industrial Midtown Greenway have helped to draw bicyclists and homeowners. It’s also brought more business to the area, the video shows.

According to walking advocacy site Walk Score, Minneapolis is in the top ten of most walkable cities in the country.

Coming in ninth place, the city was bested by highly dense urban areas like New York City, Boston, San Francisco, and Chicago.

Minneapolis came out ahead of other large cities, though, like Los Angeles, Portland, San Diego, and Atlanta.

The Walk Score site is often used by real estate agents and house hunters to determine the walkability of a specific neighborhood. Site users can simply type in an address and get a score that indicates how easy it might be to do daily errands by foot.

The site touts the benefits of more walkable neighborhoods, noting that increased walking can benefit the environment, community involvement, and personal health.

Grist, a source for green news, recently posted a video and text about the Twin Cities' Nice Ride bikeshare program.

Streetfilms took a special trip to the Twin Cities to find out more about Nice Ride.

Quoting Minneapolis Mayor R.T. Rybak, who says, "You've got to go big or go home," Grist emphasizes the fact that the program went from 65 stations with 700 bikes last year to the current 116 stations and 1,200 bikes.

Companies see the bikeshare stations as good for business, Rybak says. 

Washington, D.C., Madison, Wisc., Denver, and Boston have similar bikeshare services, it states.

The Republic, a newspaper in Columbus, Indiana, recently published an Associated Press story about a celebratory bike ride from Minneapolis and St. Paul mayors R.T. Rybak and Chris Coleman.

The two mayors jointly participated in their cities' Nice Ride public bike-sharing program.

Along with a number of other local bicyclists, the mayors started pedaling at the Seward Coop in Minneapolis and ended at a St. Paul Dunn Bros coffee shop.

Their ride was a nod to the program's expansion, which involves adding another 43 bike stations to its 73 in Minneapolis last year. This time around, the bike stations are popping up in both cities. 

Proponents of such bike-sharing programs say that they can "help cut down on obesity, traffic jams and auto emissions," the story states.