Celebrate Detroit’s Underground Railroad history with the Adventure Cycling Association, the Michigan Trails and Greenways Alliance and the Michigan Freedom Trail Commission.

Learn about Adventure Cycling’s Underground Railroad Route, updates on greenways and trails in the Detroit hub, and the Freedom Trail Commission’s efforts to designate the Detroit River as an International Heritage Site. Join us as we celebrate Detroit’s cultural heritage!

Bring friends, family, and fellow cyclists.

Historic Second Baptist Church
441 Monroe Street, Detroit

October 29, 2009  5:30 – 8:00 p.m.

Please RSVP by October 23rd to Beth Petersen: 800.755.2453 x 211 or bpetersen@adventurecycling.org.

Note that the current Underground Railroad bicycle route doesn’t go through Michigan. We are looking at adding a spur from Ohio to Detroit to Windsor and beyond. This certainly makes it all the more important that we have a way for cyclists to safely and conveniently cross the Detroit River.

There were certainly fewer rules for Detroit cyclists in July 1900. Unlike today, bells and lights were not required on bicycles.

However there was a common speed limit of 12 miles per hour (and 8 MPH around corners.) This speed limit was lower than Grand Rapids (15 MPH) but higher than Chicago’s (10 MPH.) In Des Moines, Iowa the speed limit was “a moderate gait,” which makes one think these limits were originally set for horses.

Given the road conditions in 1900, these speed limits may have been reasonable. The Michigan LAW didn’t seem to take issue with Detroit’s limits.

The League of American Wheelmen (LAW) also made these suggestions.

Wheelmen will find it advantageous as a precaution against arrest to govern themselves in accordance with the following suggestions covering points on which some cities have legislated and others have not

• Keep to the right
• Ride no more than two abreast
• Keep off the sidewalks
• Move cautiously around corners
• Ride straight keep your wheel under control sit so you have a clear view of the road and keep at least one hand on the handle bar
• Before riding on a cycle path, find out whether or not you are entitled to use it without buying a license tag
• If you collide with another wheelman or a pedestrian, dismount, and if he asks for your name and address, give it

Today did not go as planned. At 11am I read about the Secretary of Transportation being on the Detroit RiverWalk. At 11:50pm I was walking into the ceremony wearing a suit and looking like I’d actually been invited.

Secretary Ray LaHood was in Detroit to tour the new Detroit Terminal Port and highlight the $7 million in stimulus funding that helped make it possible.

Also with the Secretary was Senator Carl Levin, Senator Debbie Stabenow, Congressman John Dingell, Congresswoman Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick, and MDOT Director Kirk Steudle.

Before the tour, I had a chance to speak with both senators. They are both very in tuned with Detroit greenway projects, including the RiverWalk, Dequindre Cut, and Corktown/Mexicantown Greenlink. Senator Levin has helped bring significant funding to the Detroit RiverWalk.

When speaking with Senator Levin, I mentioned the fact that U.S. bicyclists cannot get across to Windsor and their excellent greenways without taking a car over the bridge or through the tunnel. Having this new Detroit port with customs and water taxi service would provide an excellent means for bicyclists crossing between our two countries. He apparently grasped the value in this as I overheard him repeating this to Secretary LaHood. He also highlighted it during his interview with ClickOnDetroit.

Senator Carl Levin said the new terminal will include a customs office, which will help increase traffic between Detroit and Windsor for water taxis, ferry boats and even bicycles.

“They can’t now come across. There’s no way to do it, so there may be a ferry service they are talking about to just literally bring people back and forth with their bicycles,” Levin said.

While I only had a brief moment to speak with Secretary LaHood, it was enough to give an elevator statement on our efforts in building a network of greenways across Detroit.

I also had a chance to talk with Curtis Hertel, the executive director of the Wayne County Port Authority who will be running the terminal. He too is interested in further discussions on how the Port can accommodate bicyclists crossing between Detroit and Windsor.

Still wearing my hat as Detroit Greenways Coordinator for MTGA, I made sure the Senators’ and Secretary’s staff got copies of the Detroit Greenways Network Brochure.

State Representative Marie Donigan and member of the House Transportation Committee was also there. She spoke with LaHood about improving transit in Detroit.

Will the RiverWalk be completed on this stretch next year? Probably not. There will still be a couple temporary connectors. Money to complete those is being sought. Also note that when ships are unloading passengers, the main RiverWalk will close. However, there is an alternate section that will pass around the Terminal building so that pedestrians, cyclists, runners, and skaters can pass.

Link: Photos from the Detroit Terminal Port tour

Link: Secretary LaHood’s “FastLane” blog on his Detroit visit

Here’s an interesting article from Time Magazine about making some lessor used Michigan highways more friendly to bikes, electric vehicles, and the like. One highway being looked at is U.S. 12 which connects Detroit and Chicago before continuing on to the Pacific coast.

Kim Gallagher has a plan for America’s “blue highways,” the thousands of miles of dusty, old single-lane heritage routes that wind desolately through the countryside: turn them green. Superseded by high-speed interstates, many of these narrow byways have been long forgotten, along with the faded small towns they connect, says Gallagher, a project manager for the Southwest Michigan Planning Commission. But off-the-beaten-path America can be revived, she says, by transforming little-used roadways into “green highways” that cater specifically to electric-vehicle drivers and other slow-moving, eco-minded tourists traveling by bicycle or on foot.

This month, Gallagher and Peter Hanses, who manages 17 heritage routes for Michigan’s Department of Transportation, will attend a meeting with representatives from the communities along U.S. 12 to decide exactly that: whether to pass a resolution to make the old roadway the country’s first dedicated green corridor. U.S. 12 began as a patchwork of ancient Native American trails and became Michigan’s first paved road, stretching 212 miles from Detroit to Chicago, connecting 25 quaint towns, each about 12 miles (or, a day’s lazy horse ride) apart.

U.S. 12 is a Michigan heritage route, too.

It certainly would be great to have a long continuous designed bike route between Detroit and Chicago.

In 1888, the pneumatic bicycle tire was invented which made riding on rough roads much more comfortable. By 1890, the safety bicycle design (what we have today) replaced the more difficult to ride highwheelers. This also opened the door for more women riders.

It was these milestones that ushered in the mass adoption of bicycles. Bicycle production peaked at nearly 2 million in 1897.

Historians call this the golden age of bicycling.

And during this time, the League of American Wheelmen (LAW) was the national bicycle advocacy organization.

They had a Michigan Division which was led by Edward Hines during most of the 1890s. They were highly successful as Hines noted in his membership drive from 1899. They fought for equal access to Detroit roads and against ordinances requiring lights, bells, and bike registration. They got bikes allowed on trains. They got the city to build a bicycle pavilion on Belle Isle. Also, in 1896 the Detroit Wheelmen built a very fine 3-story club house.

Nationwide, there were 102,636 LAW members in 1898.

By 1902, there were 8,692 members. The bicycle craze was over and the LAW closed their doors.

A popular perception is the arrival of the car killed the bicycle’s popularity, but the timeline doesn’t support that.

From 1901 to 1904, Detroit’s Olds Motor Works was the nation’s leading auto manufacturer. They produced 425 cars in 1901 and 2,500 in 1902. The Ford Motor Company didn’t exist until 1903. While many cyclists undoubtedly switched to cars, there weren’t enough (affordable) cars in 1901 to replace all the bicycles.

It seems likely that many bicyclists switched to streetcars — at least in Detroit.

In December of 1900, all of Metro Detroit’s streets car were consolidated into one Detroit Urban Railway (DUR) system. The fare was a flat 5 cents on most lines and 3 cents on the remainder. By 1901, the DUR acquired nearly all of the interurban lines, which provided rapid rail travel to cities outside of Detroit and as far away as Port Huron, Jackson and Toledo.

Below is an excerpt from a May 1901 LAW Bulletin article that notes cyclists switching to streetcars.

Why do we note a decline in wheeling? We think it has its root in the laziness of mankind. Time was when men wanted to get out and see the country and they employed the wheel. They had to work for it but they felt paid for all their labor in what they took in of scenery and fresh air. And now comes the trolley car and takes them out into the open country and they do no labor, get nearly all of it without work and for a nickel. We are such a lazy set that we use the nickel.

But that is not all. There is another point where wheeling hits a man in his lazy longitude. It’s a question of clothes. When a man desires to ride he must change his clothes, and when he has finished he must make another change. The trolley car requires no change of clothing and he takes the trolley. These two appeals to a man’s laziness have been very potent factors in causing riders to give up the wheel.

But all men are not lazy. There are many left who vote the wheel the king of pleasures. There are many who do ride and who will ride as long as they have strength to push a pedal and a keen appreciation of the beauties of nature when we meet her face to face. The trolley car does not put us into communion with nature as the wheel does. It does not go into the by ways the forest roads the out of the way places where we find the richest treasures of scenery. There is an independence on the wheel that we do not have on the trolley and there is an exhilaration that comes to us in no other way.

It seems the same author published an article with a similar tone in the October 1901 Bulletin, which ended with this foretelling sentence:

We are too lazy to work for our fun and we fear the muscular development we were once proud of will give place to flabbiness.

But eventually Detroit’s railway system suffered a similar demise as its ridership shifted to using buses and cars.

However, it should be noted that the futures of bicycling and light rail in Detroit are looking brighter than they have in generations. And this time, they can enjoy a mutually beneficial relationship, not unlike what the SMART (and forthcoming DDOT) bus bike racks provide.

Reference: LAW Cycling Handbook from 1945