Other neighborhoods on the list are in Oakland; Denver; Washington, D.C.; Dorchester, Mass.; Jackson, Miss.; St. Louis; Albany, N.Y.; Richmond, Va.; and Seattle.

I know some people who live in the Victorian District who would scoff at this designation in the wake of a recent surge in crime on the east side of Forsyth Park, but the APA’s description of the neighborhood and its amenities is hard to ignore.

From the APA:

Savannah’s Victorian District lies immediately to the south of the well-known National Landmark Historic District. The Victorian District encompasses the West Victorian, East Victorian, and Dixon Park neighborhoods. This downtown neighborhood was developed in the second half of the 19th century as a streetcar suburb of the original city. It was designed in a compact, pedestrian-oriented, mixed-use development pattern with a modified ward structure and street grid from the original James Oglethorpe 1733 plan.

The APA description focuses heavily on the importance of Forsyth Park — the active south half of Forsyth is bounded by the Victorian District. This list of “Community Engagement and Amenities” is also interesting:

• Savannah Landmark Rehabilitation Project was founded to provide safe, affordable housing to low-income residents in the Victorian District (1974) and subsequently built 300 apartments for low-income renters in the neighborhood (1982)
• Park Place Outreach Youth Emergency Shelter, a 24-hour facility on the district’s east side, was renovated in 2008 through the collaboration of the Cowart Group, J.T. Turner, and SCAD students; one of the first LEED-certified nonprofit buildings in Savannah
• The neighborhood is home to the new headquarters of the Savannah Bicycle Campaign (SBC), a local bicycle advocacy group, which shares its space with its statewide counterpart, Georgia Bikes, along with Healthy Savannah — a local initiative dedicated to making Savannah a healthier place to live
• SBC and Healthy Savannah are working with the City of Savannah to encourage the adoption of a Complete Streets ordinance — in addition, SBC’s new facility will rehabilitate donated bikes for distribution to underserved populations to use as a dependable transportation option
• The American Legion complex serves as an excellent example of adaptive reuse; as a local neighborhood hangout it draws a diverse crowd with local shops, bars, and a variety of restaurant options

When I moved to Savannah in 1995, I rented a sprawling parlor floor apartment on the first block of East Gwinnett Street for, I think, $625/month. I think pretty much everyone in town would have laughed at the idea of such a glowing designation for the Victorian District, but less than 20 years later, here we are. Times change and neighborhoods change, sometimes quickly.

The designation does not mention Kroger, but the new store opened in 1995 on East Gwinnett. Nor does the APA mention businesses like Brighter Day Natural Foods and The Sentient Bean by name, but those have been critical to the sense of place. SCAD’s Eckburg and Anderson halls are also mentioned — they both lie at the southern edge of the Victorian District.

By the way, the historic cottages of Meldrim Row that the city plans to demolish are just three very short blocks south of the Victorian District. Along its eastern and western boundaries, the neighborhood has some real  blight, in part because of poor street design and inappropriate zoning.

In my City Talk column today, by the way, I consider the growing number of public uses along Bull Street from Victory Drive northward. I like to think of the Victorian neighborhood as more or less continuous with the Thomas Square Historic Streetcar District where I live.

For all the positive changes in the Victorian District in recent years, I think the prevailing sense around the neighborhood is that things can still improve dramatically from here. Imagine a productive use of the old Sears/DFACS building, which is simply priced too high for investors who are interested. Imagine the boon for the neighborhood if/when there is appropriate development at the southwest corner of Bull Street and Park Avenue. Imagine the advantages in terms of business investment when Montgomery Street through the Historic District is converted back to two-way traffic. There are also underutilized lots and buildings that are scattered throughout the neighborhood.

So, this is really nice news from the APA, but there is plenty of work ahead.

Since launching three months ago, Chatham Area Transitâ€s bike share program has sold 629 user passes, according to newly released data from the transit authority.

But the program, which provides short-term bike rentals to locals and tourists at two stations, is considered by CAT staff to be too small and in need of more annual members and greater connectivity.

In the generally good weather since mid-March, during prime tourist season here in Savannah, 14 bikes per day on average have been checked out. The entire piece in the SMN is well worth a read.

A few thoughts:

I’d actually say that 629 user passes is a pretty good number, but I’m left wondering how many locals essentially bought symbolic passes in the early days of the program as a show of support.

I was skeptical early on that the initial phase of CAT Bike was designed in ways that would attract “resident commuters.” The presence of just two stations — one at the transit center on the west side of MLK off Oglethorpe and another in Ellis Square — obviously limits the pool of potential riders. And, as I noted back in January, even as a regular bike rider around downtown, I don’t feel comfortable trying to cross MLK. The streets just aren’t designed appropriately to make cyclists feel safe.

Also, the two stations are really quite close together. If I were taking the bus into downtown and ultimately headed toward the City Market area, I’d just enjoy the free 10-minute walk rather than rent a bike.

And why would a local in the City Market area want to rent a bike and then return it to the exact same spot? The most obvious destinations — like River Street and Broughton Street — are within easy walking distance, and there aren’t stations in those places to return bikes. If there were other stations a little farther away, say in Forsyth Park or out in Habersham Village, we might actually see commuters and local shoppers availing themselves of the service. (Of course, additional stations will require additional public investment.)

Also, it’s obviously worth noting that the vast majority of those of us who advocate bicycling downtown already have our own bikes.

I’m glad that CAT has made this effort and hope that we’ll continue to explore ways to make the service work. My thoughts here are shared by others in an interesting Twitter discussion thread prompted by the Savannah Bicycle Campaign.

Ironically, the program begins on Friday — among the coldest days we’ve had in this surprisingly cold winter.

From the piece:

For now, adult residents and visitors (or those 16 and older, with a parent or guardian), can sign up for a 24-hour, seven-day or annual membership, either online or at one of the two stations. Each membership, $5, $20 and $60 respectively, allows for a certain amount of usage time, with an additional $2 charge for every half hour over that allotted.

Although created primarily for the use of resident commuters, visitors could also benefit from the program, using the bikes to navigate Savannahâ€s tiny downtown streets instead of having to rent, drive or park a car.

I’m not really sure that the program is of primary interest to “resident commuters”, although I know a number of downtown workers who have already or will soon buy the relatively inexpensive (maybe too inexpensive) annual memberships for $60. Check out Kevin Klinkenberg’s post about the low price on his New Urbanism blog.

CAT Bike will launch with only two locations — Ellis Square and Rivers Exchange. But keep in mind that Rivers Exchange is not on River Street — it’s at the Joe Murray Rivers, Jr. Intermodal Transit Center on Oglethorpe Avenue. In theory, a commuter taking the bus could have a $60 annual membership and take a bike every day to and from Ellis Square and the transit center.

But, as I have noted ad nauseum, that’s a dicy area to ride a bike. I ride my bike all over downtown, but I hate trying to cross MLK. The traffic patterns are threatening and unfriendly in multiple ways. If I were working in the Ellis Square area and taking the bus into town every day, I’d simply enjoy the 10 minute walk each way.

For those who work near Ellis Square and need to run quick errands — delivering packages, picking up lunch for the office, etc. — that station might prove really convenient. Some tourists, too, will no doubt be curious about the system and anxious to get a little farther south into the Historic District that the tourist-oriented area around City Market.

I should note, however, that the new CAT Bike station in Ellis Square has replaced a series of bike racks that often had 10 to 20 parked bicycles. As of this writing, I’m not sure if those have simply been moved, but I actually had a little problem recently finding an adequate spot to lock up — and it’s wintertime. The old bike racks in Ellis Square are just around the square from the sharing station. (I don’t know how I couldn’t find them the other night.) See the pic embedded from the Savannah Bicycle Campaign’s Instagram account.

But enough with the speculation. The program, however limited, is set to launch on 1/24, and we’ll know a lot more in a few weeks about who is participating in Savannah’s new bike share program and how often they are using the service.

But my fellow blogger Ed at Peach Pundit says: “At the risk of sounding slightly hyperbolic, this and the Savannah Port deepening are probably the single most important pieces of infrastructure in the works for Atlanta and the state. Also having a strategic plan for smart growth that is nearly two-decades long is a really refreshing change for Atlanta.”

I’m guessing the Beltline ends up being far more important than the port deepening.

In the post, Ed references this piece in Creative Loafing: Beltline board OKs 17-year plan outlining what gets built and when – and it’s worth a read. It begins:

When will the Atlanta Beltline start construction on the massive Westside park and lake centered around an abandoned quarry? Will the smart-growth project’s southeast trail linking Glenwood Park to Adair Park be built in our lifetime? And what about the transit component circling the city’s core, potentially connecting more than 45 neighborhoods?

You now have an easy place to find the answers to these questions. And see how it’s envisioned to evolve over the next 17 years.

Atlanta Beltline Inc., the nonprofit tasked with planning and developing the 22-mile loop of parks, trails, and transit, has officially released its “strategic implementation plan,” or SIP, a 140-page document that outlines how the project will progress from now until 2030. ABI’s board of directors unanimously approved the plan this morning.

From the conclusion of that report, which I will embed below:

The first seven years the Atlanta BeltLine implementation have set the City of Atlantaâ€s future on a positive trajectory. The strong community response to the planning process, and especially the completed projects, has demonstrated that the publicâ€s appetite is not yet satisfied. Likewise, private real estate development has responded in a dramatic fashion to the Atlanta BeltLine, even through the Great Recession.

New private real estate development completed or un-derway within a half-mile of the Eastside Trail alone has approached $775 million, and more than $1 billion within the TAD. The Atlanta BeltLine is now a tangible reality and is already fulfilling some of its promise. The SIP will guide ABI and its partners through the year 2030 with a thoughtful, flexible approach that will help secure all of the necessary funding and achieve the programâ€s objectives.

Atlanta Beltline Strategic Implementation by thomaswheatley

I’m impressed by this whole project.

That is NOT true for this post, so I’d suggest if you’re interested, click on through right now to Henry Grabar’s The Biggest Obstacle to Cycling’s Egalitarian Aspirations? Distance at The Atlantic Cities.

Grabar talks about trends in bicycle commuting in various cities, with special emphasis on demographics — age, education, race, ethnicity. Grabar’s piece is also filled with fascinating links to original studies and the like.

Ultimately he focuses on a demographic trend that we’ve been seeing across America: the growing number of poor Americans in suburban neighborhoods. Efforts to diversify the population of bicycle commuters is made all the more difficult if poor people increasingly inhabit suburban areas far from jobs, shopping, and other basic needs. One snippet:

Elsewhere in America, the trend is not racial but socio-economic: the countryâ€s poor are moving to the suburbs in greater and greater numbers. These statistics aren’t news, but they seldom appear in analysis of cycling’s diversity. The consequences of gentrification’s centrifugal effects go well beyond cycling, of course. Suburbanization could reduce the visibility and mobility of the poor, change voting patterns, and more. But as bike advocates work to increase cycling’s diversity, developments in economic geography — features of what Alan Ehrenhalt has called the Great Inversion — are working against them.

More on that in a second.

I haven’t closely followed the implementation of New York City’s new bike sharing program Citi Bike.

But it seems like it’s going pretty well. I was especially interested in Alex Davies’ point by point tackling of the most common gripes in Business Insider. Here are four of the key gripes plus Davies’ response in his article New York’s Bike Share Is Brilliant, And Every Complaint About It Is Bogus:

3. The stations prevent emergency responders from accessing buildings.
The New York Post headline “Bike racks block EMS at victim’s co-op” echoes this view. But Brad Aaron at Streetsblog followed up with the FDNY, whose spokesperson denied having any trouble: “We had no operational or response issues to this call. Period.”

4. The racks and bikes are ugly.
This one’s harder to reject, because beauty is subjective. But remember that most Citi Bike stations are replacing parking spots, not public art works. There are lots of really ugly cars in the world that could be there instead.

5. Cyclists are a dangerous menace.
To quote Rabinowitz, “Every citizen knew — who was in any way sentient — that the most important danger in the city is not the yellow cabs…it is the cyclists.”

In April 2013, 32,653 vehicles were involved in accidents in New York City. 1,278 of them were taxi cabs. 358 were bicycles.

6. Cyclists are reckless.
This is a valid but specious point. As a NYC resident (and Business Insider’s car reviewer), I drive in the city. I walk, too. And I bike. I do all three recklessly at times.

So do many, many people. Drivers speed and blow through yellow lights. Pedestrians jaywalk, and step into the street when they donâ€t have right of way. Thatâ€s New York City.

Everyone should follow the rules, but few do — that’s as true for cyclists as for other groups.

To its credit, the NYPD has stepped up its ticketing of cyclists (not without controversy). The DOT has put “Safety Managers” on the street to keep cyclists, pedestrians, and drivers where they belong.

And urban cycling has become safer. According to the city, the average risk of serious injury for riders dropped by 73% between 2000 and 2011, even as the rate of biking more than doubled.

Davies also points out other obvious problems with Rabinowitz’s rant.

Many jokes have been made about Rabinowitz’s age, but I don’t really think that’s a joking matter. The issue, however, is real. I’ve written before about the fading echoes of older Americans who simply reject the most commonsense lifestyle decisions increasingly being made by younger generations. Hers are the words of someone who just doesn’t get it — and who doesn’t realize that she’s displaying an exponentially greater sense of entitlement than she accuses cyclists of displaying.

My favorite quotes beyond “Death by Bicycle,” which stays on screen for the full five minute interview:

• The bike sharing program was instituted so that “New Yorkers can feel like they’re in Paris and London.” (Say what? How about feeling like they’re in New York, but with a bike sharing program?)
• “I represent the majority of citizens.”
• “We now look at a city whose best neighborhoods are absolutely — begrimed is the word — by these blazing blue Citibank bikes.”
• “If the mayor had any guts, he would have undertaken a study.” (There was a 142-page study and 159 public meetings.)
• “The bike lobby is an all-powerful enterprise.”

Here’s Rabinowitz:

If her attitudes are indicative of those of others on the WSJ editorial board, then it’s no wonder the editorials were so far out of touch with the attitudes of the American electorate in the lead-up to last fall’s general election.

From that post:

The average bike score given by the Walkscore.com was 48 out of 100, putting Savannah at 77 out of the 122 cities rated. The only other Georgia city on the list was Atlanta, which received a score of 42. […]

I usually have a pretty stress free trip when I go riding and was a little surprised with Savannahâ€s low ranking, but I live relatively close to the Historic District, where most of the biking infrastructure is located.

I missed the Walkscore rankings of bicycle friendliness when they were released a couple of weeks ago, but you can see the Bike Score rankings here. The top ten cities are Cambridge, Mass.; Davis, Calif.; Berkeley, Calif.; Boulder, Colo.; Santa Monica, Calif.; Minneapolis, Minn.; Fort Collins, Colo.; Iowa City, Iowa; Hoboken, N.J.; and Ann Arbor, Mich.

Walk Score’s methodology for its new Bike Score is based on four equally weighted components:
Bike lanes
Hills
Destinations and road connectivity
Bike commuting mode share

Savannah’s ranking put us at the upper range of cities with “minimal bike infrastructure” and just two points shy of the range with “some bike infrastructure.”

But my street at the northern end of Thomas Square has a Walk Score of 80 (very walkable) and an even higher Bike Score: 89. “Flat as a pancake, excellent lanes.” I guess that refers to the bike lanes on Price and Lincoln, but I rarely use the Price Street lane and the Lincoln Street one leaves much to be desired. But given the width of streets in the neighborhood and the general lack of traffic — and the beauty and ease of accessing downtown proper — I’d definitely agree that the neighborhood is both very bikeable and very walkable. I actually haven’t even used my van for anything for the last four days.

In previous uses of Walk Score, I’ve been fairly impressed with how the statisticians are able to quantify neighborhood and community assets, so I do think these are meaningful numbers.

Some of the detailed listings of nearby businesses are incorrect, but the gist is right.

As Eric notes in his blog post, there are various plans for improving biking and walkability, some of which city officials don’t want to share specifics about right now. Why not?

Eric also notes the bungled plans to add pedestrian and bicycle corridors along Skidaway Road. Mystifyingly, county officials began by focusing on a more southerly portion of that stretch, where neighborhood opposition was strongest and where the use of the paths would have likely been minimal. They should have put the first emphasis on the stretch of Skidaway from Victory Drive to Savannah State University — an area that would be perfect for a dramatic upgrade in bikeability and walkability.

I tried there to be honest about the costs and some of the hassles — including three times I was a victim of theft (one bike, one seat, one headlight).

I also tried to convey a little bit of the sense of wonder that regular bike riders feel downtown.

Another issue that I would have played up, in addition to savings in time and money: the general health benefits. Too often, running errands on my bicycle accounts for all the exercise I get for days on end.

If you want to read more, click on through to the column. If you’re spending time reading this blog and not also reading my Savannah Morning News columns, please note that they’re linked via feed in the right sidebar. Over there >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Cheers.