The City of Bellingham is stepping up its focus on bicycle safety as the days are growing shorter and the dark, Pacific Northwest nights are growing longer. During the month of November, the city will be promoting the “See and Be Seen” bicycle safety campaign throughout the neighborhoods of Bellingham by increasing on enforcement on bicycle light regulations and helping inform riders.
According to a city of Bellingham release, the law requires that any nighttime cyclists must have a light mounted on the front of their bicycle that can be seen for at least 500 feet. A red reflector attached to the back of the bike is also a requirement.
The campaign focuses on improved visibility for bicyclists and increased awareness about the laws and regulations for nighttime riding in Washington. The city is partnering with local advocacy groups and businesses for the Seen and Be Seen campaign, including everybodyBIKE.com, the Mt. Baker Bicycle Club and the Whatcom Traffic Safety Task Force.
Local Bellingham bike shops are also partnering with the city to provide a 10 percent discount coupon for those in need of new lights for their bikes.
The campaign comes as part of the city’s six-year Transportation Improvement Program which is currently underway. The program is meant to improve transportation safety and make travel around Bellingham easier for drivers, cyclists and pedestrians.
Kim Brown, Transportation Options Coordinator for the city, said that focus on improving the ease of transportation in the city also brought up ideas about the safety campaign.
“We had a group local agencies and committees that were working together on bicycle safety issues,” Brown said. “We thought that bike lights and riding at night would be a good focus area.
Commuting through Bellingham’s varying neighborhoods offer up different kinds of obstacles to riders. The Puget neighborhood in particular has unique challenges crossing from east of I-5 to reach downtown Bellingham and the university.
“In other neighborhoods, if you can’t go down one street, you can move over and go down another,” said Puget Neighborhood Board Member Therese Kelliher. “That’s not really the case for Puget. The freeway really narrows down the choices for bicyclists. The residents want to have access to the downtown services.”
According to the Puget Neighborhood Report, one of the most hazardous areas in the neighborhood for bicyclists is at the underpass at Lakeway and I-5. The plan also says that adding bicycle lanes to Lakeway “could be costly, and would change the character of the neighborhood.”
Currently, there are no mentions of any further development for the Lakeway underpass in the Transportation Improvement Program, but Brown said the “See and Be Seen” campaign is intended to improved safety by directing responsibility to the riders themselves.
Brown said it is important for cyclist commuters all over Bellingham to take charge about staying safe. She said she hopes the campaign will make the bike light regulations clearer to everyone.
“Some people probably don’t know it’s a law while others probably do and they just don’t want to get a bike light or don’t think of it as much of an issue,” Brown said. “We certainly see a lot of people riding at night without lights, particularly when school starts back up and around the Western Campus area.”
The campaign is specifically reaching out to students and cyclists at Western. The city has also partnered with Western’s Office of Sustainable Transportation and the University Police Department to make sure that the message of See and Be Seen reaches students and faculty.
Andrea Osborn, the Sustainable Transportation Program Assistant from the WWU Office of Transportation said Western is working on raising awareness with the students and faculty at the university. Since off-campus students and employees come from all over Bellingham every day, Osborn’s office is partnering with the See and Be Seen campaign to keep the Western community informed, she said.
“We’re always having an ongoing outreach trying to reach the campus community about how to travel safely especially now that the days are getting shorter and that the nights are getting longer,” Osborn said. “We have tools here for students and employees who are trying to commute without riding alone in their car.”
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