Link roundup: November 28

Bike lockers at destination points make complete sense.  If you click the link that Red Star provided you'll see that the lockers are at a transportation terminus.  In a crowded urban setting you might find some people willing to lock a bike into a locker and then walk a couple of blocks from the bus stop to get to their destination.  Further context is that Red Star provided as explanation to another comment he/she made earlier a link to a California first mile final mile transportation conference.  The conference notes talk about solutions for the final mile/first mile dilemma.  1% of Caltrains riders use the bike lockers.  A much higher percentage of riders with bicycles are using the train to transport their bicycles and then ride to their final destinations.  The conference notes making the point that a major problem with this multi modal transportation solution is a lack of capacity on the trains for bicycles.  Bicyclists are often bumped during peak usage hours. UA and UA Medical Centre, yes lockers make total sense at these destination points.  They don't make any sense at the Sunflower Market on 1st Ave. or the Home Depot Centre on Oracle.  Just ride around back to spot the un-utilised empty lockers.   Bicycle theft is definitely a problem at UA.  I do think a lot of the problem could be solved by not using a cable lock to lock up your bicycle.  Not leaving bikes in place for days would also help as would employing good locking strategies.  Registering bicycles so they can be recovered is helpful.  If you read the stolen bicycle section of this blog there is a theme.  A very high percentage of the stolen bicycles were not secured at all when they were stolen.  Not that I'm blaming the victims.  In a perfect world you should be able to leave a bicycle unsecured and still find it where you left it 5 minutes later.  I lost the absolute best bicycle I'll ever own by walking around back at a friend's to announce that I was there.  Less than 3 minutes, the bike was gone and I never got it back.  Oh that reminds me, I also didn't report the theft or have the serial number of the frame etc so even if it was recovered I had no way of it getting back to me.  

lockers are not a first last or middle mile solution

Fancy... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:BART_El_Cerrtio_Plaza_eLockers.jpg Lacking a train but having a bus, can the Old Pueblo do better?