2011 bike count expands; volunteers needed

Money and attention don't necessarily follow the count and that's more than just a PR problem. It is known where the concentration of cyclists are, yet cyclists (and even the BAC) have had to sit down and shut up over complaints and concerns. It's not 100% disjunct, but enough to validate Red Star's raising his point-sadly. If government is looking to the count numbers to boast to the LAB and it works to raise overall ratings and acknowledgement, then fine. But I think the recent census numbers would  be more applicable to that end and the count numbers would show where to serve the need. 

Mindy thinks Red Star, like others who speak of themselves only in the third person, might be best ignored.  :-)

There are sites in the count that have been included in every count - this is important for the stats folks. Ann et al have increased the number of locations for the census to better capture the number of recreational riders we have in this town - these locations are well away from the urban core. Mountain bikers are being counted as well, and these numbers will be included.  These numbers will be included in the application for Platinum status.  This application is primarily  concerned with commuter numbers, but Tucson advocates know that Tucson has way more riders than those who ride to work.  We're including recreational riders in the app to show "them" at the League of American Bicyclists, that Tucson is a happening cycling town. Red Star can get the answers to his(her?) questions by attending bike advocacy meetings and/or  by volunteering a few hours of his/her time to count during the census.

Look, Red Star never stated that data is not important. Red Star raised questions of study design, questions of method, and yes, intent. Here you go, it's old (1979), in the context of epidemiology, but has proven to be generalizable to other fields and seminal. For decades. Probably the best presentation out there, still, especially the appendix: http://www.epidemiology.ch/history/PDF%20bg/Sackett%20DL%201979%20bias%20in%20analytic%20research.pdf The flyer by Ann Chanecka doesn't go into the study's method. So wouldn't a policy maker (or, gasp, a resident and taxpayer) upon being presented with the results, kinda wonder about the how the study was done? Perhaps not if all are in sit down and shut up mode. Margarine, yes margarine is produced and marketed with deeper thought than this Pima Association of Governments study, so it seems at this time.

Characterize the comments as you wish, for whatever reason of yours. There's a lot of money and, possibly, infrastructure change involved in these studies, not to mention problems of detecting under served areas and resource allocation. Questions of method, transparency are important and self-evident. Is it wrong to ask questions? Would you prefer that County and City residents just sit down and shut up?

One would have to see where (thinking zip codes, here) Chanecka is "counting" and, most important, where she is *not* to even begin to assess the demand for cycling, much less understand it county-wide. If she wants to count the same old thing, in the usual places, again and again, using the same old method, what is the probability that she is willfully ignoring pent-up demand and policy recommendations and innovation that might follow? Or, at least building an unnecessary bias into her work?

Volunteers needed for what? To verify for the umpteenth time that cycling is "common" in relatively population-dense, employment-dense, amenity-dense, and relatively low income areas? Planners and advocates have known this for decades; it's kinda a duh thing for these people. And yet they persist. Any possibility of getting from Ann Chanecka a map by zip code of the count stations? That might be interesting... Is something missing?