Counters see more riders at Campbell and 3rd Street

More cyclists rode through the Campbell Avenue and 3rd Street intersection during this year’s regional bike count than last year.

While the analysis by Pima Association of Government’s Ann Chanecka showed a 21 percent increase in riders from 2009, Chanecka said it was only from one location and could not be generalized for the whole region.

The rest of the bike count data won’t be available for several months.

The intersection has traditionally been one of the most popular routes in the region. Last year, PAG decided to count cyclists for a 12 hour period there — from 7 a.m.-7 p.m. rather than the 7 a.m.-9 a.m. and 4 p.m.-6 p.m. count times the rest of the locations have.

In 2009, 2,220 cyclists rode through the intersection. This year, 2,706 cyclists were counted.

Chanecka said the increased numbers seem to indicate that last year’s record-low temperatures affected the count data. This year, rain may also have played a role in the number of cyclists on the road during the count.

Chanecka said next year she is considering changing the count to prevent the weather from playing such a big role in the data collection by counting locations several times over a month.

Despite the increased numbers, this year, it still looks like there were more cyclists in 2008, which Chanecka said may be because gas was close to $4 a gallon in 2008.

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