Houston Bike Summit Makes In-Person Return

The Houston Bike Summit is having its first in-person event since the pandemic started, reports Gail Delaughter for Houston Public Media. “Bike Houston Executive Director Joe Cutrufo spoke with Houston Public Media about big challenges the city still faces when it comes to maintaining its bikeways.”

According to Cutrufo, “Houston is not known nationally as the most bike-friendly city around but we’ve actually had a bike network growing right before our eyes. We’ve built miles and miles of new protected bike lanes on streets, and lots of new miles of trails around town. But we’re not doing a great job maintaining them.” Cutrufo says the city must do more to maintain critical bike infrastructure after it’s built.

As for how to improve safety for cyclists, Cutrufo says “It’s all about design and engineering. Some people will tell you that education and enforcement are the way to make people behave. And not to say that there’s no role for enforcement — of course there is — but when you get the design right, education and enforcement to a degree sort of take care of themselves.”