A salute to Janette Sadik-Khan

With the number of miles of bike lanes in New York now up to about 500, Transportation Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan is looking to another achievement: the start of a public bike-share program that could deploy approximately 600 stations, making at least 10,000 bikes available for short rides.

New York Times op-ed columnist Frank Bruni writes that the bike-share program, the details and timetable of which are expected to be announced this month, should be at least partly operational next year. He effusively praises Sadik-Khan's leadership, pointing out that the number of cyclists daily entering Manhattan's business center (between Battery Park and 59th Street) more than tripled from 1999 to 2009 and should continue to grow because of the improvements she has initiated.

"The indifference of the New York City Police Department is the biggest obstacle" to the growth of biking, Bruni qotes Charles Komanoff, past president of the advocacy group Transportation Alternatives, as saying. The police too seldom ticket motorists who drive or park in bike lanes. Another obstacle, says Bruni, is a drastic shortage of racks where cyclists can lock up their bikes.