"Robert Gunderson's bicycle after crash on Woods Rd" by The Bike Fed is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0. To view a copy of this license, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/?ref=openverse.

In 2023, 3,605 pedestrians and cyclists were involved in crashes with motor vehicles in Maryland and 152 of those people died from their injuries. This was a 9% increase over 2022. ¹

Cycling infrastructure has been shown to reduce rates of crashes by providing cyclists with a safe place to ride without having to directly interact with motor vehicles. ²

The WHO has noted that cycling and walking increase health outcomes and mitigate the negative affects of climate change caused by cars. ³

https://transportation.baltimorecity.gov/sites/default/files/Baltimore%20Complete%20Streets%20Manual%20Final%20March%202021-compressed.pdf

Experts (and I’ll bet you!) would agree that we have a parking problem in Baltimore. But the problem isn’t that there isn’t enough free parking. It’s that there’s too much. Free parking and other car-centric decisions lead to people owning more cars, and we’ve known about this for a while.⁴ There are actually several instances in wealthier neighborhoods where there are more cars than people in a household. However, it’s very a very privileged position to have more than one car per person. In Baltimore, 29% of households don’t have any access to a car and that number is as high as 66% in historically disadvantaged neighborhoods.⁵

As I’m sure you know, this is all part of a much more complex system of decisions and problems that go on to make our lives more difficult. However, giving people in our city the power of mobility gives them more access to jobs across the city and region. That, in turn improves the outcomes for entire communities and their children. Things like improving bike infrastructure and making it safer to walk around our city are very important parts of that mission. The construction of the red line will make a big difference too but at best that is years away.

If any of this interests you and you would like to learn more, please consider taking the time to watch this video about how our streets are currently designed in a way that prioritizes the movement of cars over the safety of everyone and everything else.

This page isn’t meant to be a lecture or to tell you that you’re a bad person. It’s meant to hopefully help you see why it’s so important that we don’t fight against the progress that’s being made and the types of change that we need to see to make our communities better. We all love Baltimore and want to see it thrive. It’s just important to remember that it takes many hands.

Did you know that?

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