Bike racks are becoming a must for Orlando businesses; here’s how they get them for free

Joe Burbank/Orlando Sentinel

A bike rack in front of Rock and Roll Heaven on North Orange Avenue in Ivanhoe Village on Tuesday, June 11, 2019.

Joe Burbank/Orlando Sentinel

Bikes locked up at Lazy Moon and Lineage Coffee on East Colonial Drive on Tuesday, June 11, 2019.

Joe Burbank/Orlando Sentinel

A bike rack in front of Santiago's Bodega on Virginia Ave in Ivanhoe Village, Tuesday, June 11, 2019. (Joe Burbank/Orlando Sentinel) 3082480

Outside his bar in Orlando's Milk District, Danny Alvarez sees bikes locked up to fences, street signs, other bikes — "anything that's available," he says.

Anything but a bike rack because there isn't one there.

"Bike racks are and have been a necessity to the area for some time," said Alvarez, a daily cyclist and co-owner of The Nook on East Robinson Street. "I would love to provide incentive programs for people cycling to the bar, but we can't if we don't have anywhere for the bikes to park."

It's a problem City Hall has been trying to address, as Orlando adds bike lanes and trails around town, and restaurants and bars look to become more bike friendly.

Orlando has installed 113 racks through its Bike Rack Request Program, created in 2015.

Ian Sikonia, senior planner and bicycle and pedestrian coordinator for the city, said the bulk of the requests come from restaurants, bars and exercise facilities. Whole communities have asked to have racks installed, including Ivanhoe Village, Mills 50, the Milk District and College Park.

As long as the location is within the Orlando city limits, the request, which can be made online, is usually approved. Sikonia's team also visits the site to make sure there's room. Individual citizens cannot submit requests.

The program has put racks in front of Ten10 Brewing in Mills 50, Ivanhoe Park Brewing and Project 7 Yoga in Ivanhoe Village, Ragazzi's Pizza on Edgewater Drive in College Park, and about a dozen racks throughout Thornton Park, to name a few locations.

The program is part of Orlando's Vision Zero and Green Works initiatives that seek to eliminate traffic fatalities and make the city more friendly to pedestrians and bicyclists, Sikonia said.

"Over the past few years, we see that more and more people are riding bikes and riding the trails," he said. "In order to keep that growth, we need to find better locations, more convenient locations for people to park their bikes."

The city — which consistently is ranked one of the most dangerous places in the United States for walking and biking — wants to increase transportation choices and improve safety for cyclists and pedestrians, Billy Hattaway, transportation director for Orlando, said. Hattaway said providing ample bike racks is one way to encourage people to travel by bike.

"If people have a secure place to secure their bike, they’re going to be more encouraged to use their bike," he said.

The rack at Ten10 Brewing, adjacent to the Orlando Urban Trail, is one of the most-used bike racks in the city, said co-owner Patrick McPherson. On average, about 7,631 ride Orlando's trails every day, according to a 2017 report.

Sikonia said, so far, the request program has been a success.

The racks cost the city between $100 and $350 and are paid for by the local tax on gasoline. They are free for businesses. The annual budget for the program is between $5,000 and $7,000. The racks take one to three months to install, depending on if concrete needs to be poured and if locations want the racks to be customized.

"Having a program like that is pretty common in bicycle-friendly communities," said Bill Nesper, executive director of the League of American Bicyclists, adding that major metro areas like Chicago, San Francisco and New York City have similar programs. Orlando was designated a bronze-level Bicycle Friendly Community by the League in 2016.

Nesper called the program forward-thinking. He said providing bike parking brings in more customers and revenue for businesses.

"Bike parking is probably the most underestimated ingredient to building a bicycle-friendly community," he said.

Susan Buttery, who owns Juice Bar on East South Street and gets just about everywhere by bike, says the lack of bike racks is still a "city-wide problem."

"I have to hunt for them. I know a lot of people who ride their bikes. We just kind of make do," she said.

Buttery said she might consider applying to get a rack outside her business and believes more businesses would if the request program was more widely advertised. Sikonia said so far the city has primarily used social media to get the word out.

Joanne Grant, executive director for Mills 50 Main Street, has gotten bike racks for her area through the request program, as well as the Mayor's Matching Grant Program created in the 1990s. That program provided about $3,500 for the neighborhood to buy custom racks, she said. She's identified six more spots that need racks.

The grant program has paid for bike racks in Mills 50 and College Park, said Julie Tindall, community outreach manager for the city. It's invested about $8,500 to install racks, and Tindall anticipates more requests.

There also is the possibility of more money coming in for bike infrastructure.

Orange County Mayor Jerry Demings in a speech last month called for a penny sales tax for transportation improvements. Specific details about the tax, which voters would have to approve, have yet to be discussed, but Demings said the county needs to provide a "robust network that supports pedestrians and bicyclists."

Orlando Mayor Buddy Dyer said he supports putting a sales tax on the ballot in November 2020.

"With the addition of more restaurants and more business, just more and more people are walking and biking," Grant said. "When you’re seeing bikes chained to the side of buildings, or stop signs, or towing signs, or ‘no parking here’ signs — it was crying out there was a definite need."

Got a news tip? You can email Caroline at [email protected] or call 407-420-5685, and follow her on Twitter @bycarolineglenn.

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