The essence of the bicycle (Part 4) - As an FMLM solution

Last week we looked into the peculiarities of that undiscussed and unaddressed challenge called the first-mile-last-mile (FMLM) problem. As a town or city progresses, its transport system often grows from the initial pair of private cars and paratransit to more efficient modes of public mass transportation --rail-based MRTs and LRTs and busways or Bus Rapid Transits (BRTs). This improvement will create FMLM problems because the bigger the public mass transport is, the farther apart the stations are from each other and to our final destinations which are our homes and workplaces. This gives rise to informal FMLM fast solutions of poor quality --tricycles, trisikads, habal-habal, etc. No matter how good the public transport is, people suffer in the FMLM end trips.

Many other countries turn to bicycles and well-regulated motorcycles-for-hire as the better alternative. Which is why these newfound interest of the government in bike lanes and the pending bills in Congress to legalize motorcycles-for-hire are encouraging moves, if properly executed. Hopefully, Congress can craft better laws for motorcycles-for-hire, one which is not restrictive as if these are public utilities, which they are not. But as for the bike lanes, the government seems to have made the wrong turn.

Bicycles are very versatile as a mode --we can use them for direct home-to-work trips, or they can be FMLM solutions, depending on each situation you are in. But we have to be realistic; while I have friends who bike 20 kilometers or more each day to go to work, how many would really take that challenge? The weather limitation is true, we live in the tropics, and while many in Singapore bike from home to work, even when it's hotter there than in the Philippines, only few would really do that over longer distances. But as an FMLM solution, it would be something to consider.

Those who lived or visited other countries know this and those who didn’t, can see this in the movies --people ride their bikes to the station (where they can park there), and then proceed by train or bus. On the way back after work (or school), they take the train/bus to the station nearest their homes and bike from there. This actually created a weird problem in Japan, when people didn’t want their old bikes anymore and simply left them at the stations after buying new ones. The government had to take care of disposing of them! I hope this won’t happen in the Philippines.

The key to FMLM here in Cebu? Build bike lanes from residential areas to the BRT stations. This is as logical as it can be. Instead, I think they plan to build bike lanes along the BRT lines. Why? In mathematics, we say build the lanes normal to the BRT line instead of parallel to it. That way, it becomes a perfect FMLM solution. You’re actually creating a demand ridership competition when you build it alongside. We’re building a BRT. Anybody can see it would be perfect if there are bike lanes connected to the stations with bike racks built near them. (To be continued)