A Tale of Two Countries

Congressman Earl Blumenauer introducing the
Bike Commuter Act on Capitol Hill last March.
(Photo © Jonathan Maus)

Bike commuter benefit does not survive Senate vote on Energy Bill

The bike commuter tax benefit — which was introduced to Congress by Earl Blumenauer last March and passed a House vote last week — has been stripped out of the Energy Bill by the Senate.

The U.S. Senate passed the Energy Bill yesterday, but not before removing several “green initiatives” included in the bill by the Blumenauer-led Ways and Means Committee.

Along with removing Blumenauer’s effort to close the “Hummer tax loophole” (which sought to end the additional tax incentive for business purchases of luxury SUVs weighing over 6,000 lbs), the Senate removed the part of the bill that would have expanded the existing transportation fringe benefit to include bike commuters.

The bike commuter provision was based on The Bike Commuter Act and would have given a benefit of $20 per month to employees who biked to work “for the purchase, storage, or repair” of their bicycles. It would have brought bike commuters in line with existing tax benefits for transit users and car drivers.

Addressing National Bike Summit attendees on Capitol Hill last March, Blumenauer said the bike commuter benefit was simply a matter of equity and it would have stopped, “The discrimination against people who burn calories instead of fuel.”

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Danish cities go high-tech for bike safety

Posted by Jonathan Maus (Editor) on December 14th, 2007 at 2:45 pm

Flashing lights when
a bike is present.
(Photo: Zakkaliciousness)

From Cycleliciousness (the “Copenhagen Bicycle Culture Blog”), comes word of two interesting bike safety measures.

Given that we are in the midst of making some major bike safety improvements at dangerous intersections, I thought it might be useful to take a look at new technology being considered by the Danes.

The first is being tested in Copenhagen to reduce the number of right-hook collisions between bikes and trucks. It’s what the blog’s author calls, “a new system of diode lights” (similar the one in their photo at right) that would potentially reduce bike/car conflicts at dangerous intersections.

All of this is from bikeportland.org