Gary Johnson e-group post today, concerning Portland Oregon's attempt to become as bike friendly as Copenhagen, brought to mind a few issues Newarkers must address to achieve the same results.
One of Newark's issues is the hill. The majority of Newarkers live on the high plateau which means that, if you work downtown or need to get there to commute, you have to pedal back up the hill after work. I'm one of these folks. I can definitely say that I have forgone going to meetings, to a favorite restaurant or bar, or even on a casual trip around town because of that hill. There are only a handful of streets up it that can be pedaled without tiresome effort and most of them are very busy and perceived dangerous...Springfield, Market, Clinton and Bloomfield. These roads are main roads precisely because they are gradual inclines. They probably started as indian footpaths or horse paths.
My thought is that political policy changes when it has to, not because it wants to. Bike policy won't change until there are enough bikes on the road that it causes a problem. In the article that Gary forwarded (http://bikeportland.org/2009/10/30/want-to-be-like-copenhagen-think-about-vacuum-cleaners-and-raging-bulls/ ), this is the same situation that happened in Copenhagen...Only when bikes became a nuisance did the city acknowledge them then create paths for them.
For a number of reasons, I think the first and most likely neighborhood to become bike-popular is the Ironbound. It is flat. It is vibrant. It has a high European population (Europeans tend to be bike friendly). It is safer. It is harder to find parking. It has a lot to offer in a small area. I think it it also a trend setter for Newarkers. It seems to have a high social and aspirational value. It has a higher influx of visitors who will take notice of our efforts to increase bike usage.
For these reasons and more I think we should focus the majority of our energy and effort on one neighborhood at a time and I think it should be the Ironbound. Then the four major roads I mentioned earlier...Springfield, Market, Clinton and Bloomfield because these are the streets that will get the rest of Newark biking up/down the hill.
My 2ยข.