As much as anyone I know, Sara Studdard has cracked the nut on how to get cities to move fast in the construction of bike infrastructure. Sara is a partner at City Thread and developed the Accelerated Mobility Playbook, a roadmap that helps cities make big progress on bike and mobility projects in general in 24 to 36 months. Sara has worked with cities like Austin, Providence, Pittsburgh, and Denver to build bike infrastructure at a pace that previously was not imagined to be possible. I want to understand what Sara has learned, what the playbook is all about, and how they get cities to move quickly.

Avi Stopper (00:01)

Welcome to Bike Networks Now. I'm Avi Stopper, the founder of Bike Streets. Through a series of conversations with leaders in bike transportation and beyond, we're trying to answer a question: Why is bike transportation still not possible for most people in American cities, and how can we make it a reality? Despite voter support and billions of dollars of investment, there's no city in America where biking is a practical reality for people of all ages and abilities. Why is that? And how can we fix it so anyone can ride to the places they want to go today? These aren't just freewheeling conversations. We're in search of an answer. And that answer—a modern approach to innovation—is the topic of a book we're writing on how cities can make bike transportation possible today.

Avi Stopper (00:51)

As much as anyone I know, Sara Studdard has cracked the nut on how to get cities to move fast in the construction of bike infrastructure. Sara is a partner at City Thread and developed the Accelerated Mobility Playbook, a roadmap that helps cities make big progress on bike and mobility projects in general in 24 to 36 months. Sara has worked with cities like Austin, Providence, Pittsburgh, and Denver to build bike infrastructure at a pace that previously was not imagined to be possible. I want to understand what Sara has learned, what the playbook is all about, and how they get cities to move quickly.

Sara's bio includes this tantalizing question, quote: "Sara led the first crowdfunding infrastructure campaign since the Statue of Liberty in 1885—true or false?" Sara, welcome. I'm going to guess that it's true only because it is such an unusual question that it must indeed be the case. Am I right?

Sara Studdard (01:47)

Ha ha ha! You're correct. It is true.

Avi Stopper (01:54)

What was that project?

Sara Studdard (01:55)

Over 10 years ago, I was living and working in Memphis, Tennessee. I was doing economic development and placemaking for an arts district, Crosstown Arts District. And there was this amazing project that was going to connect Memphis's jewel of an urban park, the Overton Park, to a Memphis suburb—again, high-quality park called Shelby Farms—that would be a mostly fully protected connection between these two parks. We had politicians supporting it, residents and business owners supported it, but there was a challenge around finding the final funding needed to make it possible.

And so I had the opportunity and the gumption where I led a crowdfunding campaign where folks contributed $5, $10, $500 to raise $75,000 to help complete the Hampline connecting these two parks. And for those that don't know, part of the Statue of Liberty also included a bit of crowdfunding as well. And so at the time it was one of our messaging points and I still use it to this day.

Avi Stopper (03:18)

That is astonishing, well done. I think that's become something of a standard, right? I mean, it's not like the dominant paradigm for how things get funded, but I feel like I see these things quite frequently.

Sara Studdard (03:24)

Yeah, this was early in the crowdfunding space and it was actually with this great organization that is no longer around called IOBY that was really—was actually sort of like the non-profit version of GoFundMe. And so they offered fiscal sponsorship if you didn't have the right type of business entity and also really supported residents who are passionate about making changes in their community about how do you ask your neighbor for $25 and how do you do that over a period of time to meet your goal? And so it was really exciting. Memphis was a test community for this very community-centered crowdfunding campaign platform.

Avi Stopper (04:23)

Well, I think it's a good segue because so much of building infrastructure is about capital and of course, political capital—things we probably need to look at separately. But I was just, as an illustration of this, talking to a hardworking Dallas bike transportation planner, and she worked incredibly hard to complete a new bike master plan for the city. And I asked what their plans are to execute on this plan, to actually build it. And I was unsurprised to hear that the expectation is this sort of 25-year generational time horizon. Obviously, there are really significant political capital and capital capital considerations in that. I'm curious to hear, considering your work, what comes to mind when you hear that kind of timeline?

Sara Studdard (05:02)

Yeah. Well, I'm not surprised that those are timelines that we hear from communities across the country, regardless of size, geography, or political affiliation. And I would say that at City Thread, we really operate from the perspective that the status quo, as you gave a great example of, says that transformative mobility projects do take decades, do take generations. And also that they can't be done without meaningful stakeholder involvement, which helps overcome some of the capital and political barriers that you've mentioned.

And so at City Thread, we use our proven playbook called the Accelerated Mobility Playbook or "the Playbook" to really accelerate important projects that make those connections—like neighborhoods, parks, grocery stores, you know, makes a single bike lane connected to another bike lane so you can actually get where you want to go without being inconvenienced or confused.

And so we really believe that projects take too long. And there is a way that the variety of stakeholders who are vital to making changes in our streets and in our public space—there's just another sort of paradigm to organize folks around in order to move that 25-year timeline to two to three years, or for large, big, huge projects, you know, to five years. And we know that it can work and it can happen.

Avi Stopper (07:07)

Okay, we are sitting at the feet of the oracle. Tell us, how do you do it? How do you get this buy-in? How do you get them to believe, and of equal importance, how do you actually make it happen?

Sara Studdard (07:10)

Ha ha ha! Yeah, well I would say first, big ideas need real community buy-in. And so that means thinking about your constituents as not just people who are going to use the trail or the protected bike network, but thinking about residents, businesses, churches, nonprofits, local leaders—not your usual traditional suspects, but those who, you know, communicated with the right message or who may be on the fence can sort of show elected leaders that there is public support to do this big idea and to do it and to complete it and ensure that fairness and accountability are at its core.

We really believe that, you know, when local government isn't bogged down by inefficiencies, they are able to take on these projects and that collaborating and resourcing and funding community leaders, city staff, as well as making sure that elected leaders have the information they need to know that the person that has their cell phone number and maybe has some power and influence is not representing the broader perspective of residents. That they can really tackle urgent projects like now instead of pushing them off to the next administration.

We always say that funding is sort of the free bingo card. Yes, it's a challenge, but if you have sort of elected leaders committed, city staff that has the resources, the support from their boss, the elected leader, and then a diverse group of residents who are organized, that you can really find the funding to move on ambitious, thoughtfully ambitious projects.

Avi Stopper (09:27)

What strikes me as very unusual or different from what I think I typically observe is this idea of a broad coalition, because typically when one of these projects is being considered, there are the bike people and then there are the people who are against the bike people. And then there's a broad swath of folks, a huge swath, probably a vast majority in fact, that are not engaged at all. And maybe those are the folks that you're reaching out to.

How do you encourage cities to explain the vision of a future that bike people understand, but maybe people who have not spent so much time thinking about these cycling utopias that we all dream of don't really understand? They're not something that they've really considered before. How do you get those people—business owners, community leaders, leaders of cultural and religious organizations—how do you get those folks on board with something that they haven't really imagined before?

Sara Studdard (10:32)

Yeah, so the way that we do it is built on a messaging framework that makes a value proposition to all of those folks that you just mentioned. It makes a value proposition that biking and walking infrastructure does benefit them whether they choose to use it at all. And so for the past probably seven or eight years, we've been continuing to test and refine this message in communities across the country.

We use the type of polling that politicians use to know if they're going to win a campaign or not. So it's a representative sample of the community to ensure that we're capturing all viewpoints, all ages, races, gender, like all of the ways that folks identify and affiliate with to be able to say, and this is true, that in the majority, like a high majority of cities across the US that 75% of residents, particularly voters, when you talk to them that a protected bike lane will make their car trip less confusing or more convenient because there is a space on the road for everyone. When you tell them that congestion will actually reduce because traffic flow will change due to an updated intersection that provides safety for people crossing while walking or in a wheelchair, et cetera, that when you talk about the infrastructure and how it will benefit them, that you begin to get folks to be able to align around a shared goal that could be, let's build 10 miles of our trail system in two years. And for us, the sort of secret sauce is it's not about behavior change.

In order for folks to even have the opportunity to consider changing their behavior, we believe, and I know your work with the cool neighborhood streets and the alternative routes is so important. But there are streets that do need a heavy level of protection for families to feel comfortable using. And that by just talking about how infrastructure benefits them without asking them to do anything but support the infrastructure, we're able to organize people locally to agree on that shared goal. It has a measurement, and widens the net and has a different type of message on why a bike lane is important to the health and growth and vitality of the community today, you know, and in the future.

Avi Stopper (13:34)

Elaborate on that point about it not being about behavior change. That really catches my ear.

Sara Studdard (13:39)

Yeah. Well, humans don't really like to be told what to do. And there's a ton of research out there about successful behavior change campaigns, whether it's smoking cessation or even some of the climate work that's happened across the globe. But they're really, really expensive. They're like hundreds of millions of dollars expensive. So A, like there's not the resources to do that. And if we want to get things done quickly, we need to be able to organize people quickly. And so being able to really sort of like remove the—

In my perspective, I think a lot of advocates who are solely focused on whether it's transit or biking or recycling, right? Like there's a bit of shame attached to the message on how they're wanting folks to like get on their side. And so by just focusing on an agreement that this infrastructure should be built, we found that we get, you know, 75% and above percent support of just completing the project. That doesn't mean that folks, yeah.

Avi Stopper (14:54)

Got it. So the message maybe then is not, we're gonna get you to become a bicyclist. The message is more, these types of changes in the right-of-way are going to benefit you in these ways, one of which is that certain people who choose to ride bikes will be riding in a more protected environment, but we are not shaming you into becoming one of those. We're not coming for your cars, you know?

Sara Studdard (15:01)

Correct. Exactly, yeah. You did, yeah. I would say that's correct. I would say the one caveat is convenience over safety of even yourself or the other individual resonates most with residents. It makes me and everyone I share it with feel like slightly sad about humanity, but really people having the confidence that they will be able to continue to walk out or however they get out of their house, out of their house, and get where they need to go in a predictable way. That sort of predictability and consistency is really important in organizing folks. And then the community in the city has to deliver on it and demonstrate that the promise that they made, the value proposition that was shared, was real.

Avi Stopper (16:25)

So it sounds like you're framing the message in a way that is going to resonate with people rather than repel them. And while safety is clearly a priority, the priority for so many of us who work in transportation, the framing that you lead with is actually about convenience and how you're going to make their lives easier. It's not we're making your neighborhood safer.

Sara Studdard (16:53)

And you know, there are places where, you know, safety is the way you communicate in certain neighborhoods. We use safety as like a secondary message a lot, but convenience is like the winner in terms of when you think about running a campaign, like you put convenience and safety on the ballot box. And when it comes down to it, convenience always wins in terms of what people are wanting more of when it comes down to it. Which sort of relates to like, we are organizing folks and then activating them to show elected leadership and city staff that a majority of residents do want this 10 miles of trails built. And we're doing that over and over and over again, working in collaboration with all of the steps it takes on the local government side to complete a project.

Avi Stopper (17:58)

How do you find that these messages scale? To what degree are they plug and play? In other words, a message that resonates in one community or one city. How well does that work? You describe your work as creating a playbook or toolkit. So do the messages generally translate both from city to city, from different types of neighborhoods and socioeconomic environments to others? To what extent is there this level of we understand the way, generally speaking, that we want to engage with folks and then we can use it elsewhere?

Sara Studdard (18:34)

Yeah, I would say that it translates like relatively well to communities of all shapes and sizes and backgrounds, but we do rely on audience research. So polling and focus groups and conversations with folks to really refine it and ensure that the order of the words resonates the most that maybe in some communities safety is what people are really passionate about. It could be a reaction to deaths or fatalities. In some places we found that like the streets are confusing and like using words like confusing really works. But I would say at the core what is sort of like 100% replicable to date is framing, changing streets as something that benefits everyone and really focusing it on the infrastructure and that the infrastructure provides you with more choices and it's on you. You have the independence and the control to decide what choice you're going to take.

Avi Stopper (19:51)

Okay, so I have a very dim view on the way community engagement is currently done. In the conventional form with public meetings where you have a tiny fraction of loud people on either end of the spectrum who show up and a giant mass of other folks is just never really reached. And of course, one of the tropes that we hear over and over and over again is, I didn't know that that was happening. I didn't know that this was going on. This particular planning process was undertaken over the course of three or five years and they start to build it and you hear this uproar from the neighbors that I didn't know that this was happening and yet there were flyers and all sorts of other indications, emails that came out that this was underway. So is part of the playbook figuring out how to actually get to folks who usually don't get their voices heard? And what techniques do you find actually work in that context?

Sara Studdard (20:49)

Yeah, I would say first of all, by doing and investing in audience research that the decision maker or the elected leader trusts. So using the same pollster that the mayor uses when running their campaigns. That majority support helps create political cover, that the really loud people are actually a minority and they should be listened to and they should be respected, but that there's this sort of silent majority that do support ambitious goals around changing our streets. So that we find to be like incredibly effective. It's speaking an elected leader's language, talking about voters, you know, whether they want to get reelected or they're leaving a legacy in office, right? There's an ego component of it that like actually they are making the majority of the people that live in their community happy to help make it feel less overwhelming for elected leaders and for city staff who I personally have like immense empathy for who are in public meetings, you know, not necessarily treated—yeah, treated kindly, right? So I would say that like data component helps and then.

What we have found is that by, you know, we utilize philanthropy. We utilize funding that is not from city, state or federal to fund the majority of activities. And this not only gives a diverse coalition that's organized a bit of leverage to come to the table with some power and leverage to say like, hey, like, you know, we were supposed to hit five miles of the trail system this year. And like, I don't think that's like, you are telling us that can't happen. Do you need help or like, do we need to pull back on what we're doing because, you know, we're no longer accountable partners to each other.

But I would say that we use paid media campaigns to drive folks to do whatever city staff and decision makers within a local government, like whatever they need. Surveys, do they need emails? Do they need like 311 requests? Like we found that like a lot of the disconnect in a city's community engagement process is that the city is wanting to receive and analyze information differently than community groups are giving them that information. So they're kind of talking past each other. And it's also then ensuring that you know, local governments who may not have all of the resources and time and capacity to do, you know, door-to-door canvassing or pop up at every farmer's market, et cetera, that there's this funded coalition that's both separate from the city because no surprise to you, I'm sure, or the listeners, like the majority of Americans don't trust government to have this third party group engage with their people, talk to them in the way that they talk to each other and then direct that support in the way that the decision maker needs it and city staff need it in order to move quickly and not like slow things down because there's uncertainty because the same people have come to like the last four public meetings and they both yelled the same things. It's getting out of that sort of repetitive process.

Avi Stopper (24:48)

Okay, so a targeted advertising campaign brings people initially into the conversation, folks who are not normally going to public meetings, someone who encounters it on the local subreddit or Instagram or something like that. They get their voice heard through that. So there is some initial point of contact that I would imagine is pretty far from getting them to be in the supporters column, right for a particular project that is being conceived? Am I right about that? And if so, what is the progression of this person who you now have on an email list, who is now in a broader pool of folks who are being reached about a project? What does the campaign look like that brings them into the supporters column?

Sara Studdard (25:34)

Yeah. Yep, so I would say the like furthest away, like the person who's just seen a few ads, whether it's on what you said or even like on a bus wrap, you know, by signing up to the newsletter, they're agreeing that they support the city investing in streets or a specific goal even. And so there's a kind of light sort of commitment or yes, could be apathetic, but there's sort of like an inherent level of support by joining the email list.

And then when we're working really like deeply in a community that has a really ambitious goal, we just completed our work in Bentonville, Arkansas, where they built 30 miles of their planned biking and walking network in three years. Very cool. It's amazing. They accelerated their pace of implementation by 13 times.

And so in Bentonville, we had a full-time local project manager who helped launch the Bentonville Moves Coalition that was a diverse coalition of all of the stakeholders we've just discussed. So there's a full-time person who is sort of able to make the coalition legitimate and then work directly with a variety of stakeholder groups with like, you know, do you need sponsorship for the like church carol tour you want to do? Like sure, we'll support that. Mini grants for, you know, neighborhood associations to utilize or ballet schools who want to like do their recital like in a park. Like so engaging in thoughtful ways with groups to then have a smaller pool of the email subscribers to be able to tap and say, like, would you do this op-ed about why this goal of like accelerating the bike network buildout makes sense for you as like a ballet studio or hey like we actually need like a parent and a grandparent to show up to the city council meeting like who's available and here's some talking points and so it's really relationship-led from there to sort of remove give those usual suspects a break to not attend so many community meetings and then get new voices and perspectives to talk about why it's important to them.

And it also is really fascinating because you can see how a ballet teacher can talk about why not only a network of safe and connected and protected bike lanes matters to Bentonville, but she can also just talk about like without even using the word bike, like why it's important to her ballet studio. Like it gives parents confidence on dropping the kids off. We like to play outside and now there's an intersection that's shorter for me and my little ballet dancers to cross. And so again, it's like people are able to authentically talk about this shared goal. And again, I think by like removing sort of like, we're introducing choice by saying you'll have more choices via infrastructure, though you don't have to change. I think by removing that, really allows everyone in a community to think about what would it do for them and then be able to speak to it authentically.

Avi Stopper (29:33)

It strikes me that what you're describing here is a deep bench and I'm going to file away this idea of the either literal or figurative ballet teacher or ballet studio owner. I love that. But what occurs to me is that it's almost like if your title is your name comma bike advocate. We need you to not be the one who is doing the talking. Maybe some of the technical talking about certain elements or something like that, but we need a representative sample of supporters who are new voices who aren't heard. Am I interpreting that correctly? And is that something that you have seen really work?

Sara Studdard (30:11)

Yep. Yep. Yeah, no, you've said it exactly. And I would also add, it not only matters around who staff and decision makers are hearing from, but we've also found that we really work to like build trust between elected officials and city staff around plans where, you know, the engineers and the community and the bike advocates who have an opinion on like how wide a protected lane should be on everything to like also begin to through small wins where the city delivers and completes projects like they said they would.

That we also really work to like remove the, you know, accredited or not sort of like residents who have opinions from the process because that is another big barrier like that slows things down. But you have to have trust and you have to have you know a concept of accountability to do that but it's also like making life easier for everyone because everyone's aligned that like we want to in Bentonville 30 miles and three years.

And the first year, everyone has a project list. You get into the weeds and you begin to see that, the city staff actually is competent and capable to deliver high-quality designs. And if they do need technical assistance, there's funding available to fill those gaps. And by the end of—by November was when we had our celebration. By the end, like the people who were spending, you know, hours of their valuable time sort of picking apart a design, like now are just enjoying using it or driving by it, right? Because they trust the city. Yeah.

Avi Stopper (32:24)

You mean we as bike advocates don't need to do anything at this point. So that construction 30 miles in three years reminds me of something from Denver, which was 125 miles in five years. Were you behind that campaign? Were you involved in that?

Sara Studdard (32:38)

Yeah. At a previous organization, City Thread partner Kyle Wagenschutz and I had the great ability where we sort of tested out like why does it take cities so long? And we worked in Denver, Austin, New Orleans, Pittsburgh, and Providence.

Avi Stopper (33:02)

Okay, and that construction, X number of miles in Y number of years, you find that that is strategic? Is that something that you are really trying to get cities to adopt because that creates a very clear goal with kind of like a binary outcome. We did this or we did not do this.

Sara Studdard (33:19)

Exactly. Yeah, there's a quantitative way to measure it. And it's a way to, again, hold folks accountable. And then also through, you know, now we've worked with now over like 17 communities. We actually have like a pretty good idea about how fast cities can actually move when it comes to particularly like changes to the street. And so it's also helping folks identify like what the goal should be. What needs to be in place, like a city readiness sort of level for them to move faster.

And then for us, the acceleration component is not only because, you know, the world is burning. People need to get places. There's all of these valid reasons to invest in streets. But the acceleration also builds trust because local government has said they're going to do something. Residents feel heard. They've done it. And then it's just like rinse and repeat. And so it creates a new framework or a new relationship between city staff, elected leaders and residents.

Avi Stopper (34:36)

It's a good governance thing at the end of the day. I mean, it strikes me that it's very aligned with the ideas surrounding the abundance agenda.

Sara Studdard (34:39)

Yep. Exactly. Very much so.

Avi Stopper (34:47)

I'm curious to hear, 17 cities is astonishing, congrats, that's phenomenal. Is there one in particular that stands out, and maybe you anticipated this question with the mention of Bentonville, which is a little bit maybe of an unfair case because of certain investment interests there, but are there any cities in particular where you just feel like this is the test case, we crushed it here, this is, can we just replicate what we did here everywhere?

Sara Studdard (35:18)

Yes, can I give three examples? Yeah, so I would say Bentonville is special. It's where Walmart is headquartered for those that don't know. There is an interested funder who's funded a ton into their mountain biking trail system in Northwest Arkansas. So like there's an active funder. I would just say the city of Bentonville, residents have a variety of opinions around how a single funder has shaped the size, feel, look, you know, of their city. And so for us, the playbook really allowed us to come in. All of the funding went through City Thread and we were really able to sort of separate the who's funding this, like who's behind this by getting elected leaders on board who for a lot of reasons are sensitive to being drawn towards a certain funder's own interest. We also, again, were able to fund this coalition that to the average person and authentically was like a diverse coalition wanting to support the city to build 30 miles in three years and then I would also say like Bentonville is a majority conservative community it has like tripled in growth over the last 10 years. It is a place where change is a bit scary because a lot has been happening. And by having the grandparents who've lived in Bentonville, when it was a very small community and now it's almost a 60,000 residents, this has happened over the last 10 years, to get that diversity of people to be like, yeah, we need to like smartly think about investing in our streets and we can do it in an apolitical way and we can also potentially regain more independence and control as a local government because through this process we have a better idea of like how much to ask council for each year or what state funding could we access and how can we be leaders and how the streets should look and so you know, I think that the city of Bentonville is like an amazing example. Yes there are caveats but at the end of the day like the city staff and the mayor mayor Stephanie Orman and the coalition like they're the ones who got it done. Yeah.

Last year, Cleveland, a majority African American black community with a young, energetic black mayor announced that they are going to and are in the process of building 50 miles of their planned biking and walking network in three years and have done like really interesting things both around return to work initiatives and downtown Cleveland where like Sherwin-Williams like global headquarters is down to neighborhoods who like really just want like the blighted property to like be maintained. Have done really interesting ways and like engaging that diverse coalition and then Columbus, Ohio also is like one of the fastest growing cities in the US? Like has like truly like necessary needs to reorganize their street. They've gone through our grant program and are working on sort of making a acceleration commitment. And then I would also just add like we've also worked in communities like Hood River, Oregon, where like 5,000 people live there and maybe they have 15,000 people daily during like their tourism season who are also thinking about, you know, how moving quickly both serves residents and tourists. So I just added Hood River in to say that it's like, this is not like a mid-sized city solution. It really is a solution for communities of all size because it really centers like people and systems and like ensures that at the end of the day, you've not only achieved your goal, but you've created new systems that can be replicated. Like our whole thing is like, we want to make cities work for everyone. there's not, bureaucracy is not full of all bad things, right? Bureaucracy was created to be fair, just equal. And humans have gotten in there and helped slow things down. And so we want to make the parts of bureaucracy that preserve justice work and work quickly while also trying to overcome the parts that get into red tape or people with power and influences making decisions that affect thousands and thousands of people that live there.

Avi Stopper (41:03)

Okay, so back to my original question about Dallas. It sounds like maybe Dallas has this new bike master plan. Maybe the first thing that you would suggest to them is that they need to set an aggressive and ambitious goal around what they're going to do over a certain period of time. And acknowledging that there are probably a bunch of steps in the middle there, but really the way that you go from this really shiny, cool PDF to actually starting to produce that as a reality on the streets is by setting the incentives perhaps from a political level around, okay, we have this thing, city council has approved it, we said we're going to do it. Now the way to initiate this is to develop the facility and the skills to roll it out quickly. Is that an accurate summary?

Sara Studdard (42:02)

That's accurate. I would also just add that they should apply for our technical assistance grant and receive the assessment. And then we provide communities with the playbook that outlines everything that you just stated, like over whatever timeline works with a budget on how much it'll cost. And then Dallas can decide they want to hire City Thread to like facilitate it all or they have all of the information they need and what decisions need to be made and who needs to be at the table to do what you just stated.

Avi Stopper (42:44)

To what extent is, I'm kind of obsessed with tactical urbanism. And to what extent is that part of the playbook? Is that a tool that you use demonstration projects to build, if the objective is to build broad coalitions that are going to be unassailable politically, because they represent a huge plurality of the population, to what extent have you found tactical urbanism to be a useful tool to show people rather than tell them what a set of proposed changes might actually do. And to the ballet studio owner's questions, this is how it's going to make life better for you, how your business is going to improve as a result.

Sara Studdard (43:29)

That's a really great question. I would say it really depends on the level of political commitment. Cleveland is planning to roll out their 50 miles over the next three years with quick build solutions that have a bit of permanence to them, like something that can be installed today and like still exist three years from now with the goal to then go back and make it more permanent. We've also seen great examples that are more pop-up quick build opportunities. And I would just say like where I have caution around doing quick build is if you don't have a true understanding of the decision, the person that's gonna say keep it or take it out. If you don't know exactly like what they're gonna do, quick build is just by nature easier to remove and less permanent. And so I just think that's something to consider if you're between elections or you're not quite sure, but it is a wonderful tool to use to both be cost effective and financially responsible and in pop-up situations to your point, you know, make the case that it does benefit a variety of people in a variety of modes.

Avi Stopper (44:57)

One of the coalition questions that that raises for me is so many people seem to object so vocally to plastic flex posts in particular. It just seems like the most divisive piece of infrastructure. How do you, do you see that indeed creating problems in the construction of a really strong unassailable coalition or, or do you end up having to pivot to other, you know, to other materials that the material where the material, just feels to me sometimes like it's an unforced error because we know that lots of people are going to get very excited about plastic flex posts in particular. So how do you, there's this interesting tension there and I'm curious how you navigate that.

Sara Studdard (45:52)

Yeah, again, it really is like a case by case perspective, like where like we helped New Orleans build 27 miles of their bike network. We also helped them create an entire bike plan in six months that was equity driven and flex posts became like a very contentious challenge in a neighborhood. And so we were fortunate to have a council member who like was all in is who the mayor was looking to to be like do we pull them out and they were able to like negotiate with the residents around a plan that would eventually replace the flex posts but I would also say like because of the nature of our work, like we have a real, the folks on the ground have a strong pulse on like what people want, what they don't want, what their level of like friction is to help like get ahead of that, where it's like, okay, flex posts are like a no, like we should never mention them. Like what are the alternatives? What's the cost like benefit analysis to figure out like what the right strategy is. And maybe it's moving on to another neighborhood or maybe it's finding, you know, like something else. But that's been sort of our, it's not easy. It is like, it's very contentious. It's almost like, it's not bike lash. It's like flex post lash in some way. But by knowing exactly like what the vibe on the street is, it's helpful.

Avi Stopper (47:46)

Are there other tools in the playbook that we haven't discussed that you think are really elemental to success?

Sara Studdard (47:53)

I think we've covered them all, but establishing a shared goal that all the needed stakeholders required like agree on and are committed to that can be measured. It's then aligning all of the variety of partners needed to be successful, understanding what they need. That could be data, it could be funding, it could be money, it could be just someone telling them thank you, it's then resourcing those partners with like what they've said they needed. And then it's just moving quickly and refining on the way when you realize, you know, maybe we moved too fast or this could be faster or we missed a step and then like completing projects and continuing to like fully complete projects to see them all the way through.

Avi Stopper (48:50)

All right, we'll end with a softball question. You've done this all over the place. Do you get to go to these places first off? And second, what's it like when you're out riding on these, riding a bike on these facilities that you really helped bring to fruition that were tucked away in a plan somewhere maybe, but far from creation?

Sara Studdard (48:51)

Yeah. I would say, when I have the fortunate job to visit amazing communities with people who care about their community, who then take me on the most terrifying bike ride or walk that I've ever been on because they're just showing me all the challenges.

Avi Stopper (49:28)

How bad it is.

Sara Studdard (49:31)

It's a good like real life experience. But then to come back a few years later and be on like a very convenient and comfortable and connected experience like whether you're biking or walking or taking the bus like it's emotional like these are plans that like human beings invested in money was spent and a lot of times they sit on a shelf or they take you know a generation to get complete and so for me it's just getting to like bask in the glow of the people on the ground that actually achieved it and not being scared.

Avi Stopper (50:12)

I hope that your phone has lots of those before and after pictures that you just use as motivation on an ongoing basis. Well, thank you so much for chatting with me about this and congrats. Here is to the next 17 cities.

Sara Studdard (50:16)

Yes. Yes. Yes, thank you, Avi. I appreciate that.

Avi Stopper (50:31)

Thanks for listening. If you have questions, comments, or suggestions for guests you'd like to hear from, drop us a line at [email protected]. Bike Networks Now is a production of Bike Streets. Anyone should be able to ride a bike to any destination in their city today. You can learn more about our work at bikestreets.com.