Dakotanewsnow did a story about park master plans, and I took a screenshot of this sticky note from a constituent.

Dogs have multiple parks in Sioux Falls, they also have sidewalks, any greenspace, your house, backyard and even at a bar or restaurant. As a bicyclist I only have a few options, but if you have to ‘find’ places where your dog can be walked in Sioux Falls, you really have deeper issues, like how to smell ‘fer’.

A few years back I told you about the gentleman who’s job was scraping goose manure off the bike trail and blowing it away with a leaf blower . . .

There was also the guy who used to water trees around Yankton Trail Park with a water truck and he would run only one hose, watering one tree at a time which helped him catch up on his latest Tom Clancy novel.

Today I bring you tennis court dryer. While I’m sure this kind of thing goes on at Wimbledon, I’m not sure we need to be having parks staff walk randomly around pushing puddles with a leaf blower. It was kind of fun to watch. I think she successfully got two puddles to stick together as one 🙂

Hopefully they moved her onto goose manure scraping or Tom Clancy novels by morning coffee break.

A gentleman came forward to the council meeting tonight during public input (FF 40:00) and was surprised that he was told not to ride his newly purchased E2 Bike on the trail.

He found it ironic because he got a warning from a motorcycle cop.

UPDATE: Someone who spoke to the gentleman before his testimony, said he wasn’t even riding his bike on the rec trail but was SITTING next to it on a park bench when the officer gave him the warning. I guess it is easier to give out citations to people who are not moving 🙂

I also found it funny that the mayor tried to correct this first time inputer by telling him there is a speed limit on the trail. THERE IS NOT! No where in city ordinance is there a speed limit on the rec trail, there are also NO posted signs except one on the 41st street bridge that has been there for over 30 years.

UPDATE: I have also been informed that the rec trail does have a 20 MPH, but it is NOT posted and is just a ‘parks policy‘. Would love for someone to pay me to try to find this policy on the city website, it could get expensive.

Once again the mayor has NO CLUE what is actually in statute.

I heard from a city official tonight that they will be moving forward within the next couple of weeks on a change to the E2 restrictions (and other adjustments).

UPDATE: The bicycle ordinances on the bike trail are a prime example of the lack of transparency in our government. They post NO signs telling people about rec trail restrictions (vehicle, speed or otherwise) and expect people to just pull up their city hall crystal ball and know these things. Government runs more efficiently based on transparency, not tongue and cheek suggestions based on limited information.

UPDATE: I decided to do an unscientific study today. I rode from 11:30 AM-12:30 PM on one of my one-speed bikes, 10 miles from Cherry Rock Park circling South to West 12th street. This is what I counted;

I found ZERO; One Wheels, Electric Scooters or Wheelchairs, Electric Foot Scooters or Electric Skateboards, E-I or E-III bikes or regular foot scooters (I have seen all of these vehicles in the past just not today).

Regular bikes (no assist or light weight for fast riding); 61

Walkers; 44

Children riding bikes; 12

Dogwalkers; 9

E-II (assist plus throttle); 8

Light weight road bike (riding over 20 MPH); 7

Baby Strollers; 5

Joggers; 4

Regular skateboard; 1

I found no surprises while I took this survey, most of the users are regular bicyclists and walkers which is normal. As for the riders of E-II bikes they were all in their late 60’s to early 70’s. It was 4 individual riders and 2 couples. They were maintaining a speed of around 20 MPH which is no surprise since that is the max speed setting on most E-II’s.

Yes, that is a picture of me riding my E-Bike on the bike trail. I had no idea Lalley was taking photos for his article until he asked my permission to use the photo. We will get to the nuts and bolts of his article in a moment, but apparently this line in his piece didn’t sit well with the SFPD;

The reality is that any law is only as good as the willingness of the government to enforce it.

(Looking at you, casual marijuana user.)

Or at least publicize it.

There is no guidance out on the trail system currently beyond the general rules of the road and ride at a safe and courteous speed.

So the SFPD responded to the article today on their favorite place to inform the public (I didn’t find one single comment that thinks enforcing E-Bike rules is a good idea);

It seems all you have to do is lightly mock the SFPD about enforcement of a useless ordinance and they snap into action. It is going to be fun watching officers hand tickets to grandparents riding E2 bikes pulling their wagon with Ms. Kitty in it. Will they also be giving speeding tickets to wannabe Lance Armstrongs for booking over 30 MPH on the trail on there 18 lb carbon fiber road bike?

The ordinance has been in effect since 2018 and I am pretty sure it has NEVER been enforced. There is also NO signage on the rec trail telling folks the speed limit or the restrictions of authorized vehicles.

In other words NO enforcement and NO notification . . . except on Facebook 🙂

When you get into discussions about the repealing the ordinances, councilors and other whiners in the bike community complain that it is complicated because of all these classifications, different emerging vehicles and technologies and the interaction with pedestrians.

But after reading over 90 comments with 99% of them in favor of eliminating the ordinance you wonder what kind of input the council got from the public when crafting this five years ago besides a handful of whiners? It’s time to start listening to the market on this. The E-Bike industry is one of the fastest growing in the United States, but once again the Sioux Falls attitude of go it alone, I know better then the rest of the country, is contributing to this.

There is also an attitude, especially at City Hall these days that climate change is NOT real and anything electric is bad. I often suggest to these people they should just run their homes on coal. If electricity is bad for a bike or car, isn’t it bad for your home? C’mon climate change denier, buck up, show us what you really think!

They are really overthinking it and only need to look at other communities for assistance. I would start with something very simple, get it on the books, and over the year study what needs to be tweaked and revisit it with changes;

  1. Repeal all current restrictions, re-write from scratch
  2. Post the speed limit of 15 MPH on the trail
  3. Paint a white center line with pavement signage every 1/4 mile that says KEEP RIGHT
  4. Allow Class II and Class III bikes, AS long as they maintain the speed limit, have pedals and only use pedal assist (NO THROTTLING). This is a simple setting on the bike.
  5. Allow electric vehicles that CAN be ridden at a safe speed (this will be the hardest part of crafting the ordinance)
  6. Have monthly enforcement on Saturdays where police hand out warnings for speed.

I know it seems laughable that an ordinance has been on the books for almost 5 years and there has been no public notification (signage) or enforcement. At least the person running the FB page for the SFPD was paying attention, better get them a challenge coin 🙂