PROFILE
Bahij’s Bike Counter
The first time Bahij Chancey saw a bike counter, he was pedaling across the Dronning Louises Bridge in Copenhagen, somewhere between his apartment in Ørestad and the classes he was taking in Nørrebro. The monolith-like machine counted every person who bicycled by, displaying the tallies for all to see.
Bahij found the effect of being enumerated remarkable. “It was inspiring to know where you stood in this daily count and see how many people had come before and after you. It was also enlightening, because when you’re biking, you only see the people who are directly in front of you, not the full breadth of people who are using bikes to get around. Every day, there were several thousand people who I never saw crossing that same bridge on bike. There was an annual count, too, and the number was ticking up and up and up.”
When Bahij came back to the states and returned to riding a bike in New York, he decided the city needed a bike counter, too — and set out to make it happen.
His first attempt, in 2016, was through the city’s participatory budgeting process. He pitched his proposal for a bike counter at the base of the Manhattan Bridge into the online submission portal, and watched as it leapfrogged to most popular idea on the site. But the Department of Transportation refused to allow his proposal on the ballot, telling him that a bike counter at that location would be a multiple-agency project, too complicated for participatory budgeting.
“That was my first little setback in this campaign. But I wasn’t totally deterred,” Bahij explains. “As a TransAlt advocate, I knew that the way to get things done is to make a lot of noise, create a petition, and make sure that petition gets delivered to the right people. That was my next step.”
Bahij created an online petition and started collecting signatures — proof that he was not the only New Yorker who thought this was a good idea. He surfed over to the DOT’s official online request form, and formally asked for the installation of a bike counter. To make sure he could back up his request, Bahij also did a lot of research, learning everything he could about the technology, what it cost, and how it could be implemented.
With all that groundwork laid, Bahij knew that his next step would be to get some attention. He decided that for one day only, he would be the bike counter he wished to see in the world. Bahij picked a sunny day in May and parked himself at the base of the Manhattan Bridge, armed with a phone for regular Twitter updates, a numbered flip chart, and a sign that read: You are cyclist number… Then he started to count.
Between 6:30 am and 8 pm that day, Bahij counted some 5,800 cyclists, racked up a ton of petition signatures, and earned stories about his project on Patch, Streetsblog, and in AM New York. He also learned a critical piece of information: there were way more cyclists out there than the DOT estimated. Before Bahij’s bike counter, the DOT privately counted cyclists and, without releasing the data, published a yearly estimate of daily bike traffic on the bridges. Their estimate was a full 1,000 people less than Bahij’s count for a day in May.
With his press clips, his petition signatures, news of his counting stunt, and his newfound evidence that cyclists in New York were being undercounted, Bahij sat down with City Council Member Stephen Levin, whose district covers the Brooklyn side of the Manhattan Bridge. Council Member Levin agreed that Bahij’s idea was smart and feasible, so he wrote a letter to the DOT himself.
Just two years after Bahij launched his campaign, New York City’s first bike counter was installed on the Manhattan side of the Manhattan Bridge. As of press time, it has counted 956,715 cyclists.
“Bringing the bike counter to New York City meant that people who don’t bike to work every day would be inspired to get counted, to come in on their bike more regularly, to bike in seasons when they may not have otherwise thought to do so,” explains Bahij. “Next I’d like to see them at the other East River bridge crossings, but I’d also love to see one in Midtown, where pedestrians and drivers passing by could also see how many cyclists are using these roads. It’s time to make people who aren’t biking aware of how many people are out there cycling.”
Anatomy of a Campaign
The story of New York’s first bike counter is textbook activism. Bahij followed an idea from inspiration to actualization in a D.I.Y. campaign that has made biking in the city “count” for more than ever before. Feeling inspired? Reclaim asked Bahij to break down his recipe for success, so readers ready to transform their corner of New York City can follow along.
Research
“With your idea in mind, learn everything you can about what it would take it make it happen. I even got a quote from a bike counter company, so I could prove to Council Member Levin that my idea was affordable.”
Request
“Be sure to go through the formal channels to ask for your idea. If you’re not sure who to ask, TransAlt can help. A key part of my campaign was being able to follow up on my formal request again and again.”
Rally
“Use TransAlt’s Campaign Center (campaigns.transalt.org) to gather supporters online, and do something pressworthy to draw offline attention. When I spent 14 hours outside counting cyclists, I also put my idea on a lot more people’s radars.”
Politic
“Once you are prepared with research and a fired-up group of supporters, sit down with your local elected officials. I was able to prove to Council Member Levin that my idea was feasible and supported, and he was able to help my idea get heard.”
Follow Up
“Persistence is key. Set a weekly or monthly reminder to update your research, re-up your official request, update all the people you rallied, and see what your elected friends have to say. Every time I followed up, I moved my idea closer to reality.”
