I am going to begin building a (mostly) traffic-free network of bicycle highway routes which will hopefully one day be as familiar to bicycle commuters in St. Louis as gooey butter cake or toasted ravioli. I will begin with my own personal commuting needs and branch out from there. This network will be called "Missouri Cycling Highways", or MOCH. Routes will be named after whatever I dang please.
Of course commuting by bicycle in a city like St. Louis has drawbacks--mainly the traffic, which is to be avoided in my opinion. This means that routes need to be more circuitous, and therefore longer, to achieve a high level of safety. The second drawback is the vast sprawl that makes up St. Louis County. Things can be very far apart here. We have immediate family who live over 20 miles away. What I am getting at is that these routes are meant to be safe, not direct, and that cycling is a slow form of transportation. But that's why we love it, right?!
The whole point of sharing these routes is so that others can use them. If enough people use these routes, one day I might start marking these routes with small, inconspicuous signs leading cyclists through an effective and safe network of bike friendly streets.
My first big project was to establish a safe route from my parents house to my house. This way, I can bring my son home in the trailer. I admit, I used the Google Maps Bikes thing to give me an idea and went from there.
Either way, please enjoy the first section of my new project. It will be a small portion of the major east/west route I will call "MOCH-100", or affectionately "The Sprawl". This section will take riders from the Mobile gas station next to Kirkwood Middle School to the QT in Maplewood on Big Bend.
http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&source=s_d&saddr=kirkwood+middle+school&daddr=38.609105,-90.320764+to:Flora+Ave&hl=en&geocode=FT7-TAIdC1Kc-iFJMzfNT_o32A%3BFdEgTQIdhNCd-inVOPs_X8rYhzHRtNyjZDVGMg%3BFRMiTQIdCcWd-g&aq=0&sll=38.609971,-90.321887&sspn=0.003915,0.009645&vpsrc=6&dirflg=b&mra=pr&via=1&ie=UTF8&ll=38.593797,-90.339546&spn=0.125313,0.308647&t=m&z=12&lci=bike
In the future, I will begin mapping these routes using GPS technology. But first I have to acquire the tools and knowledge needed to do so. I didn't want to wait. I am so excited to share this concept and these routes with my fellow St. Louis cyclists.
