A sign that bicycling is successfully reaching new demographics?

From the Washington Post, "When the getaway car is a bike," which discusses how some recent crimes in the city have been abetted by criminal bicyclists.

Note that when this came up when I was running the Western Baltimore County Pedestrian and Bicycle Access Study, I made the point that (1) generally bike/multiuse trails experience less crime than abutting commercial and residential areas and (2) far more criminal acts are committed with the use of a motor vehicle, but that most people don't turn around and advocate for the banning of roads and car usage.  (See "Sidewalks and Shared-Use Paths: Safety, Security, and Maintenance" from the University of Delaware Institute for Public Administration.)

For more positive discussion of bike promotion initiatives targeting low income and people of color demographics--groups typically underrepresented in bicycle and sustainable transportation planning--see:

- Create a Commuter program, Community Cycling Center of Portland
- Neighborhood Bicycle Works, Philadelphia
- "Young people find cycling gets the wheels turning," Seattle Times
- "Black women take their place in D.C.'s bike lanes," Washington Post
- "Youth Bike Summit, New York City," blog entry
- "Ideas for making cycling irresistible in DC," blog entry
- "Best practice suburban bicycle planning," blog entry
- Recycle-a-Bicycle, New York City
- "Not white and not wealthy: Taking biking beyond the usual suspects," from the Bike Portland blog (I thought I wrote about this session at the National Bike Summit, but I guess I didn't--it was provocative)
- Major Taylor Project article, Treehugger