The balance between improved perception of safety and improved connectivity can be difficult to strike. Bikeways are often considered safer if they involve little, if any, interaction between people bicycling and people driving or if greater degrees of physical separation are placed between a bikeway and a travel lane with heavy traffic volumes and/or high motor speeds.

However, some experienced bicyclists may appreciate a more well-connected bikeway network that allows them to enter, exit, and re-enter the bikeway freely and can find separated bikeways to be slow and cumbersome to navigate. To address these trade-offs, we utilize a Bicycle Level of Traffic Stress (LTS) analysis, which relies on four generalized bicyclist typologies.

Originally developed by Roger Geller at the City of Portland, OR, the “Four Types of Bicyclists” are meant to guide efforts in assessing — in broad terms — what certain segments of a population require or want in a bikeway facility. Geller suggested that Portland’s population could be categorized into the following four groups:

1) Strong and Fearless: People willing to bicycle with limited or no bicycle-specific infrastructure

2) Enthused and Confident: People willing to bicycle if some bicycle-specific infrastructure is in place

3) Interested but Concerned: People willing to bicycle if high-quality bicycle infrastructure is in place

4) No Way, No How: People unwilling to bicycle even if high-quality bicycle infrastructure is in place

These typologies help us identify which segments of the population need lower stress facilities to try bicycling or to bicycle more often.

Jennifer Dill, Ph.D., at Portland State University, led a survey of adults in the 50 largest metro regions in the U.S. to verify Geller’s theory that roughly 1% of adults identified as “Strong and Fearless”, 7% identified as “Enthused and Confident”, the majority — 60% — identified as “Interested but Concerned”, and the rest — 33% — identified as “No Way, No How”. Dill found that theorized breakdown was remarkably close, with slightly more people identifying as “Strong and Fearless” (7%) and as No Way, No How (37%).

Graphic from Jennifer Dill, Ph.D., Portland State University

To date, many more similar surveys have been conducted, showing some variation by location. We have collected some of these survey results into a single map for comparison: