SOMERVILLE
New site has bikers riding Web to safety
By J.M. Berger, Globe Correspondent May 20, 2007
By J.M. Berger, Globe Correspondent May 20, 2007
With the much-delayed arrival of warmer weather, city bicyclists are once again rolling into rush hours and spreading out over the region for weekend recreation -- this year, with a potential cyber ally. 
A new project aims to make outings safer and easier by leveraging the power of the user-generated Internet -- the collaborative craze known as Web 2.0.
TheRightRide.org is the brainchild of Chris Braiotta, a Somerville website developer. It aims to collect intelligence from other riders about the best, worst, and most hazardous locations across Greater Boston.
Powered by Google Maps, the site features an interactive map of locations considered dangerous by local riders. The initial list of hazards was provided by Ian Thistle, a bike enthusiast of Braiotta's acquaintance. Users can add their own hot spots using a wiki-style feature, which Braiotta is inaugurating this week.
Made famous by the online reference guide Wikipedia, wikis are websites in which content is entered, corrected, and maintained by users.
While the webmaster exercises control over the data to prevent online vandals from adding bad information, most vetting and evaluation is done by other users.
Some offline resources already exist for riders seeking information on bike-friendly routes, such as bike paths and trails, says David Watson, executive director of MassBike, the Massachusetts Bike Coalition cycling advocacy group.
For instance, Rubel BikeMaps of Cambridge publishes several regional maps covering most of Massachusetts, as well as a safety guide on "Bicycle Street Smarts."
Watson says a site like theRight Ride has the potential to keep listings more current, but the value of the project will be highly dependent on the people who take part. The subjectivity of the participants could be a problem, he says.
"It's only going to be as good as the data you put into it," says Watson. Of course, that objection hasn't stopped Wikipedia from running roughshod over its more traditional and carefully vetted counterparts in the reference world.
Braiotta will maintain ultimate control over the content, but he hopes that role will involve minimal editorial oversight on his part. 
"It's one thing to have three people's opinions on the places that they've encountered," he says. "That's only going to be of limited use. When it's going to become really useful is when there's a lot of people adding their own sites on there, fixing the points that other people have put in, and overcoming the bias of just one person."
Braiotta was inspired to start work on the site after reading reports that two area cyclists had been killed in collisions with cars since April. In conversations with his fellow riders, he was told the accidents had taken place in locations well-known to experienced riders as being dangerous.
That got him thinking about his own awareness of the city's danger zones. "Because I'm just a casual bike rider, I don't always know the best routes to get to places."
That got him thinking about his own awareness of the city's danger zones. "Because I'm just a casual bike rider, I don't always know the best routes to get to places."
The site's launch phase features a scalable map tagged with hazardous locations. Braiotta hopes to eventually expand the database to include other tips, such as safe routes, fast routes, and low-traffic strategies.
Braiotta is paying for the site out of his own pocket, though he welcomes donations. Although he wouldn't rule anything out, he isn't harboring any particular commercial ambitions. Bike safety strategies can be a prickly subject for some area cyclists, who say their rights under the law entitle them to equal access to the streets of Greater Boston.
"We don't only go on quiet little side streets," says Janie Katz-Christy of the Cambridge Green Streets Initiative, who often rides the roads with her family.
She won't go so far as to call the local streets "safe" for cyclists, but she argues the solution is not to stay away from dangerous streets and intersections. Instead, she recommends reporting them to police and local officials.
"I don't think cyclists should be avoiding places.... I think we should be all over this city, and the more we do, the more other people will," she says.
Watson says MassBike encourages riders to work with public works and police to make hazardous streets and intersections less dangerous. But pragmatic concerns are foremost in his mind.
"No matter what people are doing on their bicycles, we want everybody to be safe." Drivers are shielded from injury by their vehicles, Watson says, while bicyclists are inherently more exposed.
