Boston Mayor Michelle Wu, who ran for Mayor last year on a "Green New Deal" platform, has ridden her bike to work three times this month, and is taking notes about how the city can improve bike infrastructure on the 7-mile route between her home in Roslindale and City Hall.
The mayor, who has been inviting her neighbors and constituents to join her on her rides, has enjoyed lots of company on her bike commutes.
Among the people who have joined her are Peter Cheung, a Jamaica Plain resident and frequent organizer of group bike rides in the Boston area.
"She's definitely having fun," Cheung told StreetsblogMASS. "Look at the pictures. She always has a big huge smile on her face."
Riding with Mayor @wutrain pic.twitter.com/ckEw0fBr1G
— Peter Cheung (@bostonaruban) August 11, 2022
Cheung said that the rides are also giving constituents an opportunity to lobby the mayor for safety improvements on the streets while the mayor experiences hazards firsthand.
After her most recent bike commute last Wednesday, the mayor tweeted a long thread of observations from her ride, highlighting parts of her commute that worked well, and parts that could use improvement (like this gap in bike infrastructure between Massachusetts Avenue and Back Bay):
Without protected infrastructure, double parked cars or trucks push buses & other vehicles into the median & squeeze us pic.twitter.com/Dqifw79Oij
— Michelle Wu 吳弭 (@wutrain) August 24, 2022
The mayor also expressed appreciation to the state Department of Conservation and Recreation for re-paving rough patches in the Southwest Corridor path just before the Orange Line shut down, but noted that "the new asphalt patches... need to be smoothed out at some point."
"She knows about the trouble spots, and it helps that she shares it, and shows that she cares," said Cheung, in a phone conversation with StreetsblogMASS after that morning's ride. "I’m hopeful that (the infrastructure) will be improved in the long term."
