Good for you, good for Spokaloo!

A: It's not the fastest thing around, but it gets there eventually. 

Amazingly enough, Spokane's doesn't have cycle-specific parking Downtown. Commuting on your motorcycle or scooter receives no more incentive from the City than say, driving an H2 Hummer. Short-term parking? Gotta find an empty 20 foot-long stall like anyone else, or (gasp!) break the law by parking on the sidewalks, finding an un-used, un-marked space, or sharing a space with one or more other bikes. Stall-hungry drivers have been known to knock bikes down trying to squeeze into leftover space where motorcycles are parked legally, or more often, shoot dirty looks at riders as they take up an entire on-street space.

But that's about to change, even if only a little bit.

In the wake of the new Downtown plan - which in draft form, supports two-wheeled parking arrangements - the City's getting ready to subdivide a few existing car stalls into dedicated motorcycle stalls. Being considered are five spots:

1 - on Post across from City Hall
1 - on Spokane Falls Boulevard near the fountain
1 - near Auntie's book store
1 - on Main near Red Robin, and
1 - on Broadway near the Courthouse

Each stall would be striped for four bikes plus meters, and mindful of the lack of riders downtown when the snow files, the City plans to convert them back to car-only use each winter.

Hoo-ray? Well, we'd wish for cheaper or even free parking to help incentivise riding (at least 1/4th the price, eh, City?), a purchased parking sticker arrangement, and/or a more liberal approach allowing cycles to park in under-utilized spaces, or maybe requiring surface lots to accomodate cycles for free - as a tax on denuding the downtown landscape.

But we're happy to hear there's progress being made, and so we'll cheer it as-is. If you're a rider, be sure to use the spots when they appear, 'cause the City's considering this a test case. Use 'em more, maybe we'll get more. Use 'em less, maybe we'll lose 'em.

What's the pace of progress in Spokane? Slow. But if we all do our part, we can at least keep it steady.