Mayor Freddie O’Connell relaunched the Nashville Bicycle and Pedestrian Advisory Committee (BPAC) on Tuesday. An agenda posted to the city’s website reveals that committee members received a “Transit Referendum Briefing” during their recent meeting.
A Wednesday press release by O’Connell’s office explained the mayor “released a new map related to his Choose How You Move transportation improvement program” and revealed a map of “35 miles of new and improved bicycle facilities that would be covered” under his referendum.
Other details of the briefing are unclear, though the agenda published by the city confirms O’Connell was scheduled to deliver remarks before the briefing.
O’Connell’s office also noted the mayor’s January executive order expanding the city’s Green and Complete Streets program and calling for Nashville to consider closing some streets to vehicles and developing transportation infrastructure based on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) principles.
The media advisory additionally explained O’Connell assigned the BPAC “with increasing the number of bicycle friendly businesses in Nashville while focusing on the policies that will help Nashville achieve bike friendly city status as defined by the League of American Bicyclists.”
According to the League of American Bicyclists’ website, cities are evaluated on five criteria, including “Equity [and] Accessibility,” and the group defines equity “as the fair and just inclusion into a society in which everyone can participate and prosper.”
To become a sufficiently equitable community for the League of American Bicyclists, cities must develop policies and infrastructure while acknowledging “there are historically underserved and underrepresented populations, and that fairness regarding these unbalanced conditions is needed to assist equality in the provision of effective opportunities to all groups.”
The website indicates the equity requirement was added around June 30, 2022, when the organization held a webinar to explain the change.
O’Connell’s transportation referendum recently faced criticism from Nashville’s Beacon Center, which called portions of the plan “downright inexcusably awful” and was previously branded a “greendoggle” by Nashville Tea Party founder Ben Cunningham.
Cunningham additionally warned O’Connell’s referendum may be illegal, as it incorporates elements not covered by the law, which enabled a sales tax increase to fund transit projects.
The cost of the transportation plan also swelled from about $3.1 billion to $6.93 billion in a recent independent financial analysis.
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Tom Pappert is the lead reporter for The Tennessee Star, and also reports for The Pennsylvania Daily Star and The Arizona Sun Times. Follow Tom on X/Twitter. Email tips to [email protected].
Photo “Freddie O’Connell” by Nashville Department of Transportation & Multimodal Infrastructure. Background Photo “Bike Lane” by Paul Krueger. CC BY 2.0.
