6 westword.com WESTWORD DECEMBER 11-17, 2025 | MUSIC | CAFE | CULTURE | NIGHT+DAY | NEWS | LETTERS | CONTENTS | Wheeler Dealers MAYOR’S BICYCLE ADVISORY COMMITTEE GETS A MEETING WITH THE MAYOR...FINALLY. BY BENNITO L. KELTNY Ask, and ask, and ask...and ye just may receive. The Mayor’s Bicycle Advisory Committee fi nally got the ear of Mayor Mike Johnston for a half-hour at its monthly meeting on December 4. Leadership of the 24-person policy advising committee had complained in October about Johnston’s lack of engagement with them. During last week’s face-to-face, the MBAC asked the mayor to attend at least two meetings each year, as well as provide a $500 to $1,000 annual budget for the committee and be more involved in decisions that affect Denver’s two-wheeled travelers. Johnston told the committee members that he could use more of their input during the next six weeks as he sets goals for 2026, which will include improving Denver traffi c safety and rethinking what city infrastruc- ture needs the most urgent upgrades. The City of Denver has dozens of boards and commissions, mostly created to inform city-level policy decisions. Councilmembers, department heads and the mayor typically get input from advisory boards and com- missions through liaisons or by attending meetings themselves. Then-Mayor Federico Pena created the MBAC in the 1990s; it’s one of only three city commissions that has “mayor” in the name. At the MBAC’s previ- ous meeting, committee leadership noted the irony of having not yet met the mayor more than halfway through his fi rst term. At the December 4 meeting, Loren Han- sen, the MBAC chair, told Johnston that the committee wants to be more involved with bike infrastructure projects, while also keeping communications open. The mayor promised to follow up on the committee’s request for twice-annual visits, and offered to join a group bike ride in the early part of 2026 – but said he needs to get a new bike fi rst. The small annual budget that MBAC re- quested would pay for “event supplies” and “MBAC-related swag,” Hansen said, part of a goal to increase recruiting efforts and fi nd more representation across council districts. After noting that “we don’t usually have a budget for an advisory committee,” Johnston said he’d work on allocating some money for committee efforts, including the Denver Bike Fest organized by a few MBAC members that was held for the fi rst time in April. However, the mayor also noted that the city is going through “a diffi cult budget challenge,” with a $200 million defi cit ahead of 2026. The mayor hopes to use the MBAC’s ex- pertise to reduce traffi c deaths in Denver, he added. During the next six weeks, Johnston’s offi ce will prepare a plan with the Denver Police Department and Denver Department of Transportation & Infrastructure to reduce traffi c deaths in 2026, which he called “a top city priority.” According to Denver’s Vision Zero dashboard, more than eighty people have died on Denver’s roads while driving, walking or cycling so far in 2025; Denver has reported between eighty and 85 such deaths every year since 2020. “We are going to see one of the highest numbers of traffi c fatalities this year,” John- ston added. “We’re very concerned about the direction to take to drive that number down.” The mayor also wants advice down the road on prioritizing bicycle-related infra- structure projects, he told committee mem- bers, adding that he expects to revisit the city’s six-year capital improvement plan, which outlines major investments in build- ings, infrastructure and other physical assets. “Which of those projects should be re- prioritized, which should be moved back, which we might want to move up — and so if there are investments that you all think of as the single-highest priority, that you would want to fl ag for us around safe infrastructure, we would love feedback,” he said. The city will be able to fund more than $950 million worth of capital improvement projects through the Vibrant Denver bond package ap- proved by voters in November. June Churchill, a member of the MBAC once known as “Den- ver’s bike mayor,” pointed out that “there’s no major new bike projects” approved for Vibrant Denver bond funding, which cyclists had also noted before the bond measure was approved. Still, Johnston’s meeting with the committee was “quite productive,” she said. “The mayor responded directly to MBAC’s asks and made a number of commitments,” Churchill told Westword. “I wasn’t expecting anything radical or truly transformative out of this meeting, but explicitly establishing MBAC as a resource the mayor is willing to directly invest in and consult is a good thing.” According to Johnston, his priorities in- clude increasing road safety without taking any convenience away from drivers. “We want this to be a city where it is safe and easy to get around by bike or by foot,” Johnston told Westword after the meeting. “We want to build infrastructure and a culture that makes that easier, and we think we can do that without making it more diffi cult for drivers.” Johnston cited the rollout of Ziclas, the short, heavy dividers that replaced fl ex posts along certain protected bike lanes. Cyclists didn’t like losing the fl ex posts, but Johnston said many of those posts were meant to be temporary, adding that the hopes Ziclas become known as the “Denver curb.” He described the Spanish-made product as “permanent, safe infrastructure” that’s fl at on the side that faces drivers and sloped on the side that faces cyclists. “Cars can’t drive over that,” he noted, while cyclists can bump into the Ziclas without too much impact. “In places where we’re pulling down bollards, it’s because we’re putting up more protective lanes,” Johnston added. “Those more-protected lanes have concrete or these ‘Denver curbs’ that are going to be both safer for bikers and pedestrians.” The meeting was “incredibly productive,” Hansen said. “I am happy with what was dis- cussed.” Still, he he added that he would’ve liked a chance to talk more about “being involved earlier in the planning process for infrastructure and committee funding, hav- ing this conversation with Mayor Johnston overall was a net good and something we will build on, particularly on a bike ride next year.” According to Johnston, he enjoys cycling with his family but has been in the market for a new bike since last year, when a couple of bicycles were stolen out of his garage (he’s also seen two of his cars stolen). The mayor acknowledges that bike theft is unfortunately common in Denver; so far this year, the DPD has reported more than 2,700 bike thefts across the city, up from about 2,600 in 2024. “I’ve lived the whole Denver life. We’ve all lived through it,” Johnston said. “I’m still in the market, but now I have some folks to help me do it.” Email the author at [email protected]. NEWS KEEP UP ON DENVER NEWS AT WESTWORD.COM/NEWS The rubber has hit the road for Denver’s bicyclists. One committee member called the meeting “incredibly productive”. BENNITO L. KELT Y BENNITO L. KELT Y
