Coming next week: Bull City Riding

Next week here at Bull City Rising, besides news and analysis of what's happening around Durham, I'll be starting a one-week feature series, Bull City Riding. As in, Bull City Riding DATA Buses.

The idea germinated in my head a few weeks back, when the N&O (which does a better job on economic justice issues than a heck of a lot of city papers do) ran a very pointed piece noting that several shopping centers in Raleigh have banned transit buses from their property. That list included Brier Creek, a center that had expressly agreed with the city to allow buses on property as part of its development plan with Raleigh government.

The N&O rightly noted that employers and shoppers alike depended on bus service to be able to reach these centers. But from the strip malls' perspective, better to be 'upscale' without buses on property. So what if the hired help has to schlep it?

The idea really crystallized when I was talking to several of my Durham-based friends -- all of whom are very progressive politically, and also, Caucasian like me -- and realized that, even among those who had lived in Durham for years, no one rode the DATA buses.

Certainly it's not like I'd ever been on a city bus before. Heck, when living back in Cambridge, Mass. right outside Boston for the better part of a decade, I rode the bus system and the subway very regularly. For years, I wouldn't even dare go into Boston by car, between Big Dig construction and crazy traffic. Nope, it was the MBTA #69 bus to Lechmere or the #1 bus to get down to Newbury St.

When my wife and I first moved here, though, friends warned us quickly -- don't ride the city buses. Vagaries about shootings and crime. It's just not done, they said. Of course, driving around a small city like Durham is quick and easy... heck, I'm an eight-minute drive from my home to work.

So I never rode a DATA bus. But when I drive by the DATA station on the Downtown Loop, or the bus shelter up W. Club Blvd. by Northgate, I see lots of people using the bus.

Mostly, people who don't look much like me. We don't have to worry about black and white sections of buses anymore in places like Durham -- if we were still in a segregated South, the latter would be empty. Buses themselves often come to represent transportation only for the poorest in our communities, among which number African-American and Latino Durhamites are disproportionately represented.

DATA serves people who in some cases don't have the luxury of hopping in their car, since many probably don't have one. Durhamites living across the unseen, oft-avoided line of class and status that divides our community into two parts. In this way, the city bus itself that has come to symbolize separate and unequal across America, a stigma in many cities, and, as Raleigh shows us, the anathema of the 'upscale.'

How can I blog about urban Durham when I've never stepped into this part of urban life? So next week, it's time to park the car. And ride the bus.

Last week, I went on a dry-run of this little adventure. I'd loaned my car to a friend for a day, so at quitting time, it was time to leave my office at the American Tobacco campus and walk down to the downtown bus station to catch a bus. The #1 bus will be my route, since I can hop off it on N. Duke St. and Knox three doors down from my house, and can pick it up over at Gregson and Knox. (For the record, I've never seen anyone picked up at the Gregson and Knox bus stop. Here's hoping the Treyburnites don't plow into the back of the #1 during the morning commute.)

Technically, the adventure began earlier that day, when I went to look up the #1 bus schedule online. Much to my surprise, the bus only ran half-hourly on peak daytime runs, hourly outside that time. A bus that only runs hourly? Definitely not what I was expecting. After all, DATA buses seem to be everywhere, right? Well, not if you're riding one. Better not be late to the station.

So around 5:15, I packed up the laptop and headed out of my office at the Strickland building, walking up the American Tobacco courtyard, through the North Deck parking garage, and up to Pettigrew. At that point, the plan was to walk westbound to Chapel Hill St., then head up around the loop and to the bus station between Morgan and Main. First hurdle? The sidewalk ends abruptly along Pettigrew, sputtering out about to grass and gravel a good minute's walk longer to W. Chapel Hill St. Good thing the cars didn't run me down those last few feet.

Next hurdle: actually getting to the bus stop. See, sidewalks lead you along W. Chapel Hill St. to the loop. But there's no easy way to traverse the outside of the Loop via sidewalk. No, you're expected to cross the Loop towards downtown, then travel up a sidewalk to the station, then cross the Loop again heading to the DATA depot. All in the space of about 100 feet.

I hustle around the 'wrong side' of the Loop anyway, making it to the station right at 5:26. Four minutes to spare. About five dozen prospective passengers milled about, some smoking cigarettes, others chatting, or just resting in the shade under the unassuming wood shelters. So many hanging around, waiting for a bus -- but where were the buses?

A few minutes later, in comes a bus. Then another. And yet another. All arriving pretty much right at 5:30 pm, half to the east of the DATA station, half to the west. Suddenly, passengers unloaded in droves from the arriving buses, most wandering around to catch another bus. It's like flying into ATL or CLT when a bank of flights arrive -- disgorging their carriage, engorging on others as they pass the A&W Hot Dogs or the Hudson News or the TCBY.

Except there's no stores here. No retail, no convenience store, nothing save a couple of vending machines visible inside the air-conditioned waiting room to my north.

As I watch this movement of humanity, I wonder -- where's the #1 bus? As I see buses filling up and passengers dwindling, I decide to head inside the air-conditioned waiting room, where a middle-aged woman in a DATA uniform awaits behind what I can only assume is bulletproof glass. She is the only visible customer service representatives, save for the drivers.

I walk up to ask her if I've missed the 5:30 edition of the #1 bus. She smiles warmly as she flicks a switch on the annunciator that, via the vibrations of microphone and speaker, connects two humans only through the magic of electricity.

"...don't...monitor...schedule...hopef...here soon," she said with a smile. Or, I should say, I heard through her smile. For the annunciator, due to some mechanical failure, manages to transmit precisely one-half of her words. Does she know? I doubt it.

But I catch her drift, and head back outside to wait for the #1 bus. As I wait, I see a man with a backpack walking over to another bus, one that seems destined for south Durham. I realize I saw him just minutes ago, walking out of the McKinney Silver ad agency at ATC even as I was heading out of my employer's warren.

Briefly, I was struck -- there's someone here like me! Someone who works in an office, has a computer, prepares meeting agenda and sends emails and creates PowerPoints from time to time. What an odd feeling, in my own town, to feel so out of place. To be struck by the undeniable privilege of privilege. To feel out of place, an unusual feeling of vulnerability for those  such as I comfortably ensconced in a middle-class existence.

At last, the #1 pulls up, and I board with perhaps a dozen fellow passengers. A few disembark before me, but more stay on to ride to Northgate and other destinations.  The bus is clean, and well-maintained inside.

As we pull away, we make a perfectly serviceable, if slightly noisy, trip down Main St., and then up Duke St. Side conversations occur here and there, but the bus is generally quiet, folks lost in thought or staring out the window at the warm day outside.

Near the Durham School of the Arts, the bus stops for two passengers, much to the chagrin of the annoyed sedans behind us, who whip around the DATA bus with a what-are-you-stopped-for verve to their swerving. Onto the bus steps a young woman, perhaps twenty-five, with a young child of four or so years in tow. As she boards, she reaches into her wallet, looking for something -- a pass? a dollar? change? -- while the bus driver waits patiently.

Perhaps ten seconds pass. No one complains or clucks in the back of the bus. Instead, a young man walks to the front of the bus. From the man's clothes, and headphones, and hairstyle, some among us might tend to associate a few of the so-many stereotypes we have in our culture for young men of his age. The Raleigh sneerers who degrade the Bull City on Internet message forums would based on his appearance alone instantly make the heuristic leap to a single word, shortened to four letters like so many expletives -- "thug."

The young man steps up to the young woman, takes his headphones off... and offers her two dollars, for bus fare. She smiles and thanks him, but declines, having found her DATA pass just as he arrived to pay her fare. Both return to their seats in the coach as the journey continues.

One day's ride, and a stereotype challenged. External appearance, like so many shadows, conceals who we are inside. In this case, a young man with the heart and character to step up to the front of the bus and help two other human beings, no questions asked. As we drive along, I have to ask myself, is it just the stereotypes of others? What's in my heart, unheard, unseen, rarely considered?

Before I can get too deeply lost in thought, the bus climbs the hill towards Knox. I pull the stop cord to exit the bus at my corner, just a few seconds from the air-conditioned comfort of my living room, the affection of the household pets, a TiVo and digital cable and WiFi and the ilk to entertain to my heart's content.

I wonder how many of the passengers on the bus today don't have air conditioning. Or a home.

It was the most passive day of commuting I've had in years -- I scarcely had to lift a finger -- yet also the most engaging, most thought-provoking.

What do I hope to get out of this next week? In part, I want to simply see how well the DATA service runs. It's a service that doesn't get frequent attention from the local fishwrap, save for the occasional criminal activity. Do the buses run on time? Are they clean? Are the drivers professional? What do passengers think?

But I realized last week, this little expedition is about finding out a little more about life in Durham, too. The parts of life I rarely get to experience.

More to follow all week here at BCR.

Comments

[KeepDurhamDifferent!]

That walk from the ATC sounds like it sucks, even more so in the heat. My favorite thing about DATA is the bike racks on the front (we didn't even have those in Cambridge), but then again that hill from the ATC is pretty steep.

My advice is to invest in a BlackBerry and an MP3 player. Gazing out the window loses its appeal pretty quickly when you have to listen to the occasional crazy person.

That said, I love riding the bus to RTP even though it's 30 minutes longer than the same distance by car. Gives me time to reflect on the day, or even catch up with work on the laptop. My only gripe is that DATA didn't participate this year in the gotriangle.org promotion, where in years past you could ride the buses free for a week. You'd get to see all kinds of people riding then.

[Celeste Copeland]

Thanks for doing this, Kevin. I've been interested in taking the bus (the #11 for me) to ATC for some time. I'm thinking that if it really worked out, I'd stop paying for Duke parking at the ATC entirely, and save money on gas. It's really too bad that Duke doesn't subsidize DATA passes.

In any case, I'll be interested to hear about your week.

[Cris]

Luckily, I am able to catch 2 buses that goes by my house (#5 & 10). However, I ride #4 to my job at Duke near North Duke Mall. I know that DATA only let you ride for free for promotion of their services or Earth Day. I can say the buses run on time except for a few slow driving bus drivers. Like MARTA in Atlanta,I wish that the Universities/Hospitals/Grocery Stores in the area sells DATA passes;it is convenient. I hate going Downtown every month just to purchase a pass with only a few minutes to spare to catch my next bus.

Also, I wish Data routes were convenient. Transferring Downtown is a waste a time. They need routes that connect in other area of town without going Downtown. Also, the buses need various a better schedule. Instead of leaving 30 minutes at the same time, the time frame should be different for the buses. They don't wait for you even if they see the bus approach the terminal a few seconds late. They will drive off.

[Goaty]

I rode the TTA from Chapel Hill to my job in downtown Durham for 3 years. It was exhausting and it took an hour or hour and a half each way, counting my walks to and from the bus stops. However, the people riding and driving the buses were always very nice.

Fragmented, inconvenient public transportation is by far the worst thing about living in this area. The Triangle will never succeed as an urban area without it. Thanks for working to publicize and humanize this issue!

[gails14]

My daughter decided to take the bus to so a little shopping at the Streets of Southpoint (note: no clothing stores in Downtown Durham or Ninth Street that appeal to teens!). It involved taking a bus from the Trinity Park Neighborhood and changing buses near the Duke Medical Center. It took over an hour to go from the Medical Center to the Mall.

She joined a group of other bus riders, most of whom were Mall employees, for the ride home. The bus did not come. Many called DATA on their cell phones asking where the bus was. They were told the bus driver didn't know where the stop was and they would have to wait for another bus. She overheard another rider talk about being robbed while waiting for the bus.

She is 18 years old - it was the last bus ride she ever took in Durham. Her friends told her she was crazy to take the bus through the sketchy area from the mall back to Trinity Park.

She grew up taking public transit in a medium size metropolitan area and was surprised at the inefficiency of the bus service in Durham.

[Michael Bacon]

Kevin,

I can't tell you how glad I am that you're doing this feature. Public transportation is something that I wanted to work on when I moved back to Durham in 1999. I've since worked successfully on any number of other issues I never thought I'd get involved in, but public transit continues to flummox me as to how to improve it.

I've got dozens of thoughts in my head right now flying around about head times, bus lanes, fixed guideways, bus rapid transit, density, gas taxes, you name it. But the biggest single obstacle is that almost no one around here takes it seriously, or if they do, they hoped for the magic bullet of TTA rail to fix all the problems. Just getting more people thinking along the lines of how to make public transit work in Durham is the most important thing that can happen right now.

All of your experiences sound very familiar to me -- particularly how your view of the city changes drastically when you do nothing more than change the way you move about it. Suddenly you notice gaps in the sidewalks, places where mud reservoirs form during rainstorms, and just how long it can be just to walk to a bus stop. I've gotten slack about riding the bus. Or rather, I'm slow enough getting out in the morning that by the time I have to make the transportation decision, the bus is eliminated by virtue of time. But I either walked or took the bus for years getting to Duke and then to UNC, so a lot of what you're saying sounds very familiar.

[gails14]

Since you live 8 minutes away from your place of work by auto have you thought about biking to work? Might be interesting to read a blog about that adventure - perhaps when the weather cools.

Also, this is a great website - Redefine the Way You Travel designed for the Triangle area:

http://www.redefinetravel.org/index.html

[hurley]

I hope you don't romanticize about taking the bus in Durham. I was on it for a week when my car was in the shop and the harassment of young black women by teenage rs was truly disgusting. They all hang around standing up saying "You so fine" etc and her expression and body language is screaming "I'll work double shifts for the next 2 months just get me off this f---ing bus". I told this to the bus driver and he said "it is what it is". Brilliant!

[erin]

Our conversation about this slipped my mind until I read in the L.A. Times about the transit strike for the Orange County Transit Authority, back in my hometown.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-ocbuses15jul15,1,6029379.story?coll=la-headlines-california

What you describe is exactly what bus service is like in OC, one of the most populous urban / suburban areas in the country. I remember trying to take the bus to different places when I was in high school and (generally) failing miserably. One of the things I find most disorienting about where I am currently is the lack of public transit. It's not late, it just isn't here. That, plus the lack of sidewalks, is very weird. If and when I leave here, I'll be looking to move to a place where I can start to walk to places again. Even with my new car :-)

[Toastie]

I'm only about eight minutes from work, too, and people have said, "You could bike!" It always sounds like such a great idea, until someone tells me how much a "good" bike costs. "Oh, but you could get buy with one that's only $xxx". Then there's the learning curve of actually become a good, responsible bike commuter. Then there's the commitment to overcoming the physical fitness obstacles. Then there's the lack of availability of some NASA-inspired cooling suit that would actually be comfortable during a Durham summer. And maybe I'm exaggerating and just being lazy...

But you're writing about taking the bus. I've still never taken a DATA bus. But you have inspired me to at least look up what (presumably convoluted) route I'd take to work if I opted to, so thanks for that!

[Toastie]

I'm only about eight minutes from work, too, and people have said, "You could bike!" It always sounds like such a great idea, until someone tells me how much a "good" bike costs. "Oh, but you could get buy with one that's only $xxx". Then there's the learning curve of actually become a good, responsible bike commuter. Then there's the commitment to overcoming the physical fitness obstacles. Then there's the lack of availability of some NASA-inspired cooling suit that would actually be comfortable during a Durham summer. And maybe I'm exaggerating and just being lazy...

But you're writing about taking the bus. I've still never taken a DATA bus. But you have inspired me to at least look up what (presumably convoluted) route I'd take to work if I opted to, so thanks for that!

[JDC]

I haven't been on a DATA bus either, but I've spent a great deal of time on TTA buses. Though my girlfriend and I share a car, I choose not to drive when it's not absolutely necessary for philosophical reasons. Plus I live and work downtown so I walk or bike pretty much anywhere else I need to go.

I actually caught a few seconds of a DATA official on a local TV channel touting transit this weekend. He made riding the bus sound like a social club, chock full or camaraderie between riders. My gut tells me otherwise.

As a transit rider during my days in the Boston area, I'm interested in seeing how DATA stacks up. Here's hoping you don't get canned if the bus runs late (which happens a lot on the TTA routes!).

[Matt]

I took a DATA bus last week, for perhaps the second or third time ever.

This was the #7, from south Durham to the bus terminal downtown. (Walking to ATC, btw: Five Points to Main Street to Blackwell. Fairly direct.) The bus was on time, and the people riding got along fine. Most of us seemed to be headed to work.

I'm a 10- to 15-minute trip from work by car; the bus ride took 30 minutes. Actually, it would have taken far more than that: if you add walking time, this is at least a one-hour trip.

The main reason I don't take the buses to work on a regular basis is that there is no bus route convenient to where I live. No matter which direction I walk - north, east, or south - I'm more than a mile from the nearest route.

Of course, there are other reasons: unless you're heading downtown, it's really difficult to get where you want to go on the bus, and you'll likely have to spend hours to get across town. gotriangle's cost calculator actually suggests it would cost me *more* to take the bus than to pay for gas, which I find surprising.

Good stuff:

- The gotriangle.org trip planner makes commuting by bus a *lot* easier.
http://www.gotriangle.org

Why isn't there more interest in improving the services offered by, and the image of, DATA by the local PTB? Some thoughts:

- DATA operations are not locally run, but outsourced to MV Transportation:
http://www.mvtransit.com/home/default.htm

- As you observed, DATA is used by the very poor, and almost exclusively by racial minorities. I don't think this factor can be easily ignored when considering the service's reputation and the lack of attention it gets, outside of crime reports.

- I doubt DATA fares cover the service's expenses. Maybe so, maybe not. But look for comparison to the Chapel Hill / Carrboro bus system, which offers free rides year-round and seems to get more use from the local populace.

- You were warned with "vagaries about shootings and crime". True, there has been violent crime associated with DATA in the last few years. But I promise you, if it hadn't been that, there would have been vagaries about something else. There often is a subtle racism at play: "if it's not white, it's not safe."

For comparison, by the way, check out this review of Atlanta's MARTA service:
http://atlanta.creativeloafing.com/gyrobase/Content?oid=oid%3A12420

[barry]

an article in the N&O last week mentioned that fewer than 1 in 10 Durham bus stops have either minimal shelter from the elements, or a place to sit while you wait that half hour or hour for the next bus.

As i posted over at my place, the bus stop nearest my house lacks shelter, a seat, a trash can, a place to stand that's not a mud pit when it rains, and visibility to oncoming traffic, which is a necessity since you're practically standing in a busy traffic lane while you're waiting for the bus.

http://dependableerection.blogspot.com/2007/07/youre-crazy-for-taking-bus.html

in short, it practically screams "Get to where you're going by some other means, but for God's sakes, don't wait here for the bus."

i'm not expecting that to change anytime soon.

[Michael Bacon]

JDC: I'd actually say the "social club" aspect is relatively accurate. It's been a few years since I took DATA on a regular basis, but there is a fair bit of camaraderie between a lot of the riders. Not everyone, of course -- you still have your obnoxious riders who disrupt things, but they're the exception rather than the rule.

Matt: While I think black people ride the bus in numbers disproportionate to their population in Durham, plenty of white people ride it too. I was the only white person on the bus less than half the time when I rode it. But you're right, they do not recover all their operating costs by fare, or even half. I can't remember all my numbers from hunkering down with the budget a few years ago, but I seem to remember about $10 million annually out of city general fund, and about $6-$7 million from fares.

Barry: I made a bit of noise a few years ago begging for bus shelters, but I have to ask: where in the world has shelters at every stop, or even half? Do even the most bus-friendly cities in the US reach %66 of stops with shelters?

[barry]

"where in the world has shelters at every stop, or even half? Do even the most bus-friendly cities in the US reach %66 of stops with shelters?"

beats me, although i'll try to do some research during the week. 2/3 of stops with shelters needn't be the goal. (Where'd that number come from, anyway?) I suspect that most European and Asian cities will meet or exceed that percentage, and i wouldn't be surprised if major Canadian cities, and some American cities do as well. On the other hand, if you're in a city where bus service is every 5 or 10 minutes, then shelters and seats are not as much of a necessity.

How about "bus stops serving 65% of all riders will be equipped with shelters, seats, and a floor that doesn't turn into a mud pit in the rain"? And how about, "all bus stops located in front of someone's house will have a trash can that will be emptied by Solid Waste Department 2x/week, so that the residents of the house don't have to spend half their free time picking up other people's garbage"?

Aside from the fact that the bus doesn't get me to work at all, and gets me downtown no faster than i can walk, the disgusting and unsafe conditions at the bus stop nearest my house would be enough to keep me from thinking about riding the bus.

[Chris]

I have a question: Doesn't the bus system receive a federal subsidy based on ridership numbers? I thought that the bus system would receive more federal dollars if more people rode the bus. If this is true, do we need to make personal sacrifices, and use the current inconvenient bus system as much as possible, in order to build a convenient public transit system for our community in the future?

[barry]

Here's an extract from an article in the San Antonio Business Journal from late last year:
" A survey of San Antonio public transit riders shows that 84 percent of respondents said they have ridden the bus more since VIA Metropolitan Transit had bus shelters installed at local stops.

That's at least according to Cemusa, the company VIA selected to manufacture and install outdoor transit furniture at its local bus stops. The ridership figure is up 10 percentage points since Cemusa first installed the local bus shelters in 2003, the company reports.

Cemusa commissioned the customer satisfaction survey to determine whether local bus patrons are happy with the bus shelters.

Not only do the shelters provide cover from the sweltering San Antonio heat during the summer months, but they also provide a place to sit while waiting for the bus. Companies like Cemusa pay for the installation of the shelters, while the companies make money off the sale of outdoor advertising space. "

http://sanantonio.bizjournals.com/sanantonio/stories/2006/11/20/daily9.html
The article doesn't note whether the city paid anything for the shelters, or exactly how many were installed. i'm still looking for that data.

I also found this info from document about the Seattle system (no link, it's a Word document):
"Today (May, 2006) there are about 9,400 bus stops in the Metro system and approximately 1,575 of those stops include sheltered cover for transit customers.

The relationship of shelters to bus stops starts with the establishment of a bus stop and trends over time in bus stop use by riders. Between 2000 and 2006, the number of sheltered bus stops increased from 1,411 to 1,579, an increase of 168 or an average gain in sheltered bus stops of about 28 per year. During the same time period, Metro constructed 303 new sheltered stops and removed 135 sheltered stops from bus stops that were permanently closed or had passenger boarding counts of less than five per day. Since 2001, sheltered stops increased by about 9%, while the percentage of riders with shelters grew by 13%. Today, Metro provides a sheltered wait for three out of every four riders."

So, about 20% of Seattle's bus stops have shelters, and those stops are used by about 3/4 of Seattle's bus riders.

I found a lot of pdf files that i'm not going to link to, and a lot of stuff where you've got to read between the lines to extract the necessary information. If you want to recreate my Google search, try these terms:
bus stop percentage shelter

the executive summary would read that, many municipalities are entering into or have entered into arrangements in which private parties build bus shelters, sell the ad space related to them, and provide a percentage of the revenue generated back to the municipality. Transit systems with clean, well maintained bus shelters attract a higher portion of the population as riders.

[Bull City Rising]

Hi all -- thanks for the comments. Wasn't expecting this much feedback on my little expedition, but thanks. First-in-the-series will run on Tuesday morning. For tonight, let me touch on some of the comments:

David: I did think about wearing my iPod along, but decided that I wanted to keep my ears open to what's happening on the bus, so as to be able to better report on the experience.

Cris: I think you're onto something in re downtown. It's a common thing in a lot of Sunbelt cities -- run everyone downtown, dump 'em in a holding pattern, let 'em board another bus. Cheap to do, and lets you sync all your buses, rather than having to actually, y'know, make connections between routes in reflection of those routes' needs. I tent to perceive in this trend, hidden in the structure, a subtle bit of classism -- run all the buses to downtown, since obviously all the bus riders must need to get to social services (for their welfare check), the courthouse (to meet their probation officer), the shelter (they can't have homes, can they?), and so forth. That's a bit cynical even for me, so let me add that I think it's more subconscious than overt if there's actually even anything to it.

Gails14: interesting story about your daughter. BTW, why don't I bike in? I've done it a couple of times when going in for weekends, but never during the work week. Honestly, I work up a sweat if I look at a bike, and I'm drenched if I ride one -- and if I'm going to ride in, I'd like to be able to do so and not have to shower upon arrival at work. I do walk to work (35 minutes each way down the N-S Greenway) a few times each fall and spring. With both biking and walking, though, I run into the issue that I frequently have to travel to Duke's East or West Campuses for meetings, and there really isn't any good transport other than having your own car to make that happen. Lame excuses, I know. :) I probably need to connect up with another bike commuter or two and learn the ropes.

[gails14]

Kevin - there is a National Bike to Work Day:

http://www.bikeleague.org/programs/bikemonth/

Here is an article about the coverage of Seattle's Bike to Work Day:

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2003712648_webbike18m.html

Many of the offices have showers and bike racks for daily bike commuters. Bikers that ride to downtown join the downtown YMCA and to use their locker rooms and showers plus store their bikes.

Here's a blog about the Bike to Work day in Bellingham, WA

http://www.theslowlane.com/bhaminfo/bikework.html

I had forgotten about the humidity in Durham. If there are any bike clubs in the area perhaps they would be interested in organizing a Bike to Work Day in Durham. Gee, another fun topic for you to blog about as if you didn't have enough already!