"What is it going to cost?"
The short answer is: It varies greatly, depending on what you're building.
In the last two years material and labor costs have plummeted. This is a good thing for fiscally prudent jurisdictions (ahem, like Laurel). Tomorrow night, the City has a public hearing on installing approximately 2 miles of bike lanes and bike signage along 4th and 5th Streets. To answer the inevitable question of cost - the proposed bike lanes, as presented, will run about $10,000.
To some, this may be a trivial amount; to others, it may appear exorbitant. So, in order to provide context for everyone, please see the following chart that looks at how much infrastructure $10,000 buys, for several different modes of transportation.
This is a simplified comparison that doesn't take into account maintenance costs or other construction costs that relate to terrain re-grading. It also doesn't factor in the time savings of one transportation mode over another - something that is tougher to put a price on, and something that diminishes in value as the distance traveled decreases.
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