Cambridge City Manager Huang Acknowledges ‘Difficult Trade-Offs’ Following Contentious Bike Lane Vote

Cambridge City Manager Yi-An Huang ’05 acknowledged the many “horrendous accidents” that have impacted Cambridge’s bikers, but said the passage of a controversial proposal to extend Cambridge’s bike lane expansion deadline reflected a need to make tough decisions on the city’s most contested political issue.

“We’re trying to evolve our transportation infrastructure to help people get around the city more efficiently, more sustainably,” Huang said during a Tuesday interview with The Crimson. “The challenge is we are making really difficult trade-offs.”

During a seven-hour-long Monday meeting, five councilors voted in favor of a policy order to extend the city’s deadline to construct a 25-mile network of separated bike lanes under the Cycling Safety Ordinance from May 1, 2026 to Nov. 1, 2027.

The sponsors of the order said the deadline needed to be extended to better understand the economic impact of bike lanes on small businesses, primarily regarding the removal of street parking.

But nearly 300 residents spoke out against extending the policy during Monday’s marathon public comment session, saying that delaying the installation of bike lanes posed fatal risks to cyclists.

Though Huang declined to say whether he supported the Council proposal, he affirmed the need to expand the bike lane network — which is required under the city’s amended Cycling Safety Ordinance passed in 2020.

He said the issue of bike lanes is “divisive everywhere.”

“I think it helped that we were having a conversation primarily about how fast we were implementing bike lanes,” Huang said, “not whether we were implementing bike lanes.”

The key reason cited for the CSO’s extension was the lack of information on bike lanes’ impact on small businesses and ground floor retail. Though the city commissioned an economic impact study, the February results were largely inconclusive.

According to Huang, there were limitations in measuring the economic impact, largely due to irregular economic patterns due to the Covid-19 pandemic and scarce public data on key information like local sales taxes.

“What we need to respond to is not necessarily responding and finding a dollar value to the impact of bike lanes,” Huang said. “I think it’s more recognizing that we are managing a community, and we need to find ways to make these changes while listening to voices and just finding different ways for mitigation.”

Huang also deferred the decision-making responsibility to the Council, saying that the job of city staff was to present “reasonable options” to implement the ordinance.

He said his office was “not necessarily taking a stance, especially given how close the vote was.”

While Huang said the decision to extend the CSO’s deadline would not dramatically impact the city’s planning, there will be “a fair amount of work” as the city continues to collect stronger data and expand the network.

“I think we have the major decision made by the Council,” Huang said. “The city is now instructed to bring forward the amended language of the ordinance which actually needs to be voted through.”

“I think there’s actually a lot of work left for us to kind of get through on this one,” he added.

As the city continues to address Cambridge’s transportation issues, Huang said focusing on the “less controversial” aspects of sustainable transportation was also a priority, citing Bluebikes as an example.

“I think those are all also really exciting things that we’re really looking forward to as well,” Huang said.

—Staff writer Ayumi Nagatomi can be reached at ayumi.nagatomi@thecrimson.com. Follow her on X @ayumi_nagatomi.

—Staff writer Avani B. Rai can be reached at avani.rai@thecrimson.com. Follow her on X @avaniiiirai.