No one is quite sure how many South Coast residents commute to and from work, which is why two Santa Barbara City Council members were pushing Tuesday for the city to better study that number.

The council debated the validity of authorizing a new $20,000 independent study of bicycle use, but, in the end, it unanimously voted to table that discussion in favor of a cheaper option.

City staff will come back in September with a quote for the cost of adding bicyclist and pedestrian counts to a 50-intersection automobile count the city already conducts annually, depending on whether overall population has grown enough.

Councilmen Frank Hotchkiss and Dale Francisco requested garnering more bicycle statistics through a new survey, which would be used to tailor a Bicycle Master Plan the city will soon update in an effort to make cycling safer and to entice more residents to use the form of transportation that could reduce traffic congestion.

The city has already set aside $170,000 to pay Los Angeles-based urban planning firm Melendrez to lead the update of Santa Barbara’s master plan.

Council members heard an update on that process in April, but many of them — along with community members — were less than impressed with the firm’s outreach efforts.

Hotchkiss got the $20,000 figure after speaking with an engineering company.

“Accurate numbers are really important to measure our progress in the future … so we can accurately measure any improvements made,” he said.

The city isn’t using bicycle-count data from the Santa Barbara Bicycle Coalition in its plan update, since officials care more about who is biking to work. The coalition uses volunteers to conduct bicycle counts to measure the popularity of bike riding in general.

Santa Barbara’s Transportation Planning Manager Rob Dayton told officials the city recently spent $4,000 to gain data from Strava, a smartphone app tracking where 5,000 locals are biking around the South Coast — with commuter-specific stats.

He also mentioned that bikes could be added to the city’s 50-intersection automobile count, which sets video equipment at popular intersections for a one-time count gathered during commuter hours over a week’s time.

That enhancement could cost between $2,500 and $7,000, Dayton said, and would come from the general fund or streets fund reserves.

Council members debated using an app they said caters more to bike enthusiasts than typical riders — the target audience of the master plan.

“We’re glad, actually, that this issue has been raised because we also agree good data is essential to long-term planning,” said Sam Franklin of the Bicycle Coalition. “It should be pretty obvious that bicycle use is growing.”

Other public speakers recommended doing more than one point-in-time count or studying public health data related to bike and car collisions.

Councilman Gregg Hart asked to include pedestrians in the 50-intersection count as well, hoping the data could be useful when applying for transportation grants in the future.

Dayton cautioned that one point-in-time count might not be that helpful, but council members decided that the data taken over several years just might be.

— Noozhawk staff writer Gina Potthoff can be reached at gpotthoff@noozhawk.com. Follow Noozhawk on Twitter: @noozhawk, @NoozhawkNews and @NoozhawkBiz. Connect with Noozhawk on Facebook.