The next phase of public outreach regarding the bike master plan update is gearing up, and you’ll have a chance to comment on proposed routes for neighborhood greenways, cycle tracks, bike lanes and more.
To the right, you can see the recommended bike facilities map from the 2007 Bike Master Plan. It looks great and has gone a long way toward making safer streets in Seattle. However, we’ve also seen that many of these facilities ended up as sharrows on busy roads (largely ineffective at encouraging more cycling) and bike lanes placed in the parked car door zone. The new map may look somewhat similar to the 2007 map (with more neighborhood streets in the update, of course), but it’s the facility type recommended that will hopefully change dramatically.
This is the exciting part of the update for bike facility geeks (and since you’re reading this, you probably are). So my question to you is: If you could only name one bike facility to be included in the plan, what would it be?
Here’s the poster of info about the upcoming meetings:
Comments
10 responses to “Upcoming Bike Master Plan meetings will discuss proposed facilities”
Cycle tracks on 15h Ave NE, NE 45th St, 23rd Ave E, Jackson, Montlake, Lakeview Blvd, Eastlake, and Brooklyn. New bike/ped bridges over I5 on NE 47th St and over the Montlake cut. A transformed Melrose Ave with additional connections over I5.
How many did you say we get?
Can’t wait to see all the travel and parking lane removal that will be required to get higher quality bike facilities along corridors that actually connect to destinations!
If I could have any one improvement, it would be a bike/ped bridge connecting Wallingford and the University District. A doozy, I know, but it would so great.
Top priority for me is a north-south cycletrack through downtown. 2nd or 4th Ave?
I’m not sure how the light sequencing works when you put a two way cycle track on a one way road.
Currently I can go all the way down 2nd from Belltown to the ID with either one or zero red lights.
I can get up 1st or 4th and usually get stopped at 2 or 3 lights.
It seems like if I was going in the opposite direction on either of these I’d keep getting stopped because the lights were sequenced for efficient travel in the opposite direction.
You’d have to build the cycle track and revise the light sequence, I’m not convinced the second part would happened. My previous efforts in dealing with SDOT on light timing issues have not ended up well, even when the sequencing obviously didn’t make sense.
FWIW, even having one-way protected, non-door-zone tracks in the traffic direction on those streets would get the job done, ‘eh? I think NYC has a lot of those.
It doesn’t much bother me to ride in streets with cars, but I know I’m in a small minority who feel comfortable doing that, so my desired improvements are whatever facilities will get the most normal people out on bikes. Even less ambitious facilities such as Dexter (not perfect, but so nice compared to much of what we have) draw an incredible number of cyclists in all types of weather. I think I would prefer right now we invest in a lot of average facilities (like Dexter) then a few ideal (and expensive) facilities. A N/S cycle track on Second would probably be a good investment for the heavily used downtown. Beyond that it seems like well done bike lanes on feeder streets (again, like Dexter) and properly designed neighborhood greenways (with cross traffic stop signs) are the biggest bang for our buck.
I’m not going to get too specific about this, because there’s more than one way to do it, but the single biggest cycling barrier in Seattle is I-5 on the south end. I think some kind of good bike facility across I-5 around Columbian Way and on to the West Seattle Bridge would open up tons of options for people.
After that, at least one of 1st Ave S, 4th Ave S, or Airport Way S needs a bike facility over the railyard. Alternately, extend the SODO trail and build a new bridge around 6th Ave S. But the question was one thing, and I think I-5 is the bigger deal.
I live in Fremont, and I don’t think anything north of downtown should be prioritized over getting across those barriers.
And, of course, there’s always the I-5 Express Trail: http://seattlebikeblog.com/2012/01/25/while-i-dream-of-an-i-5-bike-facility-wsdot-cameras-spot-repeat-i-5-cyclist/
Of all Seattle’s barriers, the ship canal is one of the more crossable ones, and of the ship canal crossings, the one that needs the most attention is Ballard, and after that Montlake. An I-5 path over the ship canal makes many of today’s reasonable bike trips more convenient, and there’s something to be said for that — if we have a big, hill-defeating bridge, it might as well be accessible for walking and biking.
But a direct route from the West Seattle Bridge to the Beacon Hill Greenway would take trips that are really inconvenient today and make them possible. It would open up biking possibilities between West Seattle, SODO, Beacon Hill, and then to all the places it’s convenient to bike to from Beacon Hill — the ID, First Hill, Cap Hill, the Rainier Valley, the Eastside. That’s transformative impact. Similarly with a safe route across that railyard in SODO.