Comments on: In Portland, Construction Can’t Kill a Bike Lane

By: Joseph Martinez

Joseph Martinez — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 14:41:03 +0000

In Cambridge, MA, they do this as well. A good example is the Fogg Art Museum renovation. On Broadway, they actually put up 2 sets of Jersey Barriers, one for the bike lane, and the other for the cars. Quite nice!

By: ramonchu

ramonchu — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 02:45:02 +0000

Here in LA, Beverly Blvd just west of Downtown has been under construction forever, limiting car traffic to one lane in either direction. No one complains, the city hasn’t fallen into a volcano, and the traffic hasn’t got worse, it got better–it went away. If I were mayor that would be my ruse; tell everyone in the city we’re engaging in a massive road building effort, go around closing off streets to look like construction sites but leaving spaces open for pedestrians, bicyclists, families, children, people young and old, and then watching the city flourish.

By: Stacy

Stacy — Thu, 22 Apr 2010 19:20:11 +0000

DOT had barely striped and painted the bike lane slated to run around Washington Square and down Macdougal Street when it got shut down by NYU construction on a Macdougal Street. It’s been over a year since DOT put in a separate lane, without marking, that might have connected the Washington Square bike lanes with Bleecker. Maybe they’re waiting for the Macdougal Street construction to end?

Two blocks to the east. NYU has taken also over the sidewalk on east side of Thompson Street for more construction. There’s a temporary walkway for pedestrians that further narrows the roadway cars are supposed to share with cyclists. With Obama in town today this so called “best route to get downtown” is an absolute mess.

By: Cap'n Transit

Cap'n Transit — Thu, 22 Apr 2010 17:40:04 +0000

In many other cities it’s common for sidewalks to be completely blocked by construction, often for blocks, with no alternate route. One of the many reasons I moved back to New York.

By: Jeff

Jeff — Thu, 22 Apr 2010 16:48:59 +0000

That is pretty impressive. And to think I was pleasantly surprised when the NYC DOT puts up those orange signs that say, “Construction in Bike Lane. Proceed with caution.”

But I never know how to interpret them. Are they telling cyclists to proceed with caution because they have to merge into the general-use lane, or are they telling motorists to proceed with caution because cyclists may be unexpectedly merging into the general-use lane? Or both?

I think it would be fair to have a traffic regulation which requires motorists to yield to cyclists who must enter general traffic from an obstructed bike lane, whether it is obstructed for legitimate reasons (construction, a delivery or livery drop-off which couldn’t reasonably be expected to occur otherwise, etc.), or illegitimate reasons (individuals who feel that bicycle lanes are an appropriate place to store large pieces of personal property).

By: Ian Dutton

Ian Dutton — Thu, 22 Apr 2010 16:40:03 +0000

Nice to see a couple of people noticed that the bike lane has been retained on Lafayette in the vicinity of the NYCT station rehabilitation at the Bleecker St. 6-train stop.

That wasn’t part of the original plan. It was restored because the community board expressed concerns about the removal of the bike lane.

And that’s why you should go to community board meetings

By: pat

pat — Thu, 22 Apr 2010 16:34:14 +0000

i believe i saw one on lafayette just north of Houston for the MTA’s connection of the f and 6 lines project.

By: Sean

Sean — Thu, 22 Apr 2010 16:29:46 +0000

It’s better now as a few of the projects have been finished, but for a while in fall and winter, there were two construction projects that blocked the crosstown bike lanes on 20th and 21st Streets in Manhattan – two projects each street.

21st Street was the more difficult to navigate: a corral of construction equipment that filled the bike lane between Broadway and Fifth (still there) and a wooden walled compound filling the bike lane and greeting you as you crossed Ninth Avenue going toward Tenth.

In both cases riders needed to move quickly into the narrowed vehicular lanes. It was and, in the case of the Broadway project, still is an unpleasant and needlessly dangerous situation.

By: J

Thu, 22 Apr 2010 16:21:01 +0000

Utility work in the cycle tracks on 8th & 9th Ave, regularly blocks the entire lane, rendering it pretty useless. This usually occurs at the ped refuges near intersections, when a utility vehicle is parked between the corner and the refuge. Simply parking a few feet away would leave enough room for bikes to squeeze by, but apparently that would inconvenience the workers too much, and the city hasn’t found a way to encourage/enforce this.

Also, the comparison between Portland and NYC is a bit unfair. The Portland street looks pretty suburban, with no curb use. We simply don’t have any streets like that in Manhattan and the inner boroughs. However, I still agree that we can do a lot more to maintain bike and ped access during construction. While it looks like DOT is starting to address this, they have a LONG way to go.

By: Geck

Geck — Thu, 22 Apr 2010 16:10:55 +0000

I did once see a contractor on Third Street in Brooklyn that marked out a temporary lane with cones and had a flag man present while the lane was temporarily being blocked. But that is certainly the exception. On the positive side, cops can’t reasonably ticket on the Adams Street approaching to the Brooklyn Bridge for not using the bike lane as it is now completely blocked by construction.