It's An Improvement, But...

I've come across an interesting The Atlantic blog article about bike lanes.

Its author, Steven Higashide, reports that when he first started working in New York City, in 2007, "bicycling seemed like an activity best left to the pros" like one of the city's "stock characters", a bike messenger with "a heavy chain lock around the waist" could be seen "whipping through traffic with supreme confidence."

Now, he says, he regularly uses Citi Bike for "short trips to and from the subway, after-work rides to friends' apartments and fun rides on sunny days."  He attributes his willingness to pedal to the 98 miles of protected bike lanes the city has constructed during the past decade.

He briefly describes the developments that made bike lane construction happen in New York, and other US cities.  Chief among them is something the National Association of City Transportation Officials (NACTO), a forum started in 1996 for big-city transportation planners to swap ideas, did around the time Mr. Higashide started cycling in the Big Apple.  Its members researched the standards set out in design guides traffic engineers and urban planners were consulting.  Not surprisingly, there was little mention of how to integrate bicycles into urban traffic and transportation systems, and what little was mentioned had mainly to do with painted on-street bike lanes and pleasant, if impractical, off-street paths along waterfronts and in parks. 

A "protected" bike lane in Washington, DC.

Then NACTO researched the protected bike lanes that had already been part of Northern European cities for three decades. NACTO adopted their designs--well, somewhat.  NACTO's recommendations fall into the "something is better than nothing" category:  The standards in the Netherlands, and other countries, were still more bike-friendly:  their lanes are wider (on narrower streets) and the Dutch lanes offer even more protection from traffic, especially at intersections, where for Americans it is still minimal to non-existent.  

But perhaps the worst aspects of NACTO's guidelines is that they still incorporate most of the principles (or mistakes, as I've come to think of them) espoused by American traffic engineers and planners over the past century:  the speed and flow of automobile traffic are valued over walkability (On roads with medians, traffic signals are timed so that pedestrians have only enough seconds to get to the median rather than to cross the entire road.), cyclability or livability.

And, worst of all, too many of those lanes--as I've pointed out in other posts--are poorly-designed, -constructed or -maintained.  Or they are simply impractical:  They start and end abruptly.  Even for a recreational cyclist, this is a disincentive to use them:  For transportation cyclists, it makes them simply useless.  Moreover, even the protected lanes are too often blocked by pedestrians, food vendors--and, at times, even the motor vehicles that supposedly aren't allowed on them.

What NACTO's guidelines do, mainly, is to provide legal and political cover.  When then-Mayor Ed Koch had bike lanes built along 5th, 6th and 7th Avenues, and Broadway in mid-town Manhattan, he was guided only by his memory of "a million cyclists in Beijing", not any guidelines or principles of transportation planning.  That is why taxi and trucking interests, among others, didn't need to do very much to pressure the Mayor to remove those lanes only a few months later.  A quarter-century later, when New York and other cities started to build bike lanes, they could at least say that they were following guidelines set forth by professionals in the field, however misguided they may be. NACTO guidelines were further legitimized in 2013, when the Federal Highway Administration endorsed them in a memo.  

To be fair, NACTO's guidelines were an improvement on previous standards for bicycle infrastructure in American cities, such as they existed.   And NACTO is furthering its research and issuing new, and in many cases improved, guidelines.  But the way planners see cyclists, pedestrians and vehicular traffic--and motorists' awareness of cyclists and pedestrians--still needs to evolve.  Otherwise, the construction of more bike lanes, however pretty or "protected", will not result in safer cycling or entice more people to get out of their cars and into the saddle.

A "Bridgegate" For Cyclists?

I lived through a time when the word "nuclear" was almost invariably followed by "holocaust".

Then again, I also experienced a few air raid drills when I was in elementary school.  One of the first stern glares a Carmelite nun directed at me was in response to my innocent (well, maybe not-so-inncocent) question:  "How is this going to protect us from an atom bomb?"

(Of course, now everybody knows that this is what you do in case of a nuclear attack:

• Duck under desk or table.
• Curl up in foetal position.
• Place head firmly between legs.
• Then, kiss your ass goodbye.)

Anyway...just as "nuclear" went with "holocaust", it seems that these days, "bridge" is followed by "gate".  And "Bridgegate" is the first thing people think of when you mention the George Washington Bridge.

Traffic jams have been as much a part of the bridge's 85-year history as corruption has been a part of the politics on both sides of the bridge.  Most of those tie-ups, unlike the ones caused by Governor Christie's acolytes, are not deliberate.  Nor will the ones that will  probably come soon and plague the bridge for the nest seven years.

Actually, the Port Authority's renovation project began last year, when lead paint was removed from the lower deck.  Removal of said paint will continue, and most important of all, the vertical cables will be replaced.  The PA says it will try to time the work to cause the least possible inconvenience to commuters.

Just as the term "human being" meant "white man with property*" to the Founding Fathers, "commuters" means, in PA parlance, folks who drive into the city and, well, maybe those who take the bus.  So, for that matter, does "traffic".

Now, to be fair, the PA plans to improve access to the bridge's bike and pedestrian lanes.  Then again, almost anything would be an improvement over what exists:  Hairpin turns on the New York side of the lane on the south side of the bridge, and steep stairs on both sides to access the lane on the north side.  Worse yet, the stairs on the New York side can only be entered by crossing a heavily-trafficked street that has become a de facto exit lane for the bridge an the Cross-Bronx expressway, and for buses entering and leaving the George Washington Bridge bus terminal.

It's like this on a good day.

But those entrances aren't the worst part of the lanes.  For one thing, in more than three decades of biking (and, occasionally, walking) across the bridge, I have never seen both lanes open at the same time.  Worst of all, though, is that each of those lanes is seven feet wide at its widest. At some pinch points--where, for example, towers are located--the lanes are considerably narrower.  And, of course, the structures that cause the "pinch" also make for very poor sight lines.  At times, I've wondered that collisions and conflicts between cyclists and pedestrians aren't more frequent than they are.

To give you some perspective:  The Federal Highway Administration recommends 14 feet for a two- way bike lane.  And the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials recommends 16 feet.  

In other words, the lanes are half as wide as is generally recommended.  And, just as the GWB is the nation's busiest commuter crossing for motorists, its bike and pedestrian lanes are also among the nation's busiest.

Now, are you ready for this?  The Port Authority's plans call for reconstructing the bike and pedestrian lanes.  The north lane will be designated for cyclists, and the south for pedestrians.  Sounds good so far, right?

New Jersey entrance to the bike/pedestrian lane on the south side of the George Washington B

And the bike lane will indeed be wider.  How much wider?  Check this out:  one foot.  So the new bike lane, according to the plan, will be 8 feet wide.  There is nothing to indicate that narrower "pinch points" won't be eliminated.  Perhaps they can't be.  But I have to wonder why, if the Port Authority is planning what is essentially a once-in-a-century project, it can't or won't build the bike and pedestrian lanes to modern standards. Instead, it plans to rebuild the lanes to the standards that existed in 1931, when the bridge opened.  

Now, I don't know much about the economics of major public works projects.  I can't help but to think, though, that in relative terms, it wouldn't cost much more to build a modern path than the one that's planned--and, better yet, to build  a bike path on a separate, lower lever from the pedestrian lane.  Certainly, doing so would cost less than building another lane as a stand-alone project at a later date.

Artist's rendering of a possible bike laneconstructed at a lower level alongside the current lane on the north side, which would be reserved for pedestrians.

Oh--one other thing is planned in the reconstruction:  a fence, a.k.a. a suicide barrier, along each lane.  I'm not going to argue that such a barrier shouldn't be installed:  It's likely that most of the suicides that have occurred from the bridge were preventable.  I can't help but to wonder, though, whether the barriers will make riding or walking across the bridge feel even more claustrophobic than it already is at times.

Turn, Turn, Turn (And We're Not Talking About The Byrds)!

Until recently, I believed most bike lanes were designed by people who don't ride bicycles.  You may think I'm cynical, but I've ridden on too many lanes that ended abruptly ("bike lanes to nowhere"), had poor sight lines, let cyclists out into the middle of major intersections or were, for various other reasons, simply not any safer than the streets they paralleled.

Now I'm starting to wonder whether lane designers are acting under orders to reduce the population of cyclists.  I guess, for them, that's the easiest way to appease motorists upset that we're "taking the road away from" them.  

I mean, what other reason is there for this?



Had the bike lane continued in a straight line, or simply ended at that intersection, it would be safer for anyone who has to turn left from that intersection.  Instead, a cyclist riding through that loop has to make two sharp left turns almost within meters of each other in order to go where one left turn would have taken him or her.

And studies have shown that left turns are significantly more dangerous than right turns for motorists.  (That is the reason why, for example, all United Parcel Service delivery routes are planned so that the drivers make only right turns.)  What sort of diabolical mind would force cyclists to make two such turns in succession?

This strange piece of transportation "planning" was inflicted on the cyclists of Nottingham.  I thought planners in England knew better.  Oh, well.

The Bike Lane Follies Never End

Sometimes I feel as if I could devote an entire blog to bike lanes that are poorly conceived, constructed, simply useless or bad in any number of other ways.

I've seen some doozies here in New York.  But the worst I've seen in The Big Apple is, apparently, sane compared to some that have been constructed in other parts of the US and world.

Some of the lanes I hear about are almost comically bad because it's simply impossible to understand how they can be imagined even by someone who has never seen a bike in his or her life.  When I'm in a charitable mood, I tell myself that the designers of such lanes assume that bicycles and cyclists possess extraordinary powers that mortal drivers and cars can't even dream of.

I mean, some are built as if we can pedal through steel columns or even stronger stuff.  As an example, check out this gem posted on the blog of Bike Shop Hub in Tucson, Arizona:

 

 Unfortunately, there's more where that came from--or, at least, where I found that gem.  Scroll down the page I've linked and check out, in particular, the ones posted by Marlo Stimpson and David Common.

More Bike Lane Follies

Writing yesterday's post got me to thinking, again, about some of the really bad bike lanes I've ridden. I'm talking about the kind that, if they don't enrage you because they put you in more danger than you would have experienced while riding with cars and trucks, they leave you scratching your head and wondering, "What were they thinking when they built this?"

Of course, some of those lanes aren't exactly built:  They were merely designated by some lines of paint and a few signs.  But there are the ones that make you wonder why anybody bothered to spend the time or money to build barriers or cut through parkland. 

Paths like those lead to nowhere.  I wrote about such a lane in an earlier post:

A year later, I showed another that ran under the elevated tracks of the IRT #1 train in upper Manhattan--and right into the pillars that support said tracks:

I guess I shouldn't complain, though.  No lane I've ridden is quite like this one:

It's in Exeter, England.  Hmm...Maybe the Brits have some sort of cycling we've never dreamed of here in the 'States.  Whatever it is, it's certainly stranger than riding down this bike lane:

It might be the only bike lane in the world designed for BMXers or downhill riders--though I still rather doubt that whoever conceived it has ever been anywhere near a bike!

A "Bike Lane" Under The Tracks

In some of my earlier posts, I expressed ambivalence and even disdain for bike lanes.

While it can be very nice to be able to pedal on ribbons of concrete or asphalt where motor vehicles aren't allowed, too many bike lanes are as dangerous as, or even more dangerous than, the roadways and motorists from which the lanes separate us.

Such lanes end abruptly or make turns though intersections that put cyclists directly in the path of turning trucks and buses.  Others are not clearly marked--for pedestrians, motorists  or cyclists--which results in pedestrians walking into our paths as they're chatting on their cell phones, or drivers using the bike lanes to pass other motorists.

Still others go nowhere or are so poorly constructed that they're all but unusable.  But I've never seen one quite like this:

Above 10th Avenue in the very northern end of Manhattan, the #1 train of the NYC transit system rumbles and clatters. The tracks are supported by the steel columns posted every few feet in the bike lane.

I mean, if you can ride a bike, you can do anything, right?  Well, almost...I haven't quite mastered riding through immobile objects.

The sign in the photo is not an aberration:  One is posted on every other (more or less) steel column.