As the town of Columbus embarks on creating a brand new plan for an interconnected system of motorbike lanes, advocates are calling for more protected lanes.
“I think we need to prioritize a network of safe and protected bike lanes or off-street bike lanes that connect to other lanes,” stated University District resident Lauren Squires. “I think this is long overdue in the city.”
The metropolis’s planning course of will final till 2024, stated Justin Goodwin, Columbus’ transportation planning supervisor. The metropolis can be asking for requests for proposals by the tip of November for consultants to assist with the plan.
He stated various cycle lane and cycleway tasks are underway and officers acknowledge the necessity to join them. The final plan dates from 2008.
“A lot has changed in the last 10 to 15 years, with the growth of the city, the movement,” Goodwin stated. “We’re hearing loud and clear from the cycling community that they want safer, more connected cycling infrastructure.”
Goodwin stated the plan will embody the place protected bike lanes must be and the place there must be bodily separation between the road and bike lanes the place attainable.
The downtown strategic plan at the moment being developed consists of protected bike lanes.
Ways to guard bike lanes embody plastic or metal bollards, curbs, planters and even inserting parked vehicles between site visitors lanes and bike lanes.
Squires, who lives within the SoHud neighborhood close to Hudson and Summit streets, stated she normally bikes to work when climate situations allow and the temperature is not any decrease than 30. She is an affiliate professor within the Department of English at The Ohio State University.
Even whereas using within the protected two-way bike lane alongside Summit Street between East eleventh Avenue and East Hudson Street, Squires stated cyclists must be alert to keep away from being hit by vehicles. There, the lanes are separated from site visitors by poles and parked vehicles.
“Drivers don’t stop,” she stated. “Cars are very dominant. Anyone who travels by other means feels the danger of cars.”
Arguments that bike lanes aren’t used throughout winter months or in unhealthy climate aren’t sufficient to justify the shortage of protected lanes, Squires stated.
“I think the city is at a point where it has to take this stuff seriously, not continue with half measures,” she stated. “It’s a basic service important enough for the city to provide.”
In June, the town amended a plan on Indianola Avenue to retain parking alongside a three-block stretch on either side of Indianola between Weber and Midgard roads whereas creating bike lanes.
The metropolis’s unique plan would have diminished the variety of parking areas on Indianola from 60 to 30, all of which might have been on the west aspect of the road. Business house owners alongside Indianola objected to this, saying eliminating a lot area would harm enterprise.
Some bike advocates have been upset by metropolis officers’ determination to carry an occasion concerning the planning course of earlier this week on the Studio 35 Cinema and Drafthouse, whose proprietor Eric Brembeck has fought to retain parking areas.
“They were very dismissive about our security concerns,” Squires stated.
Brembeck stated the compromise was “the best we could expect”.
“That’s what the government is supposed to do. I don’t think people understand the process and what my opposition was,” he stated.
Michael Smith, a Northwest Side bicycle owner and member of the Transit Columbus advocacy group, stated he rode the Olentangy Trail to Ohio State, the place he’s a scholar and graduate analysis assistant.
“The city needs to build a connected network of protected bike lanes. The city only has one mile of protected bike lanes on Summit,” Smith stated.
“The city hasn’t built protected bike lanes since 2015. Meeting community needs is a big disappointment for me,” he stated.
Goodwin stated the town plans to put in protected bike lanes alongside Mount Vernon Avenue within the King-Lincoln Bronzeville neighborhood on the close to east aspect of city.
Columbus civil service officers traveled to Boston to assessment that metropolis’s bike lane community, Goodwin stated. This week, Goodwin and metropolis and Central Ohio Transit Authority officers traveled to Minneapolis-St. Paul to take a look at bike lanes and bus fast transit programs.
COTA desires to construct a bus fast transit system in Franklin County — the LinkUS initiative — that might connect with a bicycle community.
Erin Synk, vp of Yay Bikes!, a motorbike advocacy group, stated it is essential to take a look at peer cities to see how they join their programs.
“We don’t have to reinvent the wheel every time,” Synk stated.
mferench@dispatch.com
@MarkFerenchik
