Broadway

[elusiveat.livejournal.com]

Is this a bicycle lane I see before me?

Comments

[secretlyironic.livejournal.com]

Yes. Citizen volunteers helped to put down markers for where the lane was going in. It will connect to the Hampshire Street lanes.

[surrealestate.livejournal.com]

No f'in way! I was just biking home on Broadway and wondering what exactly it was they were going to be painting.

Yay!

But I'm not sure how that connects to Hampshire.

[secretlyironic.livejournal.com]

Oops. I meant Beacon. My neighbor told me that Somerville's Beacon St. will be getting bike lanes to meet Cambridge's Hampshire st. (One of my neighbors is on a bike committee...)

I don't know anything about Broadway's bike lanes. But I do know the bike committee has been pushing for more lanes, and that this is the season in which lanes get painted (the paint won't stick if it's too cold so they have to wait til spring). So it's entirely possible that Broadway is also getting lanes.

[surrealestate.livejournal.com]

Lift my hopes, then dash them against the rocks. Thanks a lot!

They look to be painting *something*, anyway. Clues included the temporary "no parking" signs that indicated there would be painting as well as two big painting trucks.

[odd-dog.livejournal.com]

Broadway is getting lanes, unless that's a mirage I see outside my house :-)

[jspazzer.livejournal.com]

Beacon got bike lanes last week. Spiffy.

[haptotrope.livejournal.com]

too bad the pavement under those lanes still sucks pahtootie.

[ron_newman]

I fully agree. See this comment.

[m00n.livejournal.com]

You know I saw those last week when I was not on my bike and I was like "Wait! I'm in SOMERVILLE! ZOMG!!" It brought a smile to my face.

[odd-dog.livejournal.com]

Beacon had new lanes when I was on it yesterday. Broadway also got them.

[georgy.livejournal.com]

Where exactly on Broadway is this?

[surrealestate.livejournal.com]

Tonight they appear to be painting between Powderhouse and Packard or so. Officers with bullhorns were reminding people to move their cars or they'd get towed.

[georgy.livejournal.com]

Neat. I wonder if this will stretch all the way down to my hood in Winter Hill. Somehow I doubt it :-)

[ron_newman]

Hi. I'm on the Somerville Bicycle Committee. Beacon Street got its bike lanes last week. Tonight they're doing Broadway, between Packard Avenue and Powderhouse Circle. (The part of Broadway west of Packard is probably too narrow for bike lanes.)

[elusiveat.livejournal.com]

What makes me *really* *really* happy is that the lane markers appear to include the strip of road that I normally use anyway. This is so awesome!

[derekp.livejournal.com]

I thought the beacon street bike lane was going to be counter productive. I was wrong. The Cars drive a lot closer to the center line than they used to. It leaves plenty of room for me to ride at the edge of the bike lane and out of the door zone. Good job.

But at the intersection of Beacon and Kirkland (on the corner by what used to be Toscanini's) wasn't finished. So it's one of those bike lanes that sort of disappears and then reappears shortly thereafter. Any idea why that particular area was skipped?

[ron_newman]

I don't know about that specific location, but what I heard today was that some parts of the street had the center line off-center, which didn't leave room for bike lanes on both sides. This month's bike lane painting was done quickly and cheaply, which didn't allow for blasting away the center line and moving it.

[jspazzer.livejournal.com]

I have also observed this closer to center line phenomenon. This is the main reason I disagree with the cranky old farts on the Massbike list who complain about bike lanes being bad for cyclists.

[chumbolly.livejournal.com]

I've also observed that cars have pushed closer to the center line, and they also do a better job of not blocking the bike lane area at intersections. So count me as a fan. Though Somerville really, really needs to repave it's portion of Beacon.

Also, in the past two days I've seen the aftermath of two different car/bike crashes on Beacon/Hampshire. Scary.

[ron_newman]

Repaving will happen in a few years, but only after Somerville Avenue is finished. The city does not want to tear up two important east-west streets at once. The bike lanes you see now are a cheap interim measure until the street is rebuilt.

[derekp.livejournal.com]

Ron, what is the best way to get cycling related suggestions to the city? I would love to see more bike parking. I don't see why any parking meter should be installed without a ring for bike locks. I've noticed an uptick in racks and good locking locations, but we need more.

[ron_newman]

E-mail sbc@ci.somerville.ma.us (that's the Bicycle Committee) and swinslow@ci.somerville.ma.us (he's the city's Bicycle and Pedestrian planner). You can also post your suggestions here, and I'll forward them to Steve and the committee.

Our preference is to install future rings in places where there aren't parking meters, since bikes can already be parked to meter posts.

[derekp.livejournal.com]

Eh... sometimes.

If you've got a cable lock, you leave yourself open to just having the bike raised over the meter. If you have a small u-lock (which you should - locks that are too large = theft) such as the OnGuard Bulldog Mini or heaven forbid the Kryptonite Mini then it's pretty hard to properly lock your bike around a parking meter. I look at Parking Meters as a second to last resort (right before a street sign). The rings and racks are much preferred. That said, I don't think the city should go retrofitting meters, but when new ones are put in or work is done... why not?

[ron_newman]

Thanks, I'll pass that along. My bike lock fits around a meter post (and can't be raised over the actual meter), and I see lots of other bikes locked to meters, so I hadn't really given this much thought.

That said, I still think it's better to install new posts and rings in places that currently lack any kind of object that you can lock a bike to.

[ron_newman]

Also, I don't think the city is installing many new parking meters, if any at all. An unfortunate trend in other cities is the removal of all parking meters, replaced by self-ticketing machines. This greatly reduces the number of objects that people can lock bicycles to.

[blondeamazon.livejournal.com]

Forgive what is a very ignorant newbie biker (in the city at least) post but do the lanes really help make biking safer? I am going to be getting my bike in shape soon and trying to use it for commuting to work (Woburn which does not have bike lanes)but also running around. I go through Davis and Porter often and I have wondered if cars really stay out of the bike lane. Thanks

[schpahky.livejournal.com]

Yes. It helps. But ride on the edge of the line towards traffic to avoid getting doored by parked cars.

[daft.livejournal.com]

Yes, but I often see people on scooters who don't.
That pretty much chaps my ass.

[jspazzer.livejournal.com]

My ass too. I saw a motorcycle in there on Beacon yesterday. Such an A-Rod.

[chumbolly.livejournal.com]

That drives me crazy. If anybody reading this happens to have the habit of driving their scooter in bike lanes, please, get a clue, or a real bike.

[nalz.livejournal.com]

Scooters 50cc and under are legally allowed to ride in the bike lane.

[ukelele.livejournal.com]

You've just waded into one of those vast flaming controversies, which I will avoid ;). In my experience most but not all cars stay out of bike lanes; some will hop into them to get around slow-moving traffic before a right turn, and many will use them to double-park in commercial districts (you know, the obnoxious "I have my hazards on so I'm not really double-parked" thing?), but it's usually not an issue. The bigger things to worry about are things you'd have to worry about whether or not there were bike lanes -- cars cutting you off by making right turns, wrong-way cyclists in your lane, and people opening their driver's-side doors. (Narrow lane won't give you enough room to avoid these doors, so be aware that you may have to leave the lane in order to dodge, so you still need to be aware of traffic outside the lane, and you should be riding toward the moving-cars edge of the lane if there are parked cars on your right to give yourself maximum evasion opportunity.)

The best way to get familiar with riding in the city is to ride with other people who are used to it; your favorite bike shop can probably hook you up with some group rides.

The book The Art of Urban Cycling is fantastic.

I used to bike commute all the time and I miss the hell out of it. Have fun.

[ron_newman]

Why did you stop bike commuting?

[ukelele.livejournal.com]

1) Bought a house in Somerville, a mile and a half farther from my job in Newton (and I was never a fast rider).

2) Got pregnant. I've heard there are people who keep biking pretty much straight until labor but...I'm not one of them.

3) Now have a toddler, a complex part-time schedule involving car sharing with my husband (whose job moved from Cambridge to Waltham, axing his bike commuting, and we only have the one car), and inadequate time (see above about having a toddler and being a slow rider, and some days my job starts ass-early).

I'm doing something different next year which I expect will be much more amenable to bike commuting.

[ron_newman]

I do not know where in Woburn you are commuting to, but there is a largely unknown bike path between Winchester Center and Horn Pond in Woburn. Also, Horn Pond Parkway on the west side of the pond is entirely closed to motor traffic, making it a great place to bike (or walk).

[turil.livejournal.com]

Hooray for getting the cyclists out of the way of the real road users, the motorists!

[derekp.livejournal.com]

You realize they're going to be in the same spot they were in before, right? Just that the motorists will see a line there.

[turil.livejournal.com]

Nah, those bike lanes make it way more clear to the cyclists that they don't belong on the roads, and should hug those gutters and door zones instead of using the real travel lane.

[odd-dog.livejournal.com]

Hooray for giving me a bike lane in which I can pass the cars stuck at a standstill during my morning commute. Suckers!

[turil.livejournal.com]

Enjoy it until you get doored, or suffer the cruel fate of a right hook.

Seriously, bike lanes are just about the worst invention for cyclists ever. They really are just a scam to keep cyclists feeling inferior, rather than promoting them as equal vehicles, entitled to the entire lane, as they legally are, and as safety requires.

Sure, use the space if you want, but know that it's poorly designed and politically anti-bike.

[odd-dog.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I totally didn't realize your earlier comment was sarcastic! I had a run-in on College yesterday with a woman who honked and told me to get to the right, then kept yelling at me to the point where I eventually called the police. I thought you were a similar-minded driver and was trying to be snarky.

I don't think it's a bad idea to have bike lanes, particularly in areas where the speed limit for motorists far exceeds the capabilities of the average bike commuter. To what extent I use the bike lane or right of the road depends on what road I'm on and what the traffic conditions are like. On Mass Ave, where traffic generally is below 30mph (and where I've gotten doored, fortunately without damage to my person or my bike), I'll take up more space, but if the bike lane is going to get me past stopped drivers on a commute through, say, Inman, I'll take advantage of it. And if I'm out by myself on a winding road in a 40-50mph zone, I stay as far to the right as practicable (I believe this is also the guideline set forth by most state motor vehicle registries/departments).

[mihmo.livejournal.com]

I recently got screamed at by a COP on the 2-A in Lexington, telling me to right on the right (I was barely over the white shoulder line into the lane.) At that point on the road I think it's 35-45 mph. But, I thought bikes get full access to the lane irregardless of speed...

[ilai]

Off topic, but I feel obliged: "Out, damned spot! Out, I say!"