Eliminating Parking on the Even Side of Beacon St

[ratheripped.livejournal.com]

**Standard not exactly Davis but close enough warning**

For those of you who live along Beacon St. in Somerville, bike commute on it, or go to any of the businesses along there this is EXTREMELY important to read:

Apparently the plan to create a bike track the whole way down Beacon St. includes getting rid of ALL the parking on the even side of Beacon St. As someone who commutes by bike and car equally to get around here, I don't think getting rid of half the parking on the street is the answer. Honestly, just a good repave job would make it a lot safer for both bikers and cars since it's a fairly wide street to begin with and dodging the pot holes made biking on it dangerous...not the absence of a bike track.

This is going to make an already not-that-great parking situation exponentially worse (especially come street cleaning days) and hurt the businesses along there (think Zoe's, Cafe Rustica, The Laundromat, Petsi's, Pho n' Rice, Thai Hut, RF's, etc.) Most of the side streets along the part of Beacon near Porter are tiny little private ways that will call up Pat in a heartbeat to tow you.

A lot of these businesses relied on the 2hr parking on Beacon and having it disappear does not spell good news. As a resident who keeps a car, I already find myself fighting for spaces thanks to never-ending construction and the influx of residents with cars and their visitors during the school year.

So if you're not cool with this or want to learn more about the plan, stop by a town meeting on Monday, Oct 29th 7:30 at Cafe Rustica with the alderman to go over the details. If you can't make the meeting and you're not in favor of this, you can sign a petition at the Cafe or one of the other business along Beacon.

Apparently the meeting is no longer open to the Public but to Beacon St. Businesses and residents only [most likely do to space limitations]  - if you disagree with the proposal you can still stop by Rustica to sign the petition during their business hours. I believe they're closed on the 26th this week, but will be open on Saturday the 27th as usual.

Updates:
View the plan for the proposed reconfiguration here: http://somervillebikes.org/documents/2011-11%20Interdepartmental%20mtg%20Nov%202011_FINAL.pdf

Approximately 75 2hr and residential parking spaces along the even side of Beacon will be eliminated because of this plan.

****IMPORTANT READ:  The owner of the Beacon Street Laundromat elaborates on how this will affect business in the neighborhood and how poorly the city and Bike Committee have been about communicating with businesses and residents about the plans for the cycle tracks: http://davis-square.livejournal.com/3035976.html?thread=33457224#t33457224 ***

Comments

[ron_newman]

The proposal is to eliminate even-side parking, and build a cycle track, only from Somerville Avenue to Washington Street -- not the entire length of Beacon Street.

(Disclaimer: I'm on the Somerville Bicycle Committee, which supports building the cycle track)

[ron_newman]

What day is the meeting at Cafe Rustica? (Please edit the post to include this information)

[ratheripped.livejournal.com]

Updated - and thanks for disclosing. Like I said, I bike and keep a car here and I'd like to see some sort of compromise or intelligent discourse on the issue. The spaces on the side of the academy of Arts and Science seems like a logical place to cut out a bunch of spaces since I don't think I've EVER seen them fully used. But the part of Beacon where most of those businesses I listed are located between the Star Market and Somerville Ave are in an extremely dense residential area where residents compete with other residents for spaces on a regular basis on top of people who drive from one part of Somerville to another and go to Porter Station.

From a Business perspective, these are businesses located in areas where this isn't any public lot or metered spaces for non-residents to go (except of course on Mass Ave in Cambridge and we all know how awesome it is to try to park there). Yes, the Star Market has a lot near some, but incase you haven't noticed the sign, that's for their customers only.

[42itous.livejournal.com]

That stretch is one of the bumpiest places I have the "pleasure" to bike on a regular basis, and I agree that dodging potholes is what makes it unsafe, not narrow lanes. I don't see the necessity (or even desirability) of eliminating parking spaces along there.

[hrafn.livejournal.com]

Ditto. Other than the obstacle course nature of that stretch of road, I've felt MUCH safer biking there than many other streets, because it's nice and wide.

[littlecitynames.livejournal.com]

I feel like Somerville Ave is close enough that it's not a huge deal to bike there instead of Beacon if you're really concerned about the potholes and parked cars. Plus it's less hilly. I don't have a car and I bike down that way at least once a week, and I still wouldn't be in favor of getting rid of the parking spaces. I would love it to be paved though.

[i-leonardo.livejournal.com]

Fix the bloody potholes and keep the parking ! I've biked that stretch for 24 years and it's always felt like a wide expanse of lunar craters. the cars have never been a problem.

I'm leaving town tomorrow and won't have time to stop by and sign the petition; which aldermen should I contact ?

[ratheripped.livejournal.com]

Maryann Heuston is the alderman of Ward 2 which is the area that this impacts: mheuston@hotmail.com

and here's a PDF of the proposal....not sure if this is the most up to date version, but the size of the proposed tracks are kind of ginormous: http://somervillebikes.org/documents/2011-11%20Interdepartmental%20mtg%20Nov%202011_FINAL.pdf

Here's the thing - bike traffic on that road is only heavy at morning and evening rush hour. After 6pm that side of Beacon becomes isn't heavily trafficked by bikes or cars and both sides of the street are packed bumper to bumper with resident cars. People drive in from different neighborhoods for some of those businesses between Somerville Ave and Park. I think a lot of people would hate for them to have to relocate after being neighborhood staples because it cuts down a big portion of their business. This kind of thing makes Somerville come off as insular and makes it difficult for people to visit or do business here.

If most bikers can agree that a repave job will suffice then I don't really see any "pro" of going forward with killing all the spaces on that section of the street.

[juldea.livejournal.com]

I used to live atop Petsi's, and this idea is ridiculous. As everyone else is saying, the problem is the potholes, not the narrowness of the street. Re-pave the street and leave the parking and bikes will be just fine!

[ratheripped.livejournal.com]

Another point I would like to add to my argument against getting rid of this parking is that that ~350 bikes per hour number at peak was based on counting studies that were taken place during the spring and summer. Bike ridership in the area drops pretty significantly during the Winter. Having a ghostly bike highway 3 months out of the year isn't the best use of public space.

[grapefruiteater.livejournal.com]

This is insane. I'm with everyone else who says that paving Beacon Street is the real answer. It's like the surface of the moon. Parking is scarce in that neighborhood, and it's further limited by the Cambridge border that cuts right behind Beacon Street. When I lived in Porter Square, enforcement was lax in the areas that directly border Cambridge—in contrast to complaints about excessive ticketing around Davis Square, I wanted MORE ticketing in my neighborhood because it seemed like regulations weren't being enforced at all and people were taking advantage of that. I felt lucky to have a driveway.

I also felt that Porter Square got the short end of the stick from the city a lot of the time, and in particular, everyone seemed to forget that it's a residential area as well as a business district. \Yes, the Somerville Ave. reconstruction project has improved the area in real ways, but it was a major disruption while it was going on, and communication from the city about important things ("Hey, we're going to be digging a massive hole that will block your driveway, and next week we'll need to shut off your gas, and GOD KNOWS about the week after that...") was practically nonexistent after the first few months. Parking was lost on Somerville Ave. during that project, and major changes to the other big thoroughfare in the neighborhood that will further reduce parking aren't going to make things better.

[dibalh.livejournal.com]

I feel like ron_newman might be proactively choosing not to weigh in on why he supports, because of the conflict of being a mod here and being on the SBC/in support. For the record, I'd like to hear from supporters too if there are any here, even if they're Ron. ;)

[ratheripped.livejournal.com]

Probably because he doesn't live on the stretch that's affected by the parking cuts or frequent those businesses that often so he's keeping his mouth shut and listening respectively to our concerns ;-)

I bike that street pretty often and commuted up and down it daily last year and when the initial idea surfaced to create a cycle track all the way down was proposed I was in favor. It was safe to assumed when they said get rid of the "underused" parking on Beacon between Washington and Somerville ave they were talking about the metered spaces near the academy of science where no one parked to begin with because there's no residences on that side of Beacon and it's a bit of a dead stretch.

I didn't think they were going to put in a crazy 7' wide bike lane and basically eliminate half the parking for residents and businesses on the densely populated stretch that's closer to Somerville Ave where most of the businesses are...because that's a pretty nutty thing to do.

[nonnihil.livejournal.com]

Adding my voice to the throng: I've biked that approximately a billion times (well, okay, more like a few hundred) over the last decade and a half and I have never thought that what it needs is an enormous bike lane and less parking. Not that we cyclists aren't great and all, but this tradeoff seems almost malicious toward the drivers who are, after all, the majority users of the road at nearly every hour.

I do wonder what the impediment is to repaving the road. It seems like the parts that are potholed today are the same ones that were potholed twelve years ago. It's certainly always been in much more urgent need of renovation than Somerville ave., which seems to always be under one sort of construction or another. Is the road so badly constructed that it will pothole right back up again even after a resurface? Is the truck traffic more than the roadbed can handle?

One positive effect that removing parking would have is to increase visibility around some of the side streets and driveways on that side (which do pose a more-than-occasional surprise for a cyclist at speed if an opaque van or SUV is parked blocking the sight lines), but it seems like that justifies removing a space on each side of the danger points, not removing parking entirely.

[gmg-1.livejournal.com]

Well, I think this would probably make the street safer, so I'm in favor of it.

Obviously the potholes are the biggest concern, but I think the cycle track would probably help with the following two issues:

-as nonnihil mentioned, visibility of auto traffic entering from driveways/sidestreets can be a problem. There was a guy this morning who pulled out while looking to his right the entire time. The parked cars can make it tough to identify people like that who are driving dangerously.

-The street is wide enough so that some drivers will treat the bike lane as their own personal right turn/"zoom around someone taking a left" lane. If the cycle track is more clearly divided from the road, it might cut down on that.

That seems like a fair tradeoff to mildly inconvenience a few residents.

[ratheripped.livejournal.com]

"That seems like a fair tradeoff to mildly inconvenience a few residents."

It's not just a "few" residents and it's not a "mild" inconvenience...go check out the petition at the Cafe - this easily impacts a couple hundred or more residents and quite a few businesses that have been there for years. It's not a "fair trade off" when most of the cyclists are fine with the amount of space already on Beacon St for them to bike on.

" -as nonnihil mentioned, visibility of auto traffic entering from driveways/sidestreets can be a problem.."

Which will still happen on the side of the street where parking will remain on the proposed plan...this is also a problem on ANY street in Somerville. This issue has to do with people who break the parking rule about being at least 2ft from a drive away entrance and 10ft from an intersection...not the bike lanes or lack thereof.

[ceo]

As one who frequently bike commutes on Beacon Street, the more I think about this proposal the less I like it, purely from a bicycling perspective. One of the ramifications of it being a heavily-used cycling route is that there's a huge speed variation among cyclists, probably from about 8 to 20 mph. With the cycletrack design, it's going to be a lot harder for cyclists to pass each other, particularly on the side that still has parking so the passing cyclist can't bail into the street. And, the travel lanes being narrower will make it less safe to ride in the street.

The other problem with cycletracks is that cars on side streets will tend to pull up across the cycletrack in order to turn because (again, especially on the parking side) they won't have enough visibility otherwise, and because it looks like an extra-wide sidewalk. The same is true with driveways, and it will be extremely hazardous to any cyclist going faster than a running pace.

And, the cycletracks on Concord Ave west of the Rotaries of Death bump up and down between road and sidewalk level as they cross streets and driveways, making them annoying to ride.

So, give Beacon St the full-depth repave it desperately needs, and paint in wide bike lanes that are set out a bit from the parking lane, to reduce the dooring hazard.

[mindstalk.livejournal.com]

AIUI separated cycle tracks are state of the art for bicycle safety in cities like Amsterdam and Copenhagen. And note the PDF describes a 7' wide track. vs. the 5' wide lanes today.

[emannths.livejournal.com]

Experienced, urban cyclist/commuter here (I'm crazy--I enjoy the excitement of cycling in Boston traffic). I feel like there's little need for a cycletrack here. Better pavement and striping gets us 90% of the way there, and as a [crazy] cyclist, I'm much more comfortable handling myself in traffic than at some weird nexus between parked cars and oblivious pedestrians. I'm all for bikes-belong-type infrastructure, but I think bike lanes are sufficient.

If we're removing parking, I'd much rather see a half-dozen spots removed from Park St near Beacon. The combination of the blind hill, MTBA buses, turning cars, super-narrow lanes, and no center line makes that stretch really hairy. Everyone seems sufficiently freaked out and drives safely and slowly, but it just seems unnecessarily stressful.

By the way, if this cycletrack is build, the businesses in the area could negotiate with Star Market to allow customers to use the Star Market lot. It's well-located, and perpetually half-empty.

[mindstalk.livejournal.com]

"By the way, if this cycletrack is build, the businesses in the area could negotiate with Star Market to allow customers to use the Star Market lot. It's well-located, and perpetually half-empty."

That's a good point, at least in a rational world. Businesses seem prone to market failure about their parking lots, though.

"I'm all for bikes-belong-type infrastructure, but I think bike lanes are sufficient."

I dunno, I keep thinking we should look at the cities that actually have lots and lots of bicyclists and see what they do. More than bike lanes. Granted, more than intermittent bike paths too, as ukelele notes.

[obie119.livejournal.com]

Another longtime commuter not seeing the need for a cycletrack there. My concern (about ANY cycletrack) is whether it'll truly get the same plowing priority as streets do. Because not everyone stops commuting in November.

Like others said, the main problems in that space are the potholes and the visibility near intersections. I'd specifically like to see some safety measures where the 83 makes the right from Beacon onto Park. I've seen tons of cyclists almost get taken out there and it's a terrible intersection.

Other than that, I would say get some real paving and some sharrows, and you're good to go.
(I come more from the John Forrester side of things so I see very few reasons for segregated cycletracks)

[lonelyholiday.livejournal.com]

I don't even live in the area anymore, so I don't have a dog in this fight, but I still read all the discussion with interest (I still do have a place in my heart for the neighborhood!), and your point on snow is one that I think is DEFINITELY worth bringing up with the city.

It looks from the plans that the bike level is slightly raised from the street level. If that can't be cleared with the truck-plows, my guess it won't get done. I know that I always chuckled (or fumed, depending on the situation) about how residents/owners are supposed to remove snow from abutting sidewalks within six hours, but in several places where I assumed it was the city's responsibility (no "resident abutting" per se, or along a public building), it could take DAYS, or in some cases was just never cleared until it melted.

I find it hard to believe, then, that the city will have guys out there with shovels in a timely fashion. Easier to believe that the snow plowed from the street could end up right on the cycletrack.

Or would they count this as part of the sidewalk snow removal rules and expect residents/businesses to shovel the cycletrack as well?

Good luck to everyone on getting a satisfactory resolution here, whatever it is... I look forward to seeing what's up next time I'm in town. ;)

[tsuki-no-bara.livejournal.com]

i'm generally in favor of dedicated bike lanes and anything that separates cars from bikes on the road, but taking away parking on one side of a densely populated major street with a lot of businesses is stupid, and from looking at the proposal that ratheripped linked (specifically the diagram of the stretch from somerville ave to museum st and park st to inman), it seems like the extra strip between the car lanes and the bike track could be easily confused for a narrow sidewalk. and if the bike track isn't the same grade as the road or instantly recognizable as not-sidewalk, pedestrians are just going to walk on it. (as an occasional pedestrian who used to work around the corner from a high school and had to walk into the road to dodge groups of oblivious high school sidewalk sweepers on a regular basis, i know i would. especially in the winter when there's a high chance the road and bike track will be better and more consistently plowed than the sidewalk. altho there's no guarantee the bike track will be well-plowed either.) repaving the road and filling in the potholes is a clear benefit for everyone. doing away with parking on one side is not.

the single advantage i can see is that the bike track might cut down on the possibility of bicyclists getting nailed by people opening their car doors. but otherwise? it kind of looks like a recipe for disaster.

[ratheripped.livejournal.com]

As a cyclist those little mini sidewalks looks like it would make it a lot harder to turn left as well - it seems like it's mostly being done for cosmetic reasons. Also I'm not sure why the tracks need to be wider at the Somerville ave - > Museum and narrower from Museum to Ivaloo - this is middle of the street and it's where the number of commuting cyclists really pick up in numbers and you'd think the reverse would make more sense.

[mindstalk.livejournal.com]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Segregated_cycle_facilities has a lot on bike paths. As mentioned above, you can find studies on both sides of the safety issue, and the article doesn't make it clear if there's a preponderance. Meta-analysis would be useful. OTOH, the evidence that they increase bike ridership seems pretty strong, though of course doing it as just one stretch of one road wouldn't be likely to have much effect.

More bike riders would presumably mean more customers; whether this would offset the loss of driving customers is another matter. I still suspect most of the non-Shaw's customers are pedestrians.

Reading indicates that yes, gradually reducing parking spaces is part of making a city more bike friendly. And free parking has been a huge subsidy for car culture.

Of course, there's an alternative way of making roads safer and more attractive, which also has evidence: slow them down a lot and/or indicate shared use. The Dutch apparently allow mixed uses with a speed limit of 18 mph, moving to bike paths for faster streets. I'm all for traffic calming of 12-15 mph...

[ratheripped.livejournal.com]

"and free parking has been a huge subsidy for car culture."

Street parking your car in Somerville IS NOT free - to park overnight on Beacon you need a resident permit which has to be renewed annually. To get a resident permit you have your car registered AND insured your car here. Don't forget about paying the excise tax (which is money that goes right to the city). You also have to pay for visitors passes - even people who don't own cars can obtain them for their guests who can also benefit from the spaces on the even side of Beacon.

[domenic52.livejournal.com]

All,

Sincere apologies for the long-winded post. But it would be very helpful to an understanding of this issue to read this. And you'll get good Karma points.

I own the Beacon Street Laundromat and wish to a.) thank everybody for their interest in this issue and their sensitivity to the concerns of the residents and businesses along Beacon Street who will be significantly impacted by this plan, and b.* ) make clear that, to us, this is not a cyclist vs. non-cyclist situation; we bike or have friends who do and are concerned for their safety and sympathetic to their point of view. Our concern is that to take away 1/2 of the parking on Beacon Street will unalterably change the quality of live for several thousand people who own homes here, rent here, or own businesses here.

Some businesses impacted will not be able to remain viable if they lose the revenue derived from driving customers. It's as simple as that. None of us is getting wealthy on Beacon Street and to reduce our revenue will put some of us out of business. Once the neighborhood gets a reputation for being an untenable business location, storefronts will remain vacant for longer between failed tenants and eventually will go permanently vacant.

Additionally, elimination of loading zones on the even-numbered side of the street will prove a nightmare for businesses that rely on deliveries. Loading zones are located directly in front of businesses for reasons of safety and easy of delivery. Cutting parking in half will mean that delivery trucks will have to be lucky enough to find a parking space somewhere on the opposite side of the street and hand-truck loads to the business recipients door. The potential for accidents with cars and bikes will increase significantly.

As for the impact on residents, in addition to the increased difficulty of finding on-street parking - already very difficult at times - with half the parking places removed there will be no parking for friends and family who visit. We have many elderly residents in this diverse neighborhood who rely on friends and relatives for assistance and companionship. The city’s parking study, which showed excess available parking, does not comport with residents’ daily experience.

Additionally, snow emergencies and street cleaning days, when parking restrictions are stringent, will present very significant challenges to residents.

Finally, the residents of Beacon Street have been until last week in the dark about this entire plan. By and large, the only notice the city has seen fit to give on an issue that will greatly impact many folks' lives has been to list meetings on the city website and to send a letter to some, but not all, of the businesses notifying them of a review meeting. Many residents are outraged that their concerns have not been solicited nor have they been accorded the respect by the City of Somerville to be asked to participate in a project that will alter their lives.

So, in short, this proposed plan, if implemented will be much more than a "minor inconvenience" to the neighborhood. Businesses will be very realistically threatened, residents will see their quality of life altered, and the fabric of this neighborhood will be altered irrevocably. It's a bigger deal than it might appear at first blush.

As for the meeting on the 29th, I organized that as a way for the city to get community input; this was not initiated by the City of Somerville, although the Planning Director and Alderwoman have agreed to be there to take questions. This project would certainly benefit from the input of all concerned, residents, businesses and cyclists, but I should warn everybody that the Cafe Rustica is small and we will need to give priority to residents who have not yet had an opportunity to be heard. You are more than welcome to attend subject to that one caveat. My goal is that this not become an us-against-them issue, but merely that everyone's legitimate interests be heard and given appropriate weight in the decision making process of this project.

Thanks again for your support and understanding. Let's find a solution for this that works for everybody.

Domenic Ruccio, Jr.
Beacon Street Laundromat, Inc.

[ratheripped.livejournal.com]

Thanks for weighing in Domenic - I've added a link to this comment in the original post to increase its visibility. It's important that people understand just how much this will hurt business on Beacon.

[cden4.livejournal.com]

I think the most important thing to keep in mind as the City works on the design for Beacon St is that we all keep an open mind, look closely at all the options, and use the best data we have to make decisions. It's easy to let emotions get the best of us. I have no doubt that we can find a solution that we can all be proud of.

Parking is always a hot-button issue. Thankfully, it's one that we an approach in a very rational and logic way. As we've seen through the comments here, there are really two main needs for parking:
1. That businesses have enough parking for customers and loading areas for deliveries
2. That residents who need cars have a reasonable amount of parking available

However, at the same time, Beacon St has the highest numbers of bicyclists than any street in the City. It's a key local and regional route for bicyclists from Boston, Kendall Square, Cambridge, Somerville, Arlington, and beyond. As such, it's key that Beacon St is as safe and accommodating for current and future bicyclists as possible. (And more bicyclists means more customers for local businesses!)

The city has done a detailed parking study that took into account time of year, time of day, how long cars were parked, and where those cars were from. We should look closely at those numbers to determine the following:
- During the day, is there there high parking turnover for customers of local businesses?
- Overnight, what is the utilization by local residents? How many spaces aren't being used?
- Where are loading zones now, and if we were to remove some parking, where could we put them to still serve all the businesses safely?

One interesting thing the study has shown is that there are many cars towards the Inman Square end of Beacon St that are from other parts of Somerville (they have Somerville permits) but stay parked on the street for the entire day. These are likely people who work or study at Harvard and are parking as close to Cambridge as possible and walking the rest of the way. As such, I think it's really important to keep in mind that just because there are X numbers of cars parked today doesn't mean that there must be those same X cars there in the future.

There are many solutions to managing parking to increase turnover near businesses and to ensure that it's not being used by people ditching their cars for the entire day (time limitations, meters w/ proper pricing), as well as to provide the space that local residents need near their homes (mainly permit-only zones, especially overnight). There are certainly streets in Somerville and throughout the Boston area that have businesses and residences on both sides but only have parking on one side. There are solutions, and it's important that we look closely at all the options.

I think the big thing that everyone wants to get out of this is to figure out how to make the street as safe as possible for everyone using it and to maximize the use of the limited space we have. I have no doubt if we all put our heads together we can come up with the best solution possible.

[ron_newman]

This ResiStat blog post contains the slide presentation that the city made at the October 15 meeting, as well as notes on questions and answers at that meeting.

[ratheripped.livejournal.com]

Thanks for posting this Ron, but it's not really making me feel like the Bike Committee and City Planning Firm have made any effort on predicting how this will affect residents and businesses. It's straight up upsetting how quite a few questions and comments related to neighborhood impact go unanswered [and without any follow up item, to boot!] - especially the comments from our Aldernman and the owners of Rustica and the Laundromat. It's clear that residents and businesses were totally not taken into consideration for this proposal at all and it's painful and straight up infuriating to read. The fact that Domenic had to ASK for a meeting with the Alderman and Planner is straight up wrong instead of Committee and City Planners questioning residents or making these meetings more widely known to them.

To get further into the nitty gritty, the slides presented about the parking study don't cover the Somerville Ave to Museum St. stretch (i'm referring to mid-day occupancy chart) I've been describing in the original which reinforces my believe that the parking study that was conducted was completely misleading. This is the area that's going to be impacted most by the parking cuts due to residential density. I'd like to see the full details and not just some bullets on a slide. I could not find this study in the open data portal. And of course there's the fact that numbers hardly ever tell a complete story - did you read the comment from the man who couldn't find parking near Rustica because of his condition? Somerville is already a hard place to live for people who have mobility issues - why make it harder for them by having a cycle track bogart the space? We need to hear more from our neighbors about how this may impact them before deciding to sacrifice our neighborhood for a mammoth 7' cycle track..that's going to be made WITH OUR TAX MONEY.

By the way my boyfriend and I both took a survey from someone walking up Beacon and it DID NOT distinguish whether or not we were Beacon St area residents or not which I found outright offensive - if this was conducted by someone on the Bike Committee please reconsider how you construct your surveys to get the best data. Right now it comes off as the Bike Committee and the City Planners don't care about the people that live there and just want some giant cycle track for their own use and is skewing the data (intentionally or unintentionally) in their favor. As a resident, car owner, and cylcist, I want to work WITH the bike committee to make Beacon safe for other cyclists but not destroy the quality of life for businesses and residents. I also want there to be better communication about these public meetings - right now it seems like you're intentionally keeping us out of the dark and hoping we don't notice until they start ripping out the sidewalks. Not cool, dude. Not cool at all. So how can we work together?

[charolastra00.livejournal.com]

Cafe Rustica is one of my favorite sandwich and coffee places. I often go there with a friend who is physically disabled, and I myself am seasonally disabled in the winter (chemo lung damage makes it nearly impossible to breathe as well as walk more than 20 feet outdoors when the temp goes below 45ish or if it's rainy/damp). As it is, we often have to pass on going to Cafe Rustica because there is no parking. If parking is taken away, I will likely not even make the trip to try to go - it is almost guaranteed that I would never be able to park close enough to be able to walk.

It is difficult to have mobility issues in most places, but in Somerville, it is dreadful. Yes, we have bus service, but for me, if the weather is cold and damp, it's useless to me unless it's taking me door to door. I have to rely on my car and while I live in the community, I end up spending all of my time in Medford, Malden, and the suburbs where there is parking. Many of my friends are people I have met through the young adult disability community and it is a frustration echoed by more than just me.

I am very sympathetic toward cyclists, but after being hit or almost hit by bikes more than 3 times in September (always because the cyclist runs a red light or a stop sign), my sympathy is wearing thin and I am loathe to further be pushed out of the community.

PS - I recognize that people who are disabled to that level are rare. However, every parking space that is taken away in Somerville represents another opportunity lost for those of us who ARE. And the 3 or 4 handicapped spots per block (if that) do very little to mitigate the situation with the number of people who qualify for such placards and plates.

[smoterh.livejournal.com]

My fiance was door jacked so bad on that street that she was afraid to get on a bike for 2 years after that. I fully support this proposal. Human lives are more important that parking spaces.

[ratheripped.livejournal.com]

I can understand you and your fiance being personally traumatized by this incident, but the fact is your fiance could've been doored on any street she was biking on. Not just Beacon. Why not ban cars from the city all together? Why not due away with all street parking on all roads and put in massive bike lanes everywhere if that's your logic. There's also conflicting evidence about if massive bike lanes actually make things safer or more dangerous for cyclists or not.

I've had numerous friends who have been doored - it's 100% at fault of the driver [or their passenger] for not looking, but cyclists need to take their own precautions - this means making themselves more visible with lights and reflectors, wearing helmets, etc. Every time I see someone biking on Beacon after dark without any lights my heart sinks. When you get on a bike you take risks and need to be proactive about your own safety just as much as drivers need to be more cautious about checking for cyclists. Maybe more caution signs about checking the bike lane would help.

[boblothrope.livejournal.com]

I think sidewalk cycle tracks are a *terrible* idea. I refuse to use them, except in places like highway bridges where there's zero possibility of cross traffic.

They exacerbate two of the most common types of bike-car accidents: right-hooks, and being T-boned by cars coming out of side streets.

The maximum safe speed to bike on them is 5 mph, so you can be prepared to stop at every single driveway and intersection. Besides the fact that it takes much longer to get anywhere, it's also very difficult to bike that slowly on most bikes.

So I bike in the street instead. It's particularly frustrating when the street gets worse for biking because of a cycle track project, as it would in this case. For an example of a recent project that had this unfortunate result, see Concord Avenue by Fresh Pond.

My vote: repave the street in its current form ASAP, and then think about painting bike markings to encourage bikes to stay out of the door zone (sharrows, etc).

[emannths.livejournal.com]

Concur. They also do a poor job keeping pedestrians out (see: Vassar St cycletrack).

[mindstalk.livejournal.com]

Not definitive, but an interesting study on biker behavior:
http://www.theatlanticcities.com/commute/2012/10/whats-best-way-figure-out-what-bike-riders-really-want/3684/

6. Paths over lanes. The most intriguing find was how much riders preferred off-road bike paths or traffic-calming (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traffic_calming) bikeways (a.k.a. "bike boulevards (http://streetswiki.wikispaces.com/Bicycle+Boulevard?responseToken=031cd4eb83f2d675de8ab32332e754163)") to traditional arterial bike lanes. In terms of rider preference, a path was like reducing a route 26 or 16 percent (non-commute versus commute) and a boulevard was like reducing it 18 or 11 percent (same). A bike lane on a high-traffic street, meanwhile, was no more attractive than riding a low-traffic street with a lane.

Other sources I've seen recently have also indicated a 20% increase in biking from segregated bike paths; I found less about bike boulevards. 10% would mean an extra 35 rush hour riders, 20% an extra 70. Boulevarding wouldn't lose parking spaces and I'd guess would be cheaper to build across the city, at the cost of slowing down traffic. Speed cushions seem to allow emergency vehicles to move at speed while slowing down passenger cars.

ETA: a new big study seems to say bike paths are 6x safer than bike lanes on major roads next to parking.
http://www.theatlanticcities.com/commute/2012/10/dedicated-bike-lanes-can-cut-cycling-injuries-half/3654/

[vig krishnamurthy (from livejournal.com)]

HI Everyone: New to this forum but wanted to add a couple of new thoughts to the discussion.

I see a lot of comments here from 'veteran' or experience cyclists (like myself) who seem comfortable and feel safe riding in a variety of conditions, and seem in favor of just resurfacing the street and maintaining existing painted bike lanes.

Earlier this month, Secretary of Transportation, Rich Davey, made a landmark and path-setting goal to TRIPLE the number of trips made in the Commonwealth by bike, walking, and transit. If we are even to come close to this goal state-wide, places like Somerville (which have the underlying conditions to support the growth of these modes) will have to achieve progress of more than triple to make up for the lack of in more rural places in the state.

We have seen an exponential growth in the number of cyclists in our city over the last decade, and the 350+ cyclist per hour on Beacon St must also be more or less comfortable with the existing conditions -- by simple virtue of the fact that they too are out there and riding today. However, we are likely reaching the saturation point of bike use growth that can be achieved with our existing systems. Simply put, there are many populations of potential bike riders who will not consider riding as safe and convenient without physically separated infrastructure like cycle tracks. Therefore, we must seriously consider these interests and our long-term visions when determining the configuration of a corridor for decades to come -- and remember the latent users who are not yet vocal on these issues or in these forums.

Speed: Many of the comments I see are about how a Cycle Track would not be safe a higher speeds. But I believe that is the very point. As a society I we need to SLOW DOWN: drivers and cyclists. Remembering back to Physics 12, Kinetic Energy = 1/2 • mass • velocity^2. Cycle tracks help separate road users who are inherently different in mass (the first part of the equation). But much more importantly, going slower reduces the likelihood of crashes (by increasing reducing reaction time and increasing reaction space), and when crashes do occur lowering speed decreases exponentially the severity of crashes. On that note, traffic calming measures should be seriously discussed as part of this project. It has been 21 years since ISTEA and the recognition of multi-modal planning at the federal level, and regardless of the TIP funding for the project the city should not be beholden to antiquated FHWA standards. Again, traffic calming makes a big difference for safety (for all road users), and has a very small impact on automobiles: over the 1 mile project corridor the difference between a 30mph and 20mph traffic progression is at most 60seconds. At 20mph, the fast cyclists could safely be in the road. So speed is the BIG issue; and if one doesn't like/agree with that they can take it up with Isaac Newton! =)

Parking: The parking study conducted for the project observed a 48% occupancy ratio. To those who say that the cycle track is an inefficient use of space, it also seems that parking spaces on average empty half the time is not particularly 'efficient' either. But more importantly, we so often in these debates conflate efficiency with effectiveness. Based on my above reasoning, a cycle track and slower speeds are effective strategies for the goals of encouraging multi-modal transportation and safety. So the question is whether we can an achieve an effective parking strategy with fewer spaces. The answer I believe is yes. At first glance removing 1/2 the parking when the parking is occupied only about 50% of the time seems viable without major negative effects. But the changes to the parking can be mitigated by carefully measuring and understanding the actual usage of parking by businesses and creating a plan to give priority and visible spaces for customers.

Cheers,
Vig

“We can’t solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them”
– Albert Einstein

[boblothrope.livejournal.com]

You missed my point on speed.

Most cyclists *won't* go at a safe 5 mph on the track. They'll go the speed they normally go, thereby greatly increasing the risk of a collision, compared to riding on the existing street.

I know how dangerous cycle tracks are. But I won't go 5 mph on them either. I'll go the speed I normally go, in the street.

If you care at all about the people who live in this city, you'll support measures to make their lives safer and more convenient. Cycle tracks do neither.

And anyone who thinks we should slow down all bicycles to 5 mph in the name of safety (if it were somehow possible) has no business making transportation planning decisions.

[anyee.livejournal.com]

The easiest way to figure this out would be for someone to actually go out there and set up a time lapse camera for a week or so. Count the cars per unit time on individual days. It's not meaningful to clump this up and just say, "over 72 hours, we had an average of X cars". Anyone with even a smidgen of sense could believe that the traffic and parking in a location waxes and wanes with day and time.

This could be a great project for a handful of high schoolers led by someone who understands basic statistics...apparently unlike the person who conducted the stats analysis in the first place.

Edited to add:
They did the study on one day in July and one day in May...then called it a day. Are you fucking kidding me? n=1 for both conditions?
Did they not think that the reason people leave their cars on the street all day (low turnover) is that they're taking the train to work instead of driving?
There are random gaps in the data. Why?

Wow this study was biased. Also, the person who made the slides has no idea about readability. -_-