15th Street Bike Lane is Done

15 is done, originally uploaded by Eric Gilliland.

Comments

[JTS]

...and it sucks.

Do they have a plan for street sweeping? It's like I'm biking on the C&0 Canal. That, and so many cars are parked in the lane. Are they going to ticket the cars? What about the fact that the lane between RIA and Mass is a taxi stand? I really wish they had thought this out better.

[ontarioroader]

It was interesting watching the lane for a few minutes last night during rush hour - 8 out of ten northbound cyclists were using the lane in the wrong direction.

[Washcycle]

I rode it today. It isn't completely done. Clearly there are some lines left to paint. I too ran into cars parked in the bike lane both near Mass and near U. Near Mass is weird since it has parking meters on it. I suspect that ticketing will eventually happen - though at first with warnings maybe. If I were going to ride this regularly, I might print up some polite notes to be placed under misparked cars windshield wipers.

I seem to recall the lane was made wide enough to allow for a snowplow to get into it, but I don't know about the vacuum trucks. They're just leaves though.

[Hiya]

I hope that the lane, at nine feet wide, is wide enough for the regular (larger) street sweeper vehicles.

DDOT does have smaller leaf sucking vehicles, as well, so they should be able to collect the leaves pretty easily. Whether or not they actually do... well, that's another matter.

It seems to me that the lane is not complete, though. The plans I saw called for a one foot curb between the parking and bike lanes, instead of those little reflector things. Does anyone know if they still plan to install a curb? -It might sort out some of the parking confusion, and provide a place to install parking signs actually next to the parking lane, rather than a lane away. If street cleaning vehicles are narrow enough, they could still access the bike lane by driving in at the end of the block.

[Eric]

Everyone should send their comments about the 15th Street facilities to [email protected].