Saturday Morning Ride - Grants for everyone!

Good morning

• US DOT announced several discretionary grants for the DC area (Including roadway work to make room for the American Veterans Disabled for Life Memorial and a program to implement dynamic pricing and a reservation system for commercial vehicle parking. It will encourage freight travel at off-peak times and enable tour bus operators to find parking, as well as use parking revenues to support transit services). 
  • In DC, "TCSP funds will be used to plan for improved bicycle and pedestrian access improvements near rail stations in Washington, DC to support housing and employment development." and "TCSP funds will help upgrade streetlights and sidewalks on Kennedy Street and improve safety at key intersections." The second one may not be directly bike related to biking, it depends on what the safety improvements are. 
  • There's also money for Maryland's Chesapeake & Delaware (C&D) Canal Recreational Trail, bike lanes near the Rockville Metro station and design upgrades for Army Navy Drive in Arlington (which likely includes the cycletrack).
• Hyattsville purchased 180 bike racks that it plans to install this year when they'll also build "25,700 linear feet of bicycle lanes, mainly along Nicholson Street, 40th and 41st Avenues through central Hyattsville, and trails through southern Hyattsville connecting to the planned extension of the trolley trail.... A final list of bicycle rack locations is being finalized and will likely be released next week." That's just phase one. "Phase one of the project will be funded through a $110,00 Maryland Department of Housing and Community Development Community Legacy grant." Another 40,000+ miles of bike lanes are in Phase II and III.
• It appears the experimental zig-zag lines on Belmont Ridge Road in Ashburn that are meant to warn drivers of the W&OD Trail crossing are slowing drivers down and getting them to yield more.
• On Thursday, county officials broke ground on the Broadneck Pennisula Trail. The trail will eventually connect the B&A Trail to Sandy Point Park. It might be part of the American Discovery Trail.
• Last week, Maryland announced the winners of 28 Bikeways Programs. This week they're announcing - piecemeal it appears - six Transportation Enhancement Program winners. The Three Notch Trail in St. Mary's County got $1.4 million to go with the $470,000 last week. "The new five-mile pedestrian and bicycle trail will extend from MD 5 in Mechanicsville to MD 236 in New Market." And the Easton Rail Spur Line Trail got $826,500. "The trail will extend 2.4 miles and connect to an existing bike trail along MD 33 (Saint Michaels Road.)  Crossing MD 322 (Easton Bypass), the trail will continue over the Tred Avon River and meander through an open space area within Easton Village." Can't find any information on the other four winners. 
• See if you can find all the things wrong with this letter. [More from the Southern Maryland letter-to-the-editor bike fight]
• "if my only goal is to save other bikers from injury and death, should I follow or break the rules?"
• The International Cycling Union joins in on the Armstrong doping case. "In a testy exchange of letters made public Friday as part of the court case, the International Cycling Union (UCI) proposed that it appoint an independent panel to determine whether the charges against Armstrong have merit." And this is pretty damning:
  • “By our count, of the 21 podium finishers at the Tour de France during the period from 1999-2005, only a single rider other than Mr. Armstrong was not implicated in doping by a subsequent investigation. Yet, only a single one of these riders had a positive test with the UCI.”"
• Helsinki's low line looks really cool. It reminds me of a similar trail in Minneapolis.

Comments

[darren]

other grant award for design of Army Navy dr cycletrack in arlington.

The downtown dc parking award will put performance parking in the Gallery Place area

[Jack Cochrane]

Here's a little information about Montgomery County's projects receiving the aforementioned state grant money: http://cyclemoco.com/2012/07/maryland-announces-bikeway-grant-winners/

[Nancy]

Wash, did you mean to link to this article (If Kant Were a Cyclist)?

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/05/opinion/sunday/if-kant-were-a-new-york-cyclist.html?hp

[mike]

wow. a lot of info about maryland.

NONE of those projects matter...NONE challenge or even run orthogonal to the (car) transportation system (sic), as it currently (and will ) exist in maryland.

ALL of those projects reflect a certain kind of socialism: in conception, and execution.

are you a socialist washcycle? are your readers socialists now, too?
why dont you let the market decide on what improvements are worthy?...

[washcycle]

mike, your comments have become boring an unproductive.

[Cyclist]

I learned exactly... nothing from "mike's" comment.

[Crickey7]

How is pumping more subsidy into a single mode of transportation a response to any market force?

I think you conflate "market" with "preference", and then further take as evidence of "preference" part patterns of modal investment and the resulting useage of those modes.

This thinking is more than a little circular.

[Westnorth]

Oh no, socialism! “I’ve been giving that a lot of thought, and I kind of believe that maybe there is a place for government to build streets.” -- Ayn Rand