The future of Arlington bicycle facilities

Most readers by now know that Arlington added its first cycletrack on S. Hayes in August, and perhaps that the county plans to add another stretch to S. Eads this year (though talk was of doing it this September) between 15th and 23rd, but there is more that Arlington is working on and planning to do on top of that.

On S. Eads, the county will reduce the road from 4 lanes to 3 (one in each direction and center turning lane) to make room for the protected bike facility. This is a pilot project but if all goes well, it would become permanent.

Wilson Blvd between Rosslyn and Courthouse could also get a protected bike lane when it's repaved next year. This is in design and evaluation right now. Another project on Wilson will repave the road from N. Frederick to Manchester street in spring of 2015. That project will create bike lanes between Bluemont Park and N. Frederick Street. Sharrows will then connect those bike lanes to ones on N. George Mason Drive and the Bluemont Trail. Later those bike lanes could be converted to cycletracks. 

Construction is expected to begin in late 2015 on improvements to the Custis Trail around the "Intersection of Doom" in Rosslyn. This will include widening the trail from 10 feet to 16, improving visibility at the Holiday Inn entrance, removing a lane from Lynn Street that will shorten the crossing there and adding waiting areas at both corners. Control of right turns on red are in development. 

The County is working on a complete review of bicycle parking and planning to use an app to help them with this. Efforts include review of best practices from elsewhere, better coordination with other County agencies, installation of more bike parking in the curbside right-of-way (especially in commercial districts), changes to the zoning code to require bike parking minimums in all development and working with private property owners to add more bike parking. In addition, the County plans to start using an app called RackSpotter that will allow for crowdsourcing the location of every bike rack in the county in order to create a complete inventory as well as identify places where racks are needed. Users will also be able to see where the closest rack is, including a photo. Games to encourage use will be used. The product is currently in beta testing. 

The County has nearly completed the installation of 280 on-street wayfinding signs planned for the Rosslyn-Ballston corridor and 200 more along the Custis Trail. The County plans to add another 400 signs on its trail network in the near future. 

The County now has 31 automated county devices including the Bikeometer in Rosslyn. The data from these can be viewed by anyone at this website.

Arlington does plan to clear snow from trails this winter, but maybe not from the W&OD Trail. NVRPA is concerned that the trail will be damaged during snow removal.  

One unusual problem Arlington is dealing with is that the only contractor they had to paint bike lanes green went out of business, so they're trying to work through that setback to find a replacement. 

Comments

[Brandon]

FYI the bike counter link has a space in it so it's broken. The correct link is: http://www.bikearlington.com/pages/biking-in-arlington/counting-bikes-to-plan-for-bikes/counter-dashboard/

[DE]

Regarding the intersection of doom, without a no-turn-on-red sign and a pedestrian-only cycle, it's no better than it was. They have shortened the time for cyclists and pedestrians to get across and added a very brief delay, and those motorists turning right on red or just as the light changes are still looking the other direction as they turn across the crosswalk.

While obeying all the laws, exercising great caution, and using two bright lights, one blinking and another solid, I was still almost run over here last week. (Not an exaggeration--only quick evasive action saved me. I was then yelled at for being in the way.)

[GM]

Improvements at the intersection of doom to include improving visibility at the Holiday Inn entrance? I know that the entrances to the Key Bridge Marriott are a huge issue, but not the Holiday Inn (which is not located along the Custis Trail). Is this a typo?

[washcycle]

GM, that's what the BAC minutes say, but it is probably the Marriott.

[Jack]

You wrote, "Wilson Blvd between Rosslyn and Courthouse could also get a protected bike lane when it's repaved next year. This is in design and evaluation right now. Another project on Wilson will repave the road from N. Frederick to Manchester street in spring of 2015. That project will create bike lanes between Bluemont Park and N. Frederick Street. Sharrows will then connect those bike lanes to ones on N. George Mason Drive and the Bluemont Trail. Later those bike lanes could be converted to cycletracks."

It's getting hard to keep track of what a bike lane is and what a cycle track is. I hope the terminology gets standardized at some point. I think you're saying here that one segment might get a protected bike lane, while another part will get standard bike lanes connecting to sharrows. Then the standard bike lanes (not the protected ones) might be converted to protected bike lanes (protected bike lanes is synonymous with cycle track).

I think the industry is going to have to stick with a term for protected bike lanes that doesn't have the word bike lane in it.