Lee Highway Vision and Planning

In 2012, leaders in North Arlington decided that Lee Highway needed to be re-planned. Eventually forming the Lee Highway Alliance, they developed a visioning document for the Arlington County section of Lee Highway and the areas adjacent to it. That document was released last May.  Part of that vision was providing safe and appealing biking facilities. 

Today, only highly experienced riders travel the corridor on bike, and they report feeling unsafe. There is a desire for families and riders of all abilities to be able to travel comfortably by bike in the future. However, there was not consensus on how this should be achieved. Some participants want a focus on improvements to parallel routes such as 22nd and 26th streets, citing limited right of way width as a constraint. Others want improvements on Lee Highway itself; ideas explored include introducing protected bike lanes (lanes separated from moving vehicles by landscaping, striping or other barriers to increase comfort and safety) or shared bus/bike only lanes (restricting travel lanes for only bus or bike use, reducing the number of conflicts for cyclists while also enhancing transit efficiency). Both approaches -- improving parallel routes and making changes to the Lee Highway street design -- should be analyzed further for feasibility.

While not a planning document, they did propose additional bike lanes, trails and bikeshare stations, as seen in this map of the eastern section.

 One retrofit of Lee Highway envisioned by the plan would include a bike/bus lane as the outside lane.

The visioning document is not an adopted plan, but rather a compilation of ideas that provide a framework for the formal County planning process that will kick off in 2017. Before that starts, the County is hosting community open houses on November 29th for people to learn about the project, express their opinions or learn how to get involved. 

Comments

[Mel]

Boring. Too little too late.