Plan suggests ways to make North Capitol easier to cross by bike

The recently presented North Capitol Street Needs Assessment includes several ways to make North Capitol more bike-friendly, but they most involve how to get across North Capitol, not how to ride north-south on it. 

The only "Bicycle Mobility Improvement" to make the list of top priorities was to add approach bike lanes and bike boxes at R Street. It was a low-cost item that could be done in "1 year +". That + might be doing a lot of work. R Street connects to the Metropolitan Branch Trail and the community wants the route made safer. R has a bike lane on it, but there's a 1/2 mile gap centered on North Capitol. 

Other recommendations, listed in descending priority, were to:

• Pursue the design and implementation of bicycle facilities along K Street NW/NE
• Pursue the study, design, and implementation of bicycle facilities along Massachusetts Avenue NW/NE 
• Add Capital Bikeshare locations at major bike crossings along the corridor (at K, N and R Streets).

Even though people asked for a bike lane on M Street to connect to the current bike lane on M at First, NE; the study didn't place one there, because the NoMa Bike Access study put the bike lane on K. Why not both? [R and K do, according to counts, have the most bike traffic now, possibly driven by existing bike facilities].

The study notes that the lack of bicycle facilities means that many cyclists use the sidewalks. 

Comments

[Shalom]

The crossing at N St has a lot of potential. Coming east, N St (past Dunbar) is a low-traffic / low-stress route for many blocks (basically starting at Thomas Circle). After crossing N Cap, it connects nicely to 1st NE, NoMa Metro, and M St bike line, especially once the construction alongside the Metro station is finally done.

My ideal would be an extra span across N Cap for bikes, on the north side -- a way of widening the sidewalk, which is hopelessly narrow right there, currently the key bottleneck.

Alternatively, NY Ave W/B shrinks a lane just *after* N Cap. Start that process a couple of hundred feet earlier, and it frees up a lot of space for cyclists and peds.

[kai]

Irving St or Michigan Ave bike lanes! These two roads are SUPER dangerous for cyclists, with cars routinely going 50 mph and no shoulder for cyclists.

[washcycle]

kai. huh?