At 05:25 PM 06/26/2003 +0000, Cathy(debcat52) wrote (on the SASYNA list serv): >there was letter to editor in paper last week >re: the wisdom of having bike lanes mixing it up with 35-50 mph car >traffic on E. Wash, the most heavily used street in the city. >The writer advocated instead creating good parallel alternative >routes-- I have to agree with that. The one already going from >Wright St./MATC area to Hwy 30 is a nice start. Sometimes I go by >way of Fair Oaks/Lexington/ Sycamore Ave. but thats kind of a >roundabout way. Along Starkweather creek would be a very pleasant (& >very direct) route if that was possible.
parallel facilities for bicycles (and pedestrians) are always nice, but they are no substitute for bicycle and pedestrian access to the businesses (and residences, and East High, etc.) that exist along East Washington ave. Please remember that bicyclists are not always merely travelling through, they are often also going to, places on streets of all sizes. >What do you bike people think about this? This city seems terribly >short-sighted sometimes. Has the safety & practical-ness of this E. >Wash bike lane been critiqued very well? The writer of the letter >also made the point that at intersections like 1st St, you'll have >numerous cars crossing into the bike lane to make right turns, so >right there that's a hazard... not to mention aggravating for the >bicyclist. conflicts between rith turning cars and through-bicyclists is something that has to be considered, and it has been: an effective way of dealing with it is to position the bike lane to the *left* of the right turn only lane. this is how the potential conflict is dealt with on, e.g. Park Street northbound where it intersects with Johnson (although it may be torn up at the moment from all the construction there) >One thing thats been nagging at me for a long time about this is if >the street is widened ...then it becomes all too easy to convert the >extra bike lanes to car traffic at some future date. By then the >damage has been done, the trees have been cut down, the E Wash homes >have lost several feet of their front yards. Cynic that I am, I would >not be surprised if the bike lane was conciously thrown in there >solely to appease neighborhood activists to get them psyched for the >concept of widening. I am always concerned about widening any street, even for bike lanes, but all the drawings I have seen (both good and bad) are proposing various configurations of the same overall width as the existing footprint of East Washinton Ave (at least from Blair to the river). the intersection of East Wash with First Street is an exception to this, which is why it is of so much concern to many bicyclists and pedestrians city-wide, as well as neighborhood residents, of course. chuck Chuck Strawser Project Coordinator Bicycle Federation of Wisconsin 106 E. Doty Street, Suite 400 P.O. Box 1224 Madison, WI 53701-1224 608-251-4456 tel 608-251-4594 fax [EMAIL PROTECTED] www.bfw.org _______________________________________________ Bikies mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.danenet.org/mailman/listinfo/bikies
