This has been nostalgia for me. I was vice president and
newsletter editor for the Madison Bicycle Brigade in the early-mid 1980s.
Let me share a couple of anecdotes with you.
When the counter flow lane was set up we had trouble getting
Madison engineering to keep up with painting the westbound lane
delineations between cars, bikes and busses. When nothing happened
despite our repeated demands, we developed a scheme. I would drive my
truck, which I had for constructing a place up north, with it's amber
light flashing (to sort of look official) while MBB members walked
ahead and painted the lane lines with spray paint. Somehow the city
got wind of it (we never discovered the actual identity of the
leaker) but there they were next day: freshly painted, professionally
done lane lines, compliments of the city of Madison.
When the city was negligent about sweeping debris from the
Gorham Street bike lane, MBB sent a team out with shovels and brooms.
They filled 12 boxes. One of those boxes of debris was gift-wrapped
and presented to the mayor at a common council meeting. The street
got cleaned up really fast.
Those were fun days and a precursor of things to come. They
were part of what led to the creation of the Bicycle Federation of
Wisconsin on 30 April 1988, an event that forever changed bicycle
advocacy in Wisconsin.
At 09:32 AM 10/6/2014, Michael Rewey wrote:
The loss of leg crash occurred in 1967 (?) not too long after West
Johnson was expanded
and University became one-way in (I believe) late 1966 with a
contra-flow bus lane. I was
livng here at the time.
In Spring of 1967 we had a cross-walk blockage protest on West
Johnson. It was a
speedway and pedestrian nightmare for students with signals only at
Park and Randall (I
think Randall had one). As soon as the police started controlling
one intersection, we went to
another one. The blockage was legal, we kept walking back and
forth across the street at
intersections. A critical mass and a lot of irate motorists.
Memories...
Mike Rewey
On 6 Oct 2014 at 8:16, Robbie Webber wrote:
When I left Madison in 1980 the bikes, buses, and right turns all
shared the right lane
westbound. It was pretty hairy both because the buses were pulling
to the right to stop and
also because having a bus tailgating you isn't fun. As Mitch
mentioned, the eastbound lane
was a bus-only lane (I don't remember bikes using it, but that
doesn't mean it didn't happen.)
There was a t-shirt at the time that I regret not purchasing as a
historical memento. It showed
a stick figure on a bike leaning forward, depicting rushing or
effort. Behind the bicyclist was a
bus bearing down him, and the words, "I survived the bike lane on
University Ave."
I remember people stepping out into the eastbound bus without
looking and a few close calls
or collisions, although I don't remember and details.
When I returned to Madison in 1986, the current arrangement was in
place, and people were
talking about the very bad collision between a bus and a student. I
thought someone had
been killed, but others have subsequently told me it was the
loss-of-leg incident.
I believe Arthur once told me that the University Ave eastbound lane
was the first protected
bike lane -- AKA cycletrack -- in the US.
Robbie Webber
Transportation Policy Analyst
608-263-9984 (o)
[email protected]
All opinions expressed are my own and do not necessarily reflect
those of my employer or
any other group with which I am affiliated.
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