If you read the LADOT Bike Blog earlier this week, you caught wind that they are testing cycletrack options downtown. But what snapped my neck was that this trial is occurring on Los Angeles St. between 1st & Temple.
Wait! I just did a video over that stretch!
See! I am all encompassing!
Humor aside, I was in the area last Thursday for the Investing In Place function and had to peek my head to see anything changed. To my surprise, there wasn’t a single car parked along the stretch!
(Now the part where I bitch about my phone)I wanted to take a pic, but my android phone had been intermittently dying on me, a problem I’m hoping a factory reset will solve.
That afternoon, I bragged about my near-like Vader powers to Jennifer Gill from Metro at the meeting, but she told me she had still seen cars there. Instantly, I was knocked back to Padawan status.
Then Tuesday happened. That morning, I was participating at the Valley Industry and Commerce Association Transportation Committee Meeting along with Maria Camacho of the LA River Corporation. One of the other speakers, Claire Brown, of the city Planning Department, gave an abbreviated speech as she left to catch a conference call. Fair enough, but later I saw her in all those of the cycletrack pictures!
I would have flipped had she mentioned that! Well, probably not since I was in suit attire…but on the inside.
If you’ve gone through the pictures on the blog, there are a number of bumps or armadillos LADOT is considering along with standard bollards. There’s a lot of give and take between which you would prefer. It’s basically an argument between how visible the options are versus the level of protection against cars versus the consequences of accidentally cycling into one of them. Here’s some picts that Jennifer Gill shot:
It appears on this test that these mini barriers were laid over the previous striping, so before I come to a preference, I’ll wait to hear about how the road will be painted.
Coming full circle, you’ll notice that cars are still occupying part of the lane:
The good news for the valley is there will be a one day cycletrack pop up during CicLAvia on Chandler east of Lankershim you can follow with #PopUpChandler. Until then, we can only dream.