Cambridge Civic Journal Forum

November 2, 2011

2011 Cambridge Municipal Election – City Council Candidates

Filed under: 2011 Election,City Council,elections — Tags: , , — Robert Winters @ 10:45 am

Election Day is Tuesday, November 8, 2011.

2011 Cambridge Municipal Election – City Council Candidates

Tom Stohlman (19 Channing St., 02138) is a 2nd time candidate.

Tim Toomey (88 Sixth St., 02141) was first elected to the Cambridge City Council in 1989.

Leland Cheung (157 Garden St., 02138) was elected to the Cambridge City Council in 2009.

Ken Reeves (340 Harvard St., 02139) was first elected to the Cambridge City Council in 1989.

Larry Ward (372A Broadway, 02139) is a 3rd time candidate and served as a city councillor in 2009.

Denise Simmons (188 Harvard St., 02139) was first elected to the Cambridge City Council in 2001.

Charlie Marquardt (10 Rogers St., 02142) is a 2nd time candidate.

David Maher (120 Appleton St., 02138) was first elected to the Cambridge City Council in 1999 and is currently Mayor.

Gary Mello (324 Franklin St., 02139) is a 1st time candidate.

Henrietta Davis (120 Chestnut St., 02139) was elected to the Cambridge City Council in 1995.

Matt Nelson (108 Pine St., 02139) is a 1st time candidate.

Jamake Pascual (10 Laurel St., 02139) is a 1st time candidate.

Gregg Moree (25 Fairfield St., 02140) is a 3rd time candidate.

Sam Seidel (48 Maple Ave., 02139) was first elected to the Cambridge City Council in 2007.

Minka vanBeuzekom (20 Essex St., 02139) is a 2nd time candidate.

Marjorie Decker (61 Walden St., 02140) was first elected to the Cambridge City Council in 1999.

Craig Kelley (6 St. Gerard Terr., 02140) was first elected to the Cambridge City Council in 2005.

James Williamson (1000 Jackson Place, 02140) is a 4th time candidate.

Photos and profiles of all the Cambridge candidates may be found at the Cambridge Candidate Pages
http://vote.rwinters.com    or    http://vote.cambridgecivic.com

September 15, 2011

Concord Avenue, Under Construction

Filed under: Cambridge government,cycling,Fresh Pond,planning,transportation — Tags: , , , , , , , , , , — jsallen @ 1:33 pm

I just rode Concord Avenue last Sunday to see what was happening there.

I had thought that the construction project would have been completed by now, but it isn’t.

The image below is of the east end of the section under construction. I find a bit of irony here in that the “Bikes May Use Full Lane” sign is placed at the start of a project which intends to get bicycles off the road, and also it is nonstandard — diamond-shaped like a warning sign which is supposed to be yellow, but white like a regulatory sign, which is supposed to be rectangular (as with speed-limit and no parking signs). The message is a regulatory message: it is law.

Looking west at the east end of the Concord Avenue section under construction

Looking west at the east end of the Concord Avenue section under construction

Construction barrels divide the narrowed roadway into two lanes, rather than the three planned for when construction is complete. As the westbound bikeway is incomplete, I rode west on the roadway. Motorists still were able to overtake me without leaving their lane, as they were when the roadway was wider, with three travel lanes and a bike lane on either side. I was passed by a number of cars, no problem. I had one conflict with a driver who moved out of a side street into my path. Such conflicts will be much more common when bicyclists are riding in sidewalk space.

The road surface was very bumpy because the street has not yet been repaved. The effort is going into construction of the bicycle sidepaths at this time.

I shot video of my rides. It’s HD video and you will want to view it full screen to get all the details. This is the link to the video of my westbound ride. And here is my eastbound ride.

One other thing I hadn’t expected is that the south-side (eastbound) path was almost completely empty, except for me, though it was nearly finished, and unobstructed — on a warm, sunny Sunday afternoon when there was heavy bicycle and pedestrian traffic in Fresh Pond Park and on the Minuteman path.

I can say that if much traffic does appear on the south-side path, the situation will be very confused. There is no buffer between the 5′ wide bikeway (closer to the curb) and the wider walkway away from the curb. There was supposed to be a 2-foot-wide buffer, as I recall. Also, the concrete pavement of the pedestrian section, farther from the curb, is smoother. The bumpier asphalt pavement adjacent to the curb is supposed to be for eastbound bicyclists, in defiance of AASHTO guidelines, which require a 5′ spacing or a barrier, and also in defiance of normal path and road rules, which require riding on the right side. The City’s scheme would have eastbound bicyclists riding on the left side of the combined bikeway and walkway. Meanwhile, there also will be westbound bicyclists using this path to avoid the much worse path on the other side of the street, and probably keeping to the right as is usual.

As the path is behind a high curb, bicyclists who want to cross Concord Avenue will have to wait at the crosswalks rather than to merge into the roadway. At the few crosswalks, there is no waiting area (for example, at 1:24 in the eastbound video). Because the bikeway is between the walkway and the street, bicyclists and pedestrians who are waiting to cross the street will block the bikeway, and other bicyclists will have to divert onto the walkway.

As the concrete pavers of the pedestrian section and the asphalt of the bicycle section age and settle, a step could develop between them, just as on the parts of the Charles River paths, widened with asphalt next to the old stone retaining wall along the riverfront. Many bicyclists have gone down as a result.

Many aspects of the Cambridge bicycle program can be described as ideologically driven, and defying national and state design standards. Placing a longitudinal seam along a bikeway, and directing traffic to keep left, are merely incompetent.

Other than what I have described in this post, the project looks as though it will turn out as I expected, with the foreseeable problems I’ve already described in my earlier post; the right hook and left cross conflicts, inability to cross to the south side at most locations without dismounting in the street to lift the bicycle over a curb; resulting wrong-way riding on the north side, etc.

The party line about the Concord Avenue project, which I have in writing from two City employees (here and here) and verbally from a member of the Cambridge Bicycle Committee, is that “bicyclists will be riding in exactly the same place as they are now.” This statement turns a blind eye to the encouragement of wrong-way riding, and the keep right/keep left confusion. It ignores bicyclists’ crossing and turning maneuvers, and motorists’ being trapped by the curbs and forced to turn across the path of bicyclists; it denies that motorists block sidepaths so they can see approaching traffic in the street. Saying that “bicyclists will be riding in exactly the same place as they are now” is like saying that a bird in a cage, hanging in a tree, is in exactly in the same place as a bird sitting in that tree and free to fly off.

What really burns me up is that the City employees designing bicycle facilities appear to have no concept of how bicyclists actually are going to use them, or of the potential hazards. It’s all about “build it and they will come” and that means, build just anything they think will attract novice cyclists and children, and to hell with design standards and safety research. I see shoddy and incompetent mimicry of European designs, and astonishing hubris. So far, the Concord Avenue bikeway is half built with one side completely open, and very few bicyclists have come, except for me, and I was there on a discovery tour.

Save

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May 20, 2011

Response to City officials’ comments about Concord/Follen

Filed under: Cambridge government,City Council,cycling,Uncategorized — Tags: , , , , , , , , , — jsallen @ 8:49 pm

Robert Winters has posted a comment (#3 here) to my post about bicycling issues on the May 16 City Council agenda. Robert quotes Assistant City Manager for Community Development Brian Murphy and Traffic, Parking & Transportation Director Susan Clippinger about Follen Street and Little Concord Avenue. Their response, by way of the City Manager, is addressed to the City Council at next week’s meeting.

Their response (again, in comment #3 here) addresses some of the issues with the Follen Street/Concord Avenue installation, and reflects some progress.

Serious design issues, however, will still remain:

  • The configuration still has the same blind corners.
  • Because of the location of the curb cut into the brick plaza, bicyclists traveling away from the Common must still swerve to the right, toward approaching motor traffic, to reach the curb cut at the crosswalk on the far side of Follen Street. Bicyclists entering from the brick plaza are still close to a wall which also obscures motorists’ view of them.
  • Motorists approaching on Follen Street still won’t have a stop sign — see this Google Street View (and still not in 2020)– despite the blind corners.
  • The contraflow bike lane adjacent to wrong-way parking remains.
  • There is another blind corner at the Garden Street end of the pedestrian plaza, particularly for cyclists who continue toward the Radcliffe Quadrangle on the sidewalk (and many do, though that is inadvisable).
  • The “bike box” on Concord Avenue leads to more confusion than anything else, as described here. Also, many cyclists ride east on the north sidewalk, so they can access the plaza directly, posing a risk of head-on collisions with westbound cyclists and pedestrians at the blind corner between the sidewalk and the plaza.

Contraflow bicycle travel would be safer if parking were removed from one side of Follen Street — however, the public insists on using public street space for private car storage. As a bicycling advocate and former Cambridge resident who owned a (rarely used) car and had no other place to park it than the street, I can see both sides of this issue. It is not going to go away. The people who laid out Cambridge’s streets could not foresee the deluge of private motor vehicles that would descend on the city, and had no plan either to accommodate it or to forestall it.

I do think that a very significant safety improvement could be made without removing parking, by reversing the direction of one-way motor traffic on Follen Street and Little Concord Avenue. Then cyclists headed toward the blind corner would be going in the same direction as motorists. The motorists would be going very slowly here, and cyclists could easily merge toward the center of the roadway. A curb cut into the plaza in line with the center of the roadway would avoid cyclists’ having to swerve right. This curb cut would lead cyclists traveling toward the Common to the right side of the street.

A contraflow bike lane could then be installed on the south side of Little Concord Avenue, but it would still be adjacent to wrong-way parking. I’d rather see shared-lane markings far enough from parked cars to allow a motorist to start to exit a parking space without running head-on into a cyclist or forcing that cyclist into oncoming traffic. One-way, slow streets where bicyclists are allowed to travel contraflow are common in Germany, without bike lanes, and research has demonstrated their safety.

As to Murphy’s and Clippinger’s comments:

Motor vehicle volumes on the street are very low and most drivers are ones who live there and use the street regularly. The contraflow lane was installed to improve safety for cyclists by creating a dedicated facility for them to ride in and through the presence of pavement markings to remind motorists that bicyclists are traveling there.

The low motor-vehicle volume argument is an example of what I call “bean counter” safety analysis. I have heard the same argument before from Cara Seiderman, in connection with the wrong-way contraflow lane on Scott Street. This approach offers cyclists and motorists only statistical comfort, leaving them defenseless against actually preventing a crash through their own actions — as in “well, I can’t see over the SUV parked in front of my car, but probably no cyclist is coming so I’ll pull out.”

The bike lane does serve as a buffer to help prevent collisions between cars and other cars, but it doesn’t pass the test of preventing collisions between cars and cyclists. The comforting words “dedicated facility” don’t actually describe how it works in practice. Reminding motorists that bicyclists are traveling in the bike lane doesn’t count for much if the motorists can’t see the bicyclists.

Clippinger describes a safety analysis which looked at generalities about traffic volume. The claim that the dedicated facility was installed to improve safety may describe intention, but it does not describe either the design, or the outcome. This is a crash hotspot, remember. I have described design issues, and some solutions that look rather obvious to me. The city, as usual, installed a boilerplate bike lane design without much insight into whether it actually would be functional and safe.

May 16, 2011

About bicycling issues on City Council agenda tonight, May 16, 2011

Filed under: City Council,cycling,planning — Tags: , , , , , , , , , , — jsallen @ 11:03 am
A cyclist and a motorist approach the blind corner at Concord Avenue and Follen Street

A motorist cuts off a cyclist at the blind corner of Concord Avenue and Follen Street

The city's own picture of this scene shows a cyclist happily steering straight toward a curb.

A picture of the same scene from the City's Web site shows a cyclist happily steering straight toward a curb, which is cropped out of the picture.

Looking from the opposite direction, this is the path a bicyclist must take, swerving toward traffic to reach the curb cut.

Looking from the opposite direction, this multiple-exposure photo shows the path a bicyclist must take, swerving toward Follen Street traffic to reach the curb cut at the crosswalk.

This post attempts to shed some light on agenda items on tonight’s City Council agenda.

The quoted sections are from another commenter. I’m not sure I know how to reach him, and time is pressing. I don’t know whether I have permission to use his name, so I won’t. The unindented paragraphs  are my own. We’ll start with the other person who commented.

Two of the three items on the city council agenda are interesting examples of problems related to bicycle infrastructure that has been implemented over the past several years.  The third is simply a request to fill potholes, but includes an ignorant comment about bicycles needing to ride near the curb (not true according to Massachusetts law or Cambridge ordinance).

That is agenda item O-7 on the page linked here

The first bicycle facility problem is a contra-flow lane through a blind corner where motorists have no expectation that there will be contra-flow traffic of any sort as they round the corner on a one-way street.

http://bit.ly/iAHCfU

That is agenda item O-3 on the page linked here.

The street view is looking south on Follen Street as it intersects (Little) Concord Avenue.  The bike lane crosses in a contraflow manner from left to right, and then continues across the small brick plaza to the right to join with Garden Street and the continuation of Concord Avenue.  The intersection just beyond the plaza is the same one where Cambridge has installed a bike box critiqued by John Allen

(http://bit.ly/jQN595).

The contraflow bike lane is adjacent to wrong-way parking, another odd feature of this installation — see this for a description and explanation of wrong-way parking:

http://bikexprt.com/bikepol/facil/lanes/contraflow.htm#scottst

Upon reaching the corner, bicyclists have to ride out past a stop bar and stop sign before they can see around the corner. A stop sign requires two actions, a stop and a yield. The yield is what actually prevents a collision — but it is only possible where you can see conflicting traffic.

Many if not most of the bicyclists approaching this intersection are Harvard students headed up to the Radcliffe quadrangle. Are we to assume that they aren’t bright enough to figure out that they must yield? The problem is that nobody ever instructed them, and many have little bicycling experience as they suddenly find themselves dependent on a bicycle for transportation. Also, the stop bar isn’t where there’s anything to yield to unless a pedestrian happens to be crossing — it encourages running the stop sign, sort of like traffic ju-jitsu: aha– fooled ya!.

See Google Street View looking toward the stop sign:

http://tinyurl.com/4yfz9bc

I have a discussion of this contraflow bike lane in the page linked below this paragraph. The third photo down the page shows the stop sign. I prepared the page linked below years ago, shortly after the installation. This was clearly going to be a problem location.

http://bikexprt.com/massfacil/cambridge/harvardsq/litlconc.htm

The curb ramp on the far side of the intersection is located at the end of the crosswalk rather than in line with the bike lane. Bicyclists must ride toward approaching traffic to reach the ramp.

Bicyclists coming in the opposite direction off the little pedestrian plaza are hidden by a wall and subject to similar risks. This entire treatment is a prime example of Cambridge’s principle of Design by Wishful Thinking.

The second problem is at a rather unremarkable intersection, so it is not clear to me why there would be issues.

See Council Order O-19 on the page linked here.

http://bit.ly/kQWgBQ

The street view is looking south on Ellery Street as it approaches Broadway.  Ellery is a narrow one-way street with a bike lane.  Traffic is typically slow, but can be heavy at rush hour.  Broadway is a two-way narrow connecting through street with parking and no bicycle infrastructure in this area.  Traffic typically runs about 25-30mph, slower and heavier at rush hour.  The intersection is also at the corner of a local public high school campus.  Neither street is difficult to cycle on if you have at least modest traffic experience.

There is a flashing yellow and red overhead signal indicating a stop sign for Ellery Street entering from the north.  I tried to find data related to the several accidents cited, but did not see anything apparent on the Cambridge city web site.  I can speculate that most of the car/bike accidents are probably due to scofflaw behavior — either bicyclists in the Ellery bike lane not heeding the stop sign as they continue across Broadway, or wrong-way riders in the Ellery Street bike lane illegally approaching Broadway from the south.  Also likely would be standard right hook, left cross, and failure to yield collisions caused by motorists, but I don’t see why those would be any worse at this intersection.

I see a double-whammy right-hook provocation for bicyclists headed south on Ellery Street, in that the bike lane on the far side of the intersection is to the left of parking (and in the door zone, as is usual in Cambridge), while the bike lane on the near side is at the curb and carried all the way up to the intersection. So, bicyclists are encouraged to overtake motorists on the right, then merge left inside the intersection where motorists turn right.  I think that the high traffic volume and prevalence of high-school students probably also account for the number of crashes. There probably are scofflaw crashes too. Yes, it would be very interesting to see details so as to get a handle on what is actually happening here.

I’m not looking for any answers, but I thought people on this list might be interested in what Cambridge lawmakers are thinking.

November 3, 2010

Specific issues with Western Avenue project

Filed under: Cambridge government,cycling,planning,water — Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , — jsallen @ 2:24 pm

In this post, I’m going to examine some of the drawings of its Western Avenue project which the City of Cambridge has provided.

All of the illustrations below are from the City’s conceptual design booklet.

Western Avenue concept drawing

Western Avenue concept drawing

The cars shown parked at the left are real cars, in the original photograph that was modified to show the conceptual design. Typical sedans are about 5 1/2 feet wide, not counting the side-view mirrors, but common light trucks are as much as 6 1/2 feet wide. Big trucks and buses can be 8 1/2 feet wide.

The cars shown parked at the right are drawings added when the photo was modified. All of them are micro-cars, very much smaller than the cars on the left — only about 4 1/2 feet wide.

Bicyclists complain about “door zone” bike lanes — where opening car doors pose a threat. On the other hand, the door zone serves an important function. A motorist can open the car door without its protruding directly into the path of motor traffic, and can walk around the car.

In the drawing below, I have copied the nearest car in the original drawing into each travel lane. This drawing shows too little clearance between parked vehicles and moving ones to allow motorists safely to walk around to the street side of their vehicles or open the doors. The right lane as shown is especially tight, even with micro-cars parked on the right and ordinary sedans in the travel lanes — though Western Avenue is a designated bus and truck route.

Western Avenue concept drawing, modified

Western Avenue concept drawing, modified

To show how wide the left lane is at present, the white line in the foreground replaces the gray patch that is dimly visible in the original drawing, covering up the location of the present lane line.

The parts of the illustration that are from the original photo are to scale — including the cars I have copied into the travel lanes. The drawn-in elements are conceptual, and some are not to scale.

The drawing below, also from the City, is dimensioned, showing a 36-foot wide roadway. The elements are to scale: 10.5 foot travel lanes, 7-foot parking lanes and mid-sized cars 6 feet wide, not counting the mirrors — like a a Ford Taurus. This drawing shows more room between vehicles than the right lane in the photo, but on the other hand, the parked cars are tight against the curbs, and no trucks or buses are shown.

Cross-section of street with cycle track

Cross-section of street with cycle track

Now let’s look at an overhead drawing, which shows a typical treatment at an intersection.

Western Avenue at Jay Street

Western Avenue at Jay Street

Let’s put more cars and some bicyclists and pedestrians into the picture. I’ve put three bicyclists on the blue strip which represents the cycle track. Two are headed with traffic and one is headed opposite traffic. (Off-street facilities encourage two-direction traffic, and this is particularly so on a one-way street where there is no opposite-direction paired street conveniently nearby.) There also is a group of pedestrians standing on the bulbout before the intersection. Excuse me if the bicyclists and pedestrians look like ants, I’m no Picasso.

Pedestrians and parked cars conceal  right-way bicyclists from drivers of cars A and B, increasing the risk of a “right hook” collision. Also, Car B  is blocking the right-hand travel lane. Such blockages will increase congestion. The more bicyclists, the more often turning motorists will have to wait in the position shown. At present, motorists can keep moving as they prepare to turn right, because they can merge behind a bicyclist before reaching the intersection.

Car C in the drawing must wait far back from the intersection, what with the separate sidewalk and cycle track. Then, on reaching the intersection, as shown in the illustration below, the car must block the cycle track as the driver scans for traffic. If more than one car is in line, both the sidewalk and the cycle track will be blocked at the same time.

Western Avenue at Jay Street, cycle track blocked

Western Avenue at Jay Street, cycle track blocked

Presently, without the cycle track, this kind of blockage happens only for the sidewalk. It is more troublesome and hazardous for bicyclists than pedestrians, because bicyclists are faster, and farther away when the driver must first see them, and can be hidden by buildings or by pedestrians on the sidewalk. The crash rate for wrong-way cyclists on cycle tracks like this one is very high — research in Finland, Sweden and Germany has shown it to be about 10 times as high as for right-way travel on the street. Right-way travel on a cycle track located, like this one, behind parked cars, and with unsignalized intersections and driveways, has been shown only two or three times as hazardous.

There is also a much greater risk of collisons with pedestrians, and with other bicyclists, than when riding in the street. This cycle track has about 6 feet of width where bicyclists are clear of car-door hazards or plantings — very substandard for a two-way facility.

There is a question what the wrong-way bicyclists will do when they reach Franklin Street and the cycle track ends. Most likely, they will go up onto the sidewalk or ride opposite traffic in the bike lane.

Finally, let’s look at the intersection of Western Avenue and Memorial Drive. At present, Western Avenue has four travel lanes approaching the intersection.  The rightmost lane is a right-turn-only lane which the City describes as underutilized. I agree with that description — even in the evening rush hour, I have been able to filter forward to the intersection on my bicycle in that lane.

The City proposes to change that lane into a cycle track, so right turns are made from the next lane to the left. In this connection, I question the City’s conclusion that its plan will not increase congestion. In the evening rush hour, traffic already queues on Putnam Avenue and Memorial Drive, all the way back to River Street. Even one vehicle waiting to turn right, while bicyclists overtake on the right, will block all other vehicles in the lane behind it. This is aside from the issue of institutionalizing the “right hook” — placing all responsibility for bicyclists’ safety on the motorists, and stripping away bicyclists’ defense of merging into the line of right-turning traffic.

Western Avenue at Memorial Drive, conceptual drawing

Western Avenue at Memorial Drive, conceptual drawing

I suggest instead that bicyclists be encouraged to travel along the left side of the right-turn lane, by means of shared-lane markings and signage, or better, if there is room, a through bike lane.

The question remains of how to handle opposite-direction bicycle traffic. It does not admit of an easy answer.  At this point, I’m most inclined to try to address it on River Street.

And, I’ll add: the sacredness of on-street parking is the issue that makes the problem insoluble. If parking could be removed form one side of Western Avenue, a contraflow bike lane would be an option.

There is no such issue on River Street, because there are many parallel streets in Cambridgeport that allow travel in the opposite direction.

Signing off…

October 29, 2010

Burning bridges

Filed under: Cambridge government,planning — Tags: , , , , , , , , — jsallen @ 8:59 am

I have removed my most recent post.

Though it was factual — and passed muster with Robert Winters, who manages this forum — it did not address the main issue that motivates me to post here: my intense frustration with some directions which the Cambridge bicycle program is taking. My post was an expression of frustration rather than a description of current issues, and as such, it created more heat than light.

In the post, I asked whether Jeff Rosenblum was a builder of bridges. I think that was a fair question, but on the other hand I have burned some, and not only with him. I am no longer a member of the Massbike Technical Advisory Committee. Executive Director David Watson had already explained to me that my presence on that committee was getting in the way of Massbike’s work with governments. My recent post was the last straw for him.

I had already considered resigning for a couple of months. I regret that I did not have the courage to ask for a resignation. Instead, I backed myself into this situation. In the light of some of my posts in this forum, it may come as a surprise to my readers, but confrontation does not come easily for me. Sometimes I do not manage it well, and it bursts out.

Massbike and its predecessor organization, the Boston Area Bicycle Coalition, have been a major part of my life over the years. I have been on the Board of Directors, been President, attended hundreds of meetings and public hearings, written large reports under contract. I part from Massbike with considerable regret. On the other hand, I am also feeling much relief with this change. I had become increasingly frustrated with some directions Massbike is taking. I was increasingly uncomfortable as a member of the Technical Advisory Committee, and Massbike leadership was increasingly uncomfortable with me.

My underlying drive, my lifetime quest, as I must acknowledge to myself, is as a journalist. When I see something that disturbs me, my primary instinct is to provide information, to explain my concern, to try to make it understandable to other people. I am highly uncomfortable with biting my tongue in the interest of political expediency and compromise.

I have now freed myself from that obligation as it involves bicycling issues in Massachusetts, and so I think I will now be able to do a better job here on this forum. I offer my heartfelt thanks to Robert Winters for hosting this forum and for his support.

I’ll sign off with a quote, which I think is apt:

“The basis of our governments being the opinion of the people, the very first object should be to keep that right; and were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter. But I should mean that every man should receive those papers and be capable of reading them.” –Thomas Jefferson to Edward Carrington, 1787. ME 6:57

May 4, 2010

Jessica Eckhardt’s conversation with Nicole Freedman and Jeff Rosenblum

Filed under: cycling,planning — Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , — jsallen @ 10:28 pm

Following the Urban Revolutions event on April 28 (see previous post on this blog), Cambridge resident Jessica Eckhardt spoke with Boston’s Bicycle Program director, Nicole Freedman. They had known each other as members of the bicycle racing community. Eckhardt also spoke with Jeff Rosenblum, who works in the Cambridge Community Development Department and who was a co-founder of Livable Streets. Following (you may have to click on a “more” prompt just below this) is Eckhardt’s account of the conversation.

(more…)

April 30, 2010

Concord Avenue: City’s position, and comments

Filed under: Cambridge government,cycling,planning — Tags: , , , , , , , , , , — jsallen @ 3:20 pm

On April 27, Kelly Dunn, Community Relations Manager of the Cambridge Department of Public Works, sent the e-mail below to a number of people. One was Jessica Eckhardt, who lives near the project area. The sections below in quotes are Ms. Dunn’s e-mail and the other sections are Ms. Eckhardt’s and my response.

Dear Jessica,

Thank you for your input and suggestions regarding the cycle tracks on Concord Ave.  I hope I can address some of your concerns.

A few years ago a comprehensive planning study of the area was completed.  The Concord-Alewife Study examined the current support system for pedestrians and cyclists in the area, and looked at how we might enhance access through additional connections in the Alewife Quadrangle.  I encourage you to take a look at the study:  http://www.cambridgema.gov/cdd/cp/zng/concalew/concale_plan_all.pdf

We like what that study says, but on the other hand, your statement chttp://www.cambridgema.gov/cdd/cp/zng/concalew/concale_plan_all.pdfhanges the subject. That study contains no mention of “raised bike lanes”.

As projects move forward, we hope to be able to implement some of the connections noted in the study. Regarding the overall design of Concord Avenue, there are a few things to note. The reconstruction that will happen is a complete right-of-way reconstruction, with reconstruction of sidewalks, curbs and drainage systems; this would happen in any case and is not being done specifically to create the raised bike lane.

So, the “raised bike lane” just sorta happened?  No, the City is consciously taking advantage of the need to reconstruct the street and sewers to create the so-called “raised bike lanes”.

Why the quotes? By definition, both technical and vernacular, there is no such thing as a “raised bike lane”. Any lane is part of the roadway, at roadway level. A bike path is separate from the roadway, and standards for safe design apply to it too.  Under the proposed design, neither the street nor the paths meet design standards that apply in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.

The raised bike lane is just that: bicyclists will be in the exact same location as they are now.

That statement turns attention away from the issues by discussing location instead of behavior. The statement makes a host of assumptions, first of which is that cyclists only need to ride in the bike lane. Yes, you can be in the exact same place, but your options are very different if you are behind a curb.

Consider access to and from the eastbound “raised bike lane.”  To reach it from most entrances on the north side, cyclists will have to cross most of the way, dismount, lift their bicycles over a curb and remount. Eastbound cyclists on the south side will have to hop down a curb at most places to turn left. The difficulty and danger of crossing the street will strongly encourage wrong-way riding, a practice which Cambridge has correctly disparaged in the past and is ignoring with this project.

Also, cyclists may now merge out of the bike lane to allow motorists to turn right without conflict. This option is denied with the “raised bike lanes”.

This is not a sidewalk path and bicyclists and pedestrians are separated by a street furniture zone, where street trees and street lights are located.

We do anticipate pedestrians spilling over or choosing to use the “raised bike lane” for travel – also cyclists using the pedestrian strip. In some places, the available width for both is only 10 feet. Still, the most disturbing issue with riding on a sidewalk-level facility is not so much the conflicts with pedestrians. It is the conflicts with motor vehicles — when riding the right way and much more so when riding the wrong way.

No matter what the design, the north side of Concord Avenue cannot be a safe location for the novice and child cyclists the City wants to attract. There is heavy turning and crossing traffic, at way too many locations. We have suggested extending the multi-use path on the south side — which has its benefits and drawbacks — the most notable benefit is safety for the inexperienced and child cyclists, with only one driveway crossing in the same distance.

At intersections and driveways, the facility is a regular in-street bike lane.

This is inaccurate and reveals a serious misunderstanding. The design drawings show the facility coming down to street level within a few feet of each street or driveway. To operate as a bike lane, it would have to come down at least 100 feet farther away, so that cyclists and motorists could negotiate lane position before and after the intersection. The City is not unfamiliar with this concept, which it used in its Vassar Street project. With, on average, one driveway or street every 100 feet, allowing merging distance around intersections and driveways would leave the westbound facility a bike lane just as it is now, for almost the entire length of the project.

There will be added signage reminding motorists to yield to cyclists.

Right-turning motorists will have to stop and wait, rather than merging into the bike lane before turning. Expect congestion, and mistakes. Signs or no signs, left-turning motorists will be unable to see past vehicles in the westbound lane. The best a left-turner can do is to creep forward until his or her vehicle’s hood provides a warning to cyclists that they need to yield.

There is nothing about the design that changes where cyclists travel over a standard bicycle lane.

This statement ignores the need to cross the street, among others, as already discussed.

Turning movements are always a concern, on all roads, whether there are bicycle facilities or not. There is no evidence that a raised bike lane with this design would make the situation worse; to the contrary, it increases the visibility of the cyclist, as well as decreases the likelihood of other dangerous behaviors such as motor vehicles parking in the bike lane.

That is an astonishing statement. Such evidence has existed for decades. It follows from human factors analysis (e.g, that drivers do not have x-ray vision, as already discussed), and from safety studies on both sides of the Atlantic. See for example this review of research results. And, a recent, extensive study in Copenhagen confirmed substantially-increased crash rates for cyclists, motorists and pedestrians alike.

If everything about positioning is the same, how can a height difference of 6 inches — or less, when the facility slants down before a street or driveway — make the cyclists more visible, especially to left-turning traffic? Will the child cyclists be more visible? Will any cyclists be visible when to the right of vans, trucks and buses?

As to your concern about motor vehicles parking in the bike lane, there is ample parking in the adjacent industrial area, and besides, the bike lane is too narrow to park in. Parking there is rare, illegal and subject to fines and towing. If there is no bike lane, any illegal parking will be in the travel lane instead or with one wheel up over the curb in the “raised bike lane”.

It’s important for cyclists to feel safe; especially riders with children and others who would not choose to ride on major streets with high volumes and high speeds of traffic.

We find it very distressing that the City proposes to attract unsuspecting cyclists including children onto a facility that crosses 24 driveways and 7 streets in 3000 feet, with known and serious crash risks, by making them feel safe — when the option exists for a path with only one, signalized intersection on the other side of the same street. Is it acceptable to make people feel safe when actually creating hazards for them? There is a vernacular term for this action: “Pied Piper” and also a legal term.”attractive nuisance.” We vote to re-examine the project on the basis of true safety, rather than an illusion of safety.

The City is committed to supporting and promoting sustainable transportation, and making it available and accessible to all. Raised bicycle lanes have been proven to be safe, effective facilities, which enable more people to choose to bicycle.

We support sustainable transportation too. We ride our bicycles almost every day, and we desire real safety improvements. Please cite your sources and clarify whether you are stating that a “raised bike lane” with so many intersections and immediately behind a high curb has been shown safe.

The project will also have important benefits to other users, especially pedestrians, who will have a greater buffer from motor vehicle traffic and improved street crossings. It is also expected that narrowing the curb-to-curb width of the street will help to reduce speeds, which are currently excessive.

Then we would be trying to use the cyclists and the car-bike conflicts as a shield, sacrificing one group for the benefit of the other. See especially the table on page 3 of the Copenhagen study, which was limited to the most carefully-designed street-corridor separated bicycle facilities. It found streets with these facilities more hazardous than other streets — for cyclists, motorists and pedestrians alike. Many features of the Concord Avenue design increase the hazard far beyond that of the Copenhagen facilities. Please, Ms. Dunn, show us your evidence to the contrary. We can’t just take your word for what you say, when public safety is at stake.

Yes, speeds are sure to decrease when the motorists are brought to a complete halt to wait to turn right across the “raised bike lane” and to a crawl to try to avoid collisions when turning left.  Speeds could easily be controlled with traffic enforcement or with other measures, for example, raised pedestrian crossings.

One of the primary goals of the project is to improve conditions for people walking and biking on Concord Avenue, while maintaining vehicular capacity.  The number of travel lanes will remain the same as today.

A “raised bike lane” is not a bike lane. The number of lanes will be reduced by two. A cyclist, who has the right to use the roadway under the laws of the Commonwealth, will no longer have eastbound and westbound bike lanes on the road. Also, capacity for motor vehicles will be reduced because motorists will have to stop before turning right, and will have to creep forward (we hope) while turning left, to yield to cyclists they can not see.

The conditions for cyclists and pedestrians will deteriorate with the snow in winter and no place to put it.  Even if the “raised bike lane” is cleared, it will remain partly coated with slush and ice.

A community meeting was held last spring and the project has been reviewed by community groups, the city’s bicycle and pedestrian committees, the disabilities commission, and the committee on public planting.

The Cambridge bicycle program likes push the envelope by imitating European practice. People who are not familiar with the research literature can easily be convinced that the grass is always greener in Copenhagen, and that all such innovation is positive. This project also plays into the widespread public misperception that bicycling on sidewalks is safe. Some European designs are faulty, and this project in addition reflects a poor imitation of European practice. It will create a situation far worse than possible alternatives, and a perception of safety without really increasing safety. That is not positive innovation.

I (Jessica) am requesting meeting minutes and a copy of the flyer that was supposedly distributed around my neighborhood. I also ask why Massbike was not informed of the construction project.

If you would like, I can add your email to my public notification list; you can also check the progress of upcoming work at our website as well: http://www.cambridgema.gov/TheWorks/

Thank you again for your comments.  I will be sending out periodic construction updates at the work progresses.  If at any time you run into issues, feel free to contact me or Dan Vallee, project manager.

Sincerely,

Kelly

Kelly Dunn

Community Relations Manager

Cambridge Department of Public Works
147 Hampshire Street
Cambridge, MA 02139
T:  617.349.4870
F:  617.349.4814

kdunn *at* cambridgema *dot* gov

www.cambridgema.gov/theworks

[All contact information here is already available on the Internet; e-mail address has been altered to avoid contributing to harvesting by spam robots.]

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