Streetsblog Los Angeles

Earlier today, the L.A. County Board of Supervisors quickly and unanimously passed a motion by Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky urging for progressive changes to the L.A. County Draft Bike Plan.  The L.A. County Bike Plan addresses the “unincorporated” parts of L.A. County (those without a municipal government) such as Marina del Rey.

First, he named Carmageddon, than he rescued the Bike Plan. Good year for the Supe. Photo: Brian Watts/KPCC

The motion, available on the Supervisor’s website for the last week, picks up many of the suggestions made by bicyclists at a recent meeting of the County Planning Commission, including language that allows the County to build cycle tracks when permitted by state law, requires conformity with the recently released “model street manual” by the L.A. County Department of Public Health and UCLA Luskin Center for Innovation, and allows the use of other innovative bicycling design as they become approved by Caltrans.

“The bicycle plan has come a long way since the first draft, but there improvements are still needed to really address safety,” testified the Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition’s Alexis Lantz before passage of the motion.  ”We want the County Bike Plan to not only be a guide for implementation but a visionary plan for the next 20 years that will help create safer streets, encourages a diversity of people to bicycle, and maximizes our planned and proposed transportation investments so LA County becomes more mobile, better connected, healthier and a more livable county.

We feel the motion before you today gives the guidance needed to staff in order to do just that and we urge you to support it.” Read more…

Late last year, a team of advocates descended on City Hall to urge the City’s Planning Commission to reject the most recent draft of the city’s bike plan for a variety of issues, ranging from equity to the vague nature of the goals and timeline for implementation.  The Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition is hoping for a  re-run as the L.A. County Bike Plan heads to the County Planning Commission with many of the same issues needing resolution that the city’s plan had last year at this time.

To read the plan, click here.

This Wednesday morning (full event details at the end of the post), the County Planning Commission will meet at 9:00 A.M. to discuss the draft Bike Plan and the Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition is urging cyclists to urge the Commission to send the plan back to the staff for further revisions.  To help advocates better lobby the County Planning Commission, the LACBC created an action alert on Google Documents for individuals or organizations.

The LACBC summarizes on its blog:

“…while this plan does provide 816 miles of new bikeways  for the many unincorporated communities in LA County, the majority are bike routes (458). We feel the plan still needs a number of improvements, including more miles of bike lanes and bike boulevards (also referred to as bicycle friendly streets) before any action should be taken on it.”

The Bike Plan has been in the works since 2009, but this run to the L.A. County Planning Commission feels a bit rushed with recent developments not being taken into account.  Most notably, we’re just weeks removed from the triumphant launch of a “Model Design Manual for Living Streets” written by a team of experts including bike planner Ryan Snyder.

The manual showed how any municipality could embrace a living streets philospohy to encourage greater physical activity and a more equitable mix of transportation modes.  Funding for the Manual came from the L.A. County Public Health Department, yet neither the manual nor its street designs are part of the L.A. County Bike Plan.

It’s time for the County’s left and right hands to get an idea of what the other is doing. Read more…

A conceptual rendering of what the buffered bike lane down Spring St may look like as the design is being close to finalized with a ground breaking planned for early December 2011 (Photo: DLANC)

(I was on the road yesterday and missed the big announcement of L.A.’s first buffered bike lane coming this December.  Streetsblog contributor Brigham Yen caught the news first and announced it on his personal blog at BrighamYen.com – DN)

Valerie Watson, the At-Large Director of DLANC (Downtown LA Neighborhood Council), who has been heavily involved with making the Historic Core in Downtown LA a much more pedestrian and bike friendly community, sends me this rendering (and more info) of a fully separated bike lane down Spring St that will also be painted green (like those coveted ones in bike-friendly Portland or New York).

With a ground breaking coming as soon as December (as in this year 2011!), the 1.5 mile bike lane will stretch from Cesar Chavez to 9th Street and be 6 feet wide with green paint to mark very clearly for motorists to see, and there will also be a 4-foot stripe buffer zone between the bike lane and car lane for further cyclist protection. Full time loading and parking will be available on the west side of the street next to the bike lane (as you can see in the rendering).

Here are some benefits of having the bike lane down Spring St:

• Better access to businesses along Spring St by patrons walking, biking, using transit, and driving
• Full time parking and loading will be added on west side of Spring St
• Increased crossing safety for pedestrians

The design of this project can still be tweaked and refined by the community’s input and feedback is encouraged.

And even more good news. Read more…

Image: Los Angeles Link

It seems like every time the City of Los Angeles and bicycles are mentioned in the same sentence, some controversy is involved.  Yesterday, the League of American Bicyclists released its list of “Bicycle Friendly Communities” and the City of Angeles received an Honorable Mention for the second time in four years.  The League’s Award has proven somewhat controversial with some seeing it as a sign that things are getting better, while others are wondering what in the world the League was thinking.

The League of American Bicyclists regularly awards communities, states, universities and other organizations awards for bicycle friendliness.  The awards are bronze, silver and gold.  The Honorable Mention category is more of an encouragement for city’s on the right path to keep trying.  A League spokesperson tells L.A. Weekly that the Honorable Mention is for the quality of the Bike Plan, and not because of the actual state of things on the streets.

For a full size image, click here.

Glendale PLACE Grant Coordinator Colin Bogart shows off the new tri-lingual pedestrian safety markings at an intersection adjacent to Glendale City Hall.

This week’s series on the grants from the L.A. County Department of Public Health’s Policies for Livable and Active Communities and Environments (PLACE) Grants focuses on Glendale and their groundbreaking Safe and Healthy Streets Plan.

Glendale’s grant was different than most because it wasn’t the city that was actually awarded the grant, but the Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition (LACBC). The LACBC and the city worked together on the grant application. We’ll discuss the unique collaboration between the LACBC and Glendale tomorrow. On Friday we’ll discuss some of the physical changes that have happened over the last three years and that are currently underway.

Today, we’ll focus on Safe and Healthy Streets, the planning document passed unanimously by the city in June and how their plan sets a new bar for clean and green transportation planning in Los Angeles County.

For their part, the City of Glendale professes confidence and optimism that Safe and Healthy Streets will bring a change to the city’s transportation grid.

“People in Glendale are really frustrated by our record on traffic safety,” provides Mayor Laura Friedman. “It’s a way to get a grip on traffic safety in the city, and it’s probably the most cohesive effort we’ve ever had.”

The Baseline: Glendale knew it had a problem and was open to change.

When she first joined the City Council, Laura Friedman (pictured above) pushed for bike parking at City Hall. Now the City's racks are partially filled everyday by staff with a few spots held for visitors. The LACBC's Jen Klausner calls the racks "beautiful."

By its own admission, Glendale was in desperate need for a new approach to transportation planning. The unintended consequences of a transportation network that emphasized moving cars can be seen in the statistics. In Glendale, approximately 17.4% of adults (age 18+) are obese as are approximately 15.8% of children. An additional 46. 2% of adults and 17.9% of children are overweight. Many of Glendale’s health problems could be solved by a transportation system that emphasizes “people powered” transportation, but for years they weren’t ready to make the change. In 2008, almost 40% of adults in Glendale engage in minimal to no physical activity and 66.4% of adults drive to go on an errand less than one mile from their home. Read more…

Bikeside is right, this "flow chart" explaining bike plan implementation needs to be retired.

Yesterday, the LADOT and City Planning made their quarterly update to the City Council on the progress of the implementation of the Bike Plan.  The Council’s Transportation Committee also moved a motion that would transfer $475,000 to LADOT’s overtime account.  Between the somewhat confounding report offered by the agencies and the revelation that bike projects have to be built on overtime, it’s no surprise that some advocates are anxious.

The funding motion addressed on Wednesday is a sort of good news/bad news motion.  The motion allows the transfer of $475,000 from LADOT project accounts to overtime accounts so that LADOT can install new bike lanes and Sharrows.  The good news is that these funds will see to the completion of eight bike lane projects totaling eight miles and nearly seventeen miles of Sharrowed Streets.

If implementation of these projects really does occur “in the next couple of weeks” it would be a great start for the city in the 2011 fiscal year.  The Mayor famously promised 40 miles of new bike infrastructure a year last March at the Bike Plan signing, a promise which has gotten off to a somewhat rocky start.  Knocking out 25 miles of that infrastructure in the first couple months of the year is a good sign.

But the “overtime” issue is a troubling one.

A couple of weeks ago I stood next to the Green Shared Lane in Long Beach talking with Long Beach’s Mobility Coordinator, Charlie Gandy.  I asked him how much it cost to paint a green lane on each side of a main drag through Downtown Los Angeles.  His answer?  ”$5,000.”  When pressed, he admitted that he didn’t know the labor costs, because “those are fixed costs with the city.”  In other words, painting bike infrastructure is just part of the job in Long Beach, and that saves the city hundreds of thousands of dollars in project costs.

As Bikeside Chris put it, “ As LADOT continues to bill the City for overtime, scarce Measure R, Transportation Enhancements, Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality and Transportation Development Act bike improvement funds quickly become depleted.”  As the city over bills for bike projects now, it means less projects later. Read more…

(Update, July 7: Jane Choi from the Planning Department called me to inform me that the “40 miles per year” goal didn’t start until July 1, 2011, the start of the fiscal year.  While it seems an odd date to start an implementation plan for the 2010 Bike Plan, it is the start of the first fiscal year after the Mayor promised cyclists “40 miles per year.”  Regardless, this means the clock is ticking.  L.A., you have 358 days to provide 40 new miles of bike facilities. – DN)

The city of Los Angeles’ “2010″ bike plan was approved March 1st 2011. The overdue passage received praise from the media, who called it “comprehensive“, “historic” and “[if built, marks] one of the most lasting achievements of Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa’s tenure.” The bike plan won an award from the Los Angeles section of the American Planning Association.

Are the new MLK Bike Lanes the exception or the rule?

Mayor Villaraigosa and others have touted the plan’s 1600 miles of bikeways, and pledged to implement 40 miles each year. Last week, the mayor released a July 1st 2011 Executive Directive on Implementation of the 2010 Bike Plan. The directive reiterates the 40 miles/year commitment, and commits other city departments to include bikes in various city projects.

With the new directive, and the start of a new fiscal year, Streetsblog takes a look at how the “2010″ plan implementation is going so far. Streetsblog readers will recall that the city bike plan includes a “5-year” implementation plan. As noted in the initial Streetsblog review of the implementation plan, the “5-year” plan, based on planned completion dates is actually an 8-9 implementation plan. The implementation plan online includes dates – ie: includes “Year 0″ for “Project Year 2010″, through “Year 5″ for “Project Year 2015.” Though in the final council file version, the dates have been scrubbed and replaced by priority 1 through 3, with no dates specified.

Given that it’s now July 2011, the “2010″ bike plan is, theoretically, a year and a half into its implementation plan timeline, which began with “project year 2010.” Just how many miles of bike lane is the city of Los Angeles implementing? Are L.A. cyclists seeing that “commitment to build 40 miles of bikeway a year” in themayor’s directive? How does recent implementation compare to past performance?

While, overall, the city has been exceeding its past (lackluster) performance, it appears that the 40 miles annually remains elusive. Read more…

Is the Mayor's promise of 40 miles of bike projects a year killed by CEQA studies? Time will tell...

Yesterday the LADOT announced through the LADOT Bike Blog that a series of projects outlined in the Bike Plan would undergo a full environmental review before construction of these projects can begin construction.  Between conversations with City Planning and LADOT, we have a good idea of how the environmental review will go forward.  City staff is concerned about lawsuits brought against projects under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA.)  CEQA lawsuits had delayed the implementation of the San Francisco Bike Plan for four years and continues to stall the Expo Line Bike Path.

In order to expedite the review, the City is creating project packages of a group of projects that will be reviewed at the same time.  The first package will be announced soon, but the Bike Blog’s description of the first packet as “”Bike lanes in Priority 1 of the 5 Year Implementation Strategy and the projects around NBC Universal expansion that require environmental review” gives a pretty good idea of what’s going to be in the packet.

What won’t be included in these reviews are projects that don’t require the removal of a travel lane or parking such as all of the “year zero” projects, including the 7th Street Bike Lanes, the York Boulevard Bike Lanes, and the “Bicycle Friendly Streets.”  Also, bike projects included in other plans that have or will undergo review such as the Figueroa Corridor Study or the Downtown Street Standards won’t need a second review.  City staff felt that the projects included in the NBC Universal project weren’t studied sufficiently.

An full environmental impact report for each packet is expected to take 12-18 months and the study of the first packet won’t begin until the fall of this year.  This means that some of the more controversial projects, such as bike lanes on most streets that are part of the Backbone Bikeway Network, might not even be cleared through the environmental process for two years from today.   The good news is that the first step of the process, completing the Environmental Assessment (EA), will most likely clear some of the projects and could take a couple of months from when the studies begin.

Step one is completing the EA.  The EA is a first look at the project package to see which projects would create enough of an impact on existing traffic patterns to warrant further study.  Yes, this does mean that, under current environmental law, the bike projects will be tested to see if they disrupt the car traffic at all.  Or, as Alexis Lantz, the Planning and Program Director for the Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition, put it, “No matter how much better a project may improve the overall livablity and safety of our communities or the mobility of other modes, if it predicted to in anyway inconvenience vehicles it requires an EIR (Environmental Impact Review), which is not really the point or intention of CEQA.” Read more…

(This is the first of a two-part series.  The second piece will look at some of the local maps and provide a more local review. – DN)

If you haven’t been keeping up with the state of the L.A. County Bicycle Plan process, don’t feel bad.  You’re not alone.  Because the plan only covers the unincorporated parts of L.A. County, it’s a plan for small patches of bicycle infrastructure in what would appear to be completely random places unless you’re well versed in the political boundaries of Greater Los Angeles.

Bike lanes, bike paths, bike routes. Nothing more progressive or forward thinking than that.

Another reason not to be enthused about the plan?  It’s kind of really boring.  Or, as Allison Mannos of the Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition (LACBC) put it, “It reminds me of where the city’s Bike Plan was two years ago.”

The good news is that the plan does call for hundreds of miles of new bike paths, bike lanes, and bike routes.  The bad news is that many L.A. County roads won’t receive the treatments they deserve to keep routes safe and increase cyclists’ access.

With hearings being held for the plan throughout the rest of the month, now is the perfect time to check in with some of the issues that L.A. County needs to address when editing and improving its Draft Bike Plan.

The largest two problems, as stated by the LACBC, is a county law requiring that mixed use travel lanes be at least twelve feet in width and that most of the “bike routes” are really just streets with signs saying bike routes.  At the 2010 Street Summit, LADOT Senior Bikeways Coordinator Michelle Mowery referred to these kinds of “bike routes” as “useless.” Read more…

Bathed in light, Bill Rosendahl addresses Bikeside Speaks! last May at the Bikerowave. Photo:Sara Bond/Bikeside

Today, we approved a Bike Plan which provides more opportunities for people in Los Angeles.

More opportunities for people to discover the benefits of combining public transportation with a bike to finish that last mile.

More opportunities for parents and kids to ride safely on streets.

More opportunities for people to switch from gas to pedal power, burning fat instead of fossil fuels.

More opportunities for visitors to experience our wonderful weather on two wheels instead of four.

More opportunities to decide between a car and a bike for short trips.

And more opportunities to turn fear into confidence for those who are just plain scared to share the road with cars, like me. Read more…