New Bike Lanes Underway in West Valley on Eve of Mayor’s Bike Summit
Preliminary bike lane markings on Reseda Boulevard at Nordhoff. The lines are somewhat less visible than the permanent markings will be, they’re visible in the center of the image, in front of the bus. Photo by Joe LintonThis past weekend, city of Los Angeles work crews were out scraping and putting down preliminary bike lane striping on Reseda Boulevard. The final thermoplastic striping isn’t there yet, but the preliminary lines are down. The lanes extend from Devonshire Street to Parthenia Street – a total of 2 miles. Streetsblog readers will recall that these lanes were
approved in 1996, but remained unimplemented until bicyclists caught city staff lying about planned peak-hour parking lanes, which would have precluded the approved bike lanes.
In other valley bike lane news, preliminary striping is also in place for new bike lanes on Wilbur Avenue from Nordhoff Street to Lassen Street. The new Wilbur lanes will be one mile long and were the result of a “road diet,” which reduced a 4-lane road to 3-lanes. Wilbur is an existing bike route, but was never designated for bike lanes in neither the 1996 plan, nor the 2009 or 2010 draft plans. The road diet, according to Glenn Bailey, the mayor’s representative on the City Bicycle Advisory Committee, is in response to unsafe crosswalks for accessing schools in the neighborhood.
Three new miles of bike lane (almost done) are good news going into tomorrow’s mayoral Bicycle Summit. The summit takes place tomorrow (Monday) morning from 9am-11am at the Metro Boardroom. The address is One Gateway Plaza, L.A. 90012. Metro is located at the east end of Union Station, with easy rail and bus access, including via the Red and Gold Lines. Attended bike parking is available on the plaza level.