La Verne Approves Protected Bike Lanes to Pomona North Metro Station

La Verne’s city council voted 5-0 on Monday to accept and move forward with designs for a short two-way protected bikeway that would connect with a much longer facility in Pomona.

La Verne will be taking on 0.16 miles of a 2.2 mile stretch of Arrow Highway, as part of a larger regional initiative to bolster multimodal connectivity to the 2028 Olympic games. Cricket events will take place nearby at the Pomona Fairplex. 

The project is funded by the San Gabriel Valley Council of Governments (SGVCOG), administering Metro Active Transport (MAT) funds. The design originates from Pomona’s Public Works Department.

The two-way protected lane will be on the south side of Arrow, running from White Avenue in La Verne to Mountain Avenue in Pomona. This will be the first time this part of Arrow has been repaved in decades.

The project’s western terminus will be White and Arrow, with eastbound motorists in the number 3 lane having to merge to number 2 before crossing the intersection. 

From there, La Verne’s share of the bike lanes is about 850 feet, replacing a travel lane that soon converts into parking on the other side of the Pomona borderline at Lordsburg Court. Pomona will retain that on-street parking by trimming a median.

It’s a small project for La Verne. The lane’s design and installation will be totally covered by the SGVCOG and Pomona, and in fact La Verne will save almost $250,000 on repaving its portion of Arrow Hwy. Construction is expected to run Spring 2027 through Fall 2027.

However, there are some concerns about the project’s design and alignment.

Councilmember Rick Crosby seemed to chafe at losing local control. “Just make it clear,” Crosby said, “this design on the south side of both directions […] is not our design. It was Pomona’s design, and they are doing it prior. It’s only coming back to us for this short section.”

A public speaker identified as Mr. Becker said that for La Verne, ending at White amounts to a “bike lane to nowhere.” He seemed concerned about the capacity of La Verne’s streets to handle bike club rides.

“Has anybody ever been on Baseline [Road] on Saturday or Sunday morning when you have 50 to 75 bicycle guys,” Becker asked. “They’re going to funnel into one lane?”

“What happens if they turn right on White Avenue and they get to Bonita Avenue? You’ve condensed all those lanes there,” he went on. “This is just a complete disaster.”

Mayor Tim Hepburn seemed optimistic that La Verne will have its own quality east-west bike lane.

“Hopefully we can work with the COG, work with our funding, to get the remainder of the bike lanes to be in a safe area,” Hepburn said, “because Arrow Highway is very busy.” 

Chantal Siever showed her support for the design from Pomona.

“I prefer a two-way, protected bike path over just bike lane paint or sharrows,” Siever said. “I’m biking these roads every day with my kids to commute to bring them to school […]  My kids could bike on this. My kids could not bike just on painted bike lanes that go in the direction of traffic, like on Bonita.”

Siever added, “I strongly encourage a fixed vertical barrier, such as a curb and not only flex [plastic delineator] posts, to separate bikes from cars, and extend the curb at the intersection to protect the end of the bikeway.”

Another commenter who was only identified as Jamie told the council she was pleased with how this reconfiguration will change the existing vehicle merge at Lordsburg Ct.

“We see this play out when the Fairplex has events and they leave right where the drag [races] are, they merge all of those lanes. And when you cross over that intersection at White when you’re headed east, it helps with the merging, because everybody’s already pushed over,” Jamie said, referring to the removed number 3 lane. “So I’m supportive of this moving forward.”

There were a handful of comments made about whether cyclists will follow the rules of the road. Councilmember Wendy Lau responded with common sense.

“I think the same [question] could be posed about motorists in terms of, are they paying attention for bicyclists? So I think it’s going to be a learning curve for those of us exiting the community or entering the community to be looking out for the cyclists, and the cyclists also need to be similarly apprised. And so everything that is new is going to take some time before it gets old, before we get used to it,” Lau said. 

Mayor Hepburn ultimately said, “You may not like this, but it’s happening, and it’s happening everywhere in the San Gabriel Valley. They are trying to put more people out in the open that are protected.” 

“I think it’s a great addition,” Hepburn said. “It’s going to be beautiful. It needs to be done.” The item passed unanimously.

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