Separated Bike Lanes: Could Jacksonville Benefit?

[Metro Jacksonville]

Separated Bike Lanes: Could Jacksonville Benefit?



With JTA attempting to force their dreams of bus rapid transit down the throats of residents, bicycle and pedestrian safety improvements continue to be ignored.  The City of Vancouver is implementing something that Jacksonville needs more than bus only lanes: Separated Bicycle Lanes.

Full Article
http://www.metrojacksonville.com/article/2010-aug-separated-bike-lanes-could-jacksonville-benefit

[tufsu1]

these are often built in very high bicycle traffic areas....as an example, there are several of these on the UF campus in Gainesville.

[uptowngirl]

Jacksonville absolutely needs this. I got a little two person bike and my preschooler and I biked to her DT school everyday for a year. It was fantastic, except when I was trying to cross Union or State St., avoid cars honking and swerving at me, or buses trying to hit me (as apparently they own the curbside). I soon gave up and ended up driving the ten blocks to the school (how crazy is that??!!). We actually have a bike lane on 8th st, it just starts about a block off of Main and then just ends two blocks later. I have always wondered about this two block bike lane, was this an experiment? Jacksonville needs to wake up, even small towns have bike lanes!


Note: If JTA is goign to add this horrible bus plan that no one really wants, they should have to spend a portion of that money to implemnet bike lanes. Its the right thing to do.

[Hurricane]

That rocks!!!

We need for everyone at the city to watch this!

[Lunican]

A separated bike lane from downtown to the beach would be very popular.


Chicago's Lakefront Path:

[Paisleyparker330]

I gew up in J-ville and currently live in Minnesota where there are bike paths almost every where especially in the metro. It's a great way to encourage alternate transportation, increase safety and promote health. I think all a person has to do is to take an honest look around at what's going on in the environment and with obisty and the benefits are obvious.

[Lunican]

Instead we are spending hundreds of millions of dollars on overpasses and flyovers.

[Lunican]

Here is another good video from NYC.

http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=12120402&server=vimeo.com&show_title=1&show_byline=1&show_portrait=1&color=9086c0&fullscreen=1&autoplay=0&loop=0

[Captain Zissou]

Gainesville actually has very few physically separated bike lanes, and all of them are for pedestrians as well, but they still make a huge difference for students going to and from class.  I could make it from my house to class (about 2-2.5 miles on average) in less than 10 minutes.  Consistent bike lanes at street level would be a start.

I also think that being able to ride my bike to class helped me fight of a few pesky pounds that I am currently unable to shake!

[Springfielder]

When I visited Ireland, I was impressed with how Dublin and other cities all had separated bike lanes. I was also amazed at how many bikes used them. Jacksonville is sorely lacking in providing bike lanes, where as most major cities have created them years ago.

[urbanlibertarian]

This could turn into a turf war between motorists and cyclists.  It's probably more politically doable to put something like this on streets in the urban core not typically used by suburbanites passing through.

[Dog Walker]

Let's see; our city is flat, our climate mild, no ice or snow.   DUH!

[Ocklawaha]

The Ciclovia System in Cartegena Colombia


Even better in Bogota?


..or Santiago, Medellin, Panama, Bogota etc...TIPICA


Sure will be nice when Jacksonville catches up with the 3Rd World!

OCKLAWAHA

[Bike Jax]

Segregated Bike/ped infrastructure is something we at Bike Jax have been pushing for for sometime. We even did an post in January of last year proposing what we think is a better and more economical way to build roads in the suburban landscape. http://www.bikejax.org/2009/01/rethinking-how-we-build-our-roads.html

We are continuing to refine that original post into a viable idea and during this period we have learned so much about the road building process and its funding. The hurtles we have to over come are many, a city with a part time bike/ped coordinator that does not believe in or support segregated paths, A state department of transportation that is still desperately clinging onto 1950's design principles and most important of all is that all funding comes through the federal government which dictates certain criteria that city or state must abide in order to attain that funding.

I also personally feel that on what segregated we have already are under control of the Department Recreation and not under roads and planning doesn't help. If these paths are to be respected as alternative transportation corridors then they should be treated as such.

We are working with cycling groups in other cities to refine the idea suggested in the above link so we can take it to the source, the USDOT. If it we can get it adopted by the agency that sets the standards and provides the funding, then it won't be long before we start see some real change in our streets.

PS. We are desperate need of an engineer with cad accessibility that would like to contribute to this project.

[Paisleyparker330]

Let's see; our city is flat, our climate mild, no ice or snow.   DUH!

LOL!!!