Progress in NYC

New York has made a big step forward over the past month. A physically separated bike lane has been installed and is open on Ninth Avenue on Manhattan Island (West Village), the first of its kind.

Thanks to StreetFilms for this video.

This plan was announced on September 19th, less than a month ago! Obviously, the engineering work had been done already, and it was just a matter of painting and installing flexible bollards. New York appears to be serious about making immediate changes for cyclists. The city presentation (pdf) shows that eventually a curb and raised concrete buffer will be installed in some places along the street.

What can Toronto learn from this? Major changes to a streetscape can happen fast if we want it to. Manhattan's one-way streets, while having some downsides* for cyclists and pedestrians, do have the advantage of possible bike lanes on the left side of motorized traffic.

You'll find copious discussion among New Yorkers about this plan on Streetsblog (before) and StreetFilms (after) sites.

* I'll leave the one-way street discussion for another time, but I'll leave you with some links explaining why one-way streets create miniature expressways for cars in the wrong place.

USA Today - Many cities changing one-way streets back
Raise the Hammer - Two-Way Streets Part of a Conceptual Shift
More at Seeing Green.

Tags:

infrastructure

other cities

Comments

Clarence Eckers... (not verified)

One-Way!

Sun, 10/14/2007 - 21:44

Hey, I am sure you already know about this, but we also did a short vid on a plan to change two way streets to one way that was very instrumental in fighting back the plan!

http://www.streetfilms.org/archives/park-slope-one-way-vs-two-way-streets/

Keep up the great work!

Svend (not verified)

Thanks Clarence

Mon, 10/15/2007 - 11:28

Clarence, thanks for the link to so many great videos and ideas collected on www.streetfilms.org
It's worth bookmarking that site, Toronto can be inspired by and perhaps invigorate New Yorkers and other cities in return.

chephy (not verified)

The first of its kind?

Sun, 10/14/2007 - 23:43

Not the first at all. A couple of decades ago NYC already had separated bike lanes... and got rid of the because riders weren't using them.

darren

Arguably first

Mon, 10/15/2007 - 09:09

I'll just quote Aaron Naparstek of Streetsblog, who is much more familiar with New York than me.

I think it's correct to call this bike path a "first" for NYC.

My contact at DOT described it as, "The first time we’ve done a bike lane that’s protected behind the parking lane. It’s also the first class I type of path that is in the urban core, it’s not on the edge."

The 1980's bike lanes sounded like an interesting story. I found this video interview with Sam Schwartz that explains some of what went wrong.

-dj

chephy (not verified)

It is a bad design. I hope

Tue, 10/16/2007 - 00:54

It is a bad design. I hope it does not spread.

What do you do if you need to turn right onto the street, ride for five blocks and turn right again?

I also think it's absolutely wrong to say that the parking lane protects cyclists. If anything, it endangers them, because the majority of collisions happen at intersections, and parked cars block the view, adding to the danger.