What does "How often do you deviate from a planned route to avoid an obstruction?" Does it mean avoid a particular street or block, or just exit the bike lane to avoid the obstruction? It's gotta be the former, since not avoiding the obstruction in the latter means running into it.
www.cambridgema.gov
I've found myself just using side streets from NEU all the way through Fenway and over to Kenmore-BU. Most main streets aren't direct connections. In those trips the only one for me that would benefit from a protected bike lane is on Beacon b/w Kenmore and Audubon Circle. Too bad all fo the construction work at One Kenmore has just made it all not workable.
When the design considerations prioritize moving car traffic over anything else (i.e. see the latest Cambridge St study), you're left with these important gaps at key intersections and busier stretches of road..where protection/separation is ironically needed the most. I have faith that Mayor Wu has things moving in the right direction but it will take years before major redesigns reach the entire city.
I think the designers are starting to figure this out. I was shocked the other day to find that the new left turn lane on VFW Parkway where it intersects with Church St sacrificed a through traffic lane, rather than the bike lane in order to find room. That's new for VFW Parkway, where the otherwise decent bike lanes merge in with a car lane at all the other intersections with turning lanes. This is progress, now they just need to restripe Baker, LaGrange, Corey, etc. and that quickly and cheaply becomes a decent bike route.
This really should have been done along Dartmouth Street. Much of the street has extra right-of-way from the former carriage road that fed between the Back Bay residential area and Back Bay Station. But there has been a lot of encroachment into that right-of-way.
Yeah Beacon, Washington, and Harvard Ave all need protected or separated lanes as well. I need to go between Brighton at the outer end of Comm Ave and Ruggles everyday and Washington St to Huntington is so unpleasant and the drivers are ridiculous. I now take Comm Ave down to Essex and then back streets to cross the D to the Emerald Necklace then come down Forsyth to Ruggles. Going this way this
For those not digging though the article, some Cambridge city council members want to delay building protected bike lanes. Most immediately, that affects planned lanes on Main Street and Cambridge Street. A bike safety group set up this campaign if you want to write to the city council. And there's still time to write in, because the vote was just delayed until next week.Cambridge Residents Slam Council Proposal to Delay Bike Lane Construction | News | The Harvard Crimson
The longstanding debate over bike lanes in Cambridge reignited Monday evening, as Cambridge residents lashed out against a proposal to extend the deadline to finish a citywide bike lane network.www.thecrimson.com
actionnetwork.org