Biking in Boston

It's important to remember the BTD/DPW split. Supposedly to do with regulations (signs, marking) vs infrastructure (concrete, asphalt), but really much more political. I've met good, well-meaning people in both departments, but that doesn't mean they call the shots (although BTD Deputy Cmr Gillooly being a driving force behind Comm Ave Phase 2A is a pretty positive sign). Also don't forget that many important street projects in Boston must be coordinated with DCR, MBTA, MassDOT, and other state agencies who may or may not be on the same page.

My hope is that Walsh has decided to cut through the stand-off by introducing the 'chief of the streets' and active transportation director. It will be interesting to see how it plays out.
 
rinserepeat said:
Maybe we can partly blame the vehicular cyclists for holding us back in terms of bike infrastructure - but the city has also done an extremely poor job at making better pedestrian infrastructure. It's really uneven - in neighborhoods where people are organized, educated, and have time to fight, that's where you actually see improvements - but in under-served communities that really desperately need safer infrastructure is where you see lazy, borderline criminally incompetent, road design - and these staffers show up at meetings using neighborhood divisions to their advantage - pitting neighbor against neighbor so they don't have to do any actual design thinking.
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I confess I am not so familiar with the poorer and more minority-heavy neighborhoods of most other cities in the USA Ive visited, but the difference in overall road quality - for cars, bikes and pedestrians - is unbelievably striking in our city here. Like shockingly so. The differences between white Dorchester, most of JP and Hyde Park vs interior Dorchester and Roxbury is just ridiculous.

On another note, though - when people are saying our bike and road designs are so far behind the times - what exactly is being talked about here? In areas where bike lanes are being striped and new sidewalks built, what makes these designs 10-15 yrs behind?
 
FK4 said:
I confess I am not so familiar with the poorer and more minority-heavy neighborhoods of most other cities in the USA Ive visited, but the difference in overall road quality - for cars, bikes and pedestrians - is unbelievably striking in our city here. Like shockingly so. The differences between white Dorchester, most of JP and Hyde Park vs interior Dorchester and Roxbury is just ridiculous.
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Sadly all too common, and not just with transportation infrastructure; schools, too, often enough. I haven't been inside the schools in Roxbury to compare to the schools in Newton where I live so I don't know for a fact that such a disparity exists here. I'd be very surprised if it's not.

FK4 said:
On another note, though - when people are saying our bike and road designs are so far behind the times - what exactly is being talked about here? In areas where bike lanes are being striped and new sidewalks built, what makes these designs 10-15 yrs behind?
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In NYC, for one example, they've gone way farther into fully protected bike lanes, where the bike lane is along the curb, then there's the parking row, then the lane(s) of traffic. And they often even have a wide enough buffer zone between bike line and parking row for the car doors to swing wide open without extending into the bike lane.

Examples aplenty:
http://www.nyc.gov/html/dot/downloads/pdf/2014-09-03-bicycle-path-data-analysis.pdf

Manhattan has the advantage of those nice broad avenues, from which it’s at least conceivable to drop a lane of traffic. This sort of thing will be inherently tougher here in Boston, we’ve got lots more streets with the sorts of width constraints that will make this more challenging. Amsterdam’s also done great things and might be a better direction for us to look, given the nature of their street grid.
 
If it is any consolation, all pavement in car-happy Medford is a cracked and potholed mess regardless neighborhood race or social status. So we got that equality thing going for us.
 
FK4 said:
On another note, though - when people are saying our bike and road designs are so far behind the times - what exactly is being talked about here? In areas where bike lanes are being striped and new sidewalks built, what makes these designs 10-15 yrs behind?
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Just striping a bike lane in the door zone does not make for good infrastructure and doesn't attract people who might ride a bike if they felt safer on the street.

Look at the new design guidelines that are forthcoming from MassDOT.
http://www.peopleforbikes.org/blog/...ase-a-new-bikeway-guide-and-its-going-to-be-a

Those guidelines show protected bikeways, protected intersections, and overall a much safer design that's much more attractive for anyone on a bike.

Riding in mixed traffic is fine on low-speed (and I mean 20 MPH or less), low-volume residential streets... but Boston still isn't allowed by the state to lower the speed limits on its roads.

People who like to ride in mixed traffic on high-speed streets will disagree with me here, but they are a very small segment of the overall bike riding population.
 
elemenoh said:
Just striping a bike lane in the door zone does not make for good infrastructure and doesn't attract people who might ride a bike if they felt safer on the street.

Look at the new design guidelines that are forthcoming from MassDOT.
http://www.peopleforbikes.org/blog/...ase-a-new-bikeway-guide-and-its-going-to-be-a

Those guidelines show protected bikeways, protected intersections, and overall a much safer design that's much more attractive for anyone on a bike.

Riding in mixed traffic is fine on low-speed (and I mean 20 MPH or less), low-volume residential streets... but Boston still isn't allowed by the state to lower the speed limits on its roads.

People who like to ride in mixed traffic on high-speed streets will disagree with me here, but they are a very small segment of the overall bike riding population.
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Also, truly bike friendly cities (Copenhagen, Amsterdam, many other parts or Europe) have bicycle-specific signals at major intersections -- often with significant bicycle priority over cars where major trails meet/cross the roadways.

A cheap white stripe in the parked car door lane is not a bicycle lane, it is an irresponsible invitation to being killed in a "dooring" accident.
 
JeffDowntown said:
Also, truly bike friendly cities (Copenhagen, Amsterdam, many other parts or Europe) have bicycle-specific signals at major intersections -- often with significant bicycle priority over cars where major trails meet/cross the roadways.

A cheap white stripe in the parked car door lane is not a bicycle lane, it is an irresponsible invitation to being killed in a "dooring" accident.
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For an American example of this, we have Chicago, which has bicycle-specific signals and protected bikeways throughout the downtown area. I'm not sure about the outer neighborhoods though, I didn't have the opportunity to check those out when I was in Chicago.
 
Matthew said:
It's important to remember the BTD/DPW split. Supposedly to do with regulations (signs, marking) vs infrastructure (concrete, asphalt), but really much more political. I've met good, well-meaning people in both departments, but that doesn't mean they call the shots (although BTD Deputy Cmr Gillooly being a driving force behind Comm Ave Phase 2A is a pretty positive sign). Also don't forget that many important street projects in Boston must be coordinated with DCR, MBTA, MassDOT, and other state agencies who may or may not be on the same page.

My hope is that Walsh has decided to cut through the stand-off by introducing the 'chief of the streets' and active transportation director. It will be interesting to see how it plays out.
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MassDOT it all depends on the PM and level of community engagement. DCR didn't realize until recently that people used their paths for commuting. MBTA planning has some obvious issues and are severely understaffed.

Apperently article 97 was invoked as to why the Seaver street "improvements" are substandard. The area around and within Franklin park needs some major investment in both walking and biking infrastructure and it appears there are some individuals within city and state agencies who are actively fighting against it. It seems really perverse that an article within our constitution that is supposed to protect access to natural resources is used to block installing multi-use paths to and in places cut off to the public by high-speed car infrastructure.
 
Funny how Storrow is seen as an essential regional commuting roadway yet the path next to it is seen as purely recreational.

Last week I emailed DCR a map and photos of 3 places where patches are desperately needed on the Charles River Path next to Storrow, where there have been unpatched utility cuts and giant tree root heaves. Of course, I received no response. Yet how many times have they repaved Storrow Drive while they let the path crumble? It's sickening.
 
Walsh just announced executive order making "complete streets" official design policy in the city. Anyone have thoughts on what this might mean? Does it affect projects currently on drawing board? Any teeth with public ways owned by state?
 
I'm also confused, I thought that Boston had a complete streets policy in effect for years.

In other Boston cycling news, there is a change.org petition circulating today trying to remove bike lanes from East Boston, and a counter-petition (with 5x the signatures, lol) saying to add more. That reminded me of the embarrassing dead-end of the East Boston Greenway, so I looked into it's current status. It turns out that the BRA, DCR, MBTA, Massport, the city and god knows who else sorted out their differences, and construction started in late July. If they're still on-schedule they expect to open the full Maverick->Constitution Beach path in October or November.
 
Boston published a complete streets guideline but it wasn't the standard policy to use it, just highly recommended. This is good.

Glad to hear about the East Boston Greenway. That's such a wacky dead end.
 
It seems there is a Change.org petition in Eastie to do away with bike lanes to make the roads safer for everyone. http://www.universalhub.com/2015/dueling-petitions-get-rid-easties-bicycle-lanes

Jon Ramos set up a dueling petition to "Make Eastie Safe for BIKING!".
https://www.change.org/p/carlos-bas...thony-petruccelli-make-eastie-safe-for-biking

I've already signed the Make Eastie Safe for Biking (even though I'm from Rozzie) and I hope you, and especially those of you from East Boston, do to.
 
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Here's another general safety tip (once you've gotten your front white light ;-)

Commercial Operators Really Care About Safe Operation
Call them to report an angry/bad/discourteous commercial driver.

I had a great call with one of those "School Transportation" / minivan operators again this AM. So far I've had a 100% success rate with this process:

- Get phone/brand-name off the dangerous vehicle
- Get plate or vehicle number if you can (but don't sweat it)
- Look it up when you get someplace safe (home or office)
- Call main number
- Say "I saw one of your vehicles operating in a [unsafe|illegal|discourteous] manner, is that something you'd be interested in?"
- They will say "Absolutely"
- Tell your story
- They will apologize and promise to act

This AM, it was a school van that nearly rammed (or went to the right of) a car that had stopped on a main street to let me bike-turn left. The car was being too courteous to the point of dangerous, but I've learned it is safer to go than to let traffic further pile up while I try to convince the car that I could've waited.

Not a big deal, but when the van driver yelled at the car "Come Onnnn!" and generally made loud and angry vocalizations, I decided to call, since it seemed at odds with being a school driver and I prefer not having cars that yield to bikes get yelled at.

The call went according to pattern, and I highly recommend this feedback system to any road user, but particularly those on foot or bike threatened by commercial vehicles.

This morning the dispatcher said: "don't feel bad if you didn't get the exact plate number, if you tell me the time and location, we've got GPS records and I can look it up and it will tell me which of our vehicles was there when this happened"

Sweet.
 
Someone needs to make sure that the city's Complete Streets policy is applied to the reconfiguration of Fenway, Park Drive, and Brookline Ave around the Muddy River daylighting project. This area is very dangerous for cyclists, and it seems as though there are no designated bike lines in the design drawings, which is a huge oversight by the city.
 
Question for those who bike Comm Ave in the Back Bay - how do you handle the abrupt one-side-to-the-other realignment of the bike lanes at Charlesgate, especially going west? ("There but for the grace of god, merge I")
 
When I was there I would start by looking early to merge right and then change lanes to the right hopefully by the time I reached the intersection.

Usually could do it no problem between Charlesgate and Kenmore.
 
Shepard said:
Question for those who bike Comm Ave in the Back Bay - how do you handle the abrupt one-side-to-the-other realignment of the bike lanes at Charlesgate, especially going west? ("There but for the grace of god, merge I")
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Going east, I stay in the bike lane up until Charlesgate East. If the Comm Ave signal is green, I'll pull off and stop just in front of Newbury St Extension (there is also a bike "launching pad" just past the intersection designed for this, the bicycle symbol with the diagonal left arrow, but it is often blocked by parked cars) and wait for a gap in traffic or until the Comm Ave light goes red. Then I'll cross over to the left side bike lane. If the Comm Ave signal is red, I'll use the bike box to position myself in front of the right-most left turn lane, so that when it turns green, I can proceed straight into the left side bike lane.

Going west, as soon as I come out of the underpass, and once I get up to ground level again, I'll merge over into the right lane. Once I get to Charlesgate East, I'm lined up to continue in the bike lane without a problem. If for some reason I'm unable to merge over before Charlesgate East, I'll continue to just past the intersection on the left side and stop in the bike "launching pad" (the bicycle symbol with the diagonal right arrow). I'll wait for a gap in traffic and then merge over to the right to the bike lane.
 
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