Friday, August 20, 2004
Beer, Bikes, & Bridges
I will be staffing the Fremont Bridge Approach Replacement Project booth at Fremont Oktoberfest on Saturday, September 18 from 12:00 - 2:00. Come by and say hello. You could even buy me a beer.
Update on the Fremont Bridge Approach Replacement Project
Yes, this update is long overdue but to my knowledge there is not exactly a vast readership clamoring for more information about the status of the cycling/pedestrian facilities on the approaches to the Fremont Bridge. There should be, granted, and I'm doing what I can to cultivate that level of interest, but it's slow going.
The week of July 12 I sent letters to Councilmembers Conlin, Rasmussen, and Godden regarding the FNC's concerns about the lack of adequate (actually, any) disruption planning for cyclists and pedestrians during construction. More importantly, we also expressed our frustration that there did not seem to be any planning for bikes/peds after the bridge project is completed. This is a much bigger deal, because although the disruption due to construction will be a headache for about 18 months, we have to live with the completed bridge for decades.
I also managed to get myself invited to a July 22nd meeting organized by SDOT and PB with the "Seattle Bike/Ped Community." This was an interesting and eye-opening meeting. Due to the overwhelming public support for bike/ped facilities, PB revised many of their plans to address all of the shortcomings identified by FNC, Cascade Bicycle Club, the Seattle Bicycle Advisory Board, Bicycle Alliance of Washington, and others. They got it about 90% right, with one major exception--no bike lanes on the bridge approaches themselves, no queuing areas for northbound bikes, and no striping or signing at the Fremont & 34th intersection. Emily Allen (of SBAB) and I eventually fell into a good-cop/bad-cop routine (I think I was the good cop) and eventually got the engineers from PB to agree to put in the lanes, Denver arrows, and other signage improvements we suggested.
Shortly after this meeting I heard back from Richard Conlin, and he said he is also concerned about the project and offered to meet with me. I told him that we are satisfied with the efforts the City is making and that we did not need to meet at this time. I also heard back from Tom Rasmussen's office, and conveyed the same message to them.
Just today I heard from SDOT via email that they are finalizing the revisions that came out of the July 22 meeting and they are scheduling another meeting for sometime after September 7. Hopefully they got it right!
More news when I have it.
The week of July 12 I sent letters to Councilmembers Conlin, Rasmussen, and Godden regarding the FNC's concerns about the lack of adequate (actually, any) disruption planning for cyclists and pedestrians during construction. More importantly, we also expressed our frustration that there did not seem to be any planning for bikes/peds after the bridge project is completed. This is a much bigger deal, because although the disruption due to construction will be a headache for about 18 months, we have to live with the completed bridge for decades.
I also managed to get myself invited to a July 22nd meeting organized by SDOT and PB with the "Seattle Bike/Ped Community." This was an interesting and eye-opening meeting. Due to the overwhelming public support for bike/ped facilities, PB revised many of their plans to address all of the shortcomings identified by FNC, Cascade Bicycle Club, the Seattle Bicycle Advisory Board, Bicycle Alliance of Washington, and others. They got it about 90% right, with one major exception--no bike lanes on the bridge approaches themselves, no queuing areas for northbound bikes, and no striping or signing at the Fremont & 34th intersection. Emily Allen (of SBAB) and I eventually fell into a good-cop/bad-cop routine (I think I was the good cop) and eventually got the engineers from PB to agree to put in the lanes, Denver arrows, and other signage improvements we suggested.
Shortly after this meeting I heard back from Richard Conlin, and he said he is also concerned about the project and offered to meet with me. I told him that we are satisfied with the efforts the City is making and that we did not need to meet at this time. I also heard back from Tom Rasmussen's office, and conveyed the same message to them.
Just today I heard from SDOT via email that they are finalizing the revisions that came out of the July 22 meeting and they are scheduling another meeting for sometime after September 7. Hopefully they got it right!
More news when I have it.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)