Mayor on wheels

Have you seen this great photo on Flickr of Mayor Reed bicycling along the BeltLine? Cycle chic indeed! And kudos to Cameron Adams for capturing the moment.

WANT

Baby is six months old now, and I am drooling over family bicycle options. I think it's between this Christiania trike, the Christiania 2 wheel bakfiets, or a classic bakfiets from Workcyclesor American-made CETMA. The trike is for sale over at Houndstooth Road in Decatur... Anyone know where I can test ride a 2 wheel bakfiets?

Atlanta's first, um, contra-track-path thingy

The Fifth Street bicycle lane has been a valuable low-traffic connection between Midtown West/ Georgia Tech and Midtown East/ Virginia Highland/ Old Fourth Ward (and now the BeltLine). But there was always the tricky spot at one-way W. Peachtree St where Fifth jogged and you couldn't travel eastbound on it without going the wrong way or on the sidewalk for half a block. At one point, Tech had a driveway that made the connection, but they replaced it with a plaza...

Now, there is a new facility to address this problem. Cyclists continuing east on Fifth follow a ramp that takes them upstream so they are aligned with the next segment of the Fifth Street bike lane using a reallocated portion of the sidewalk. It is being referred to as a cycle track, although it is different from tracks I have seen - it is marked with paint rather than separated by curbing or pavement surface, and it is along the back of the sidewalk. But it does get you where you need to go.

For westbound traffic, I'm told there is now a "Copenhagen left turn" in which you stop beside the bike lane and wait for the green light on the cross street. I'm afraid I didn't see it as I had merged over to the left lane before my turn, as usual. Lanes are marked with green paint and directional arrows through the intersection. It is a pilot project, so city and state transportation departments will try to learn from its performance.

The BeltLine, or Atlanta grows a spine

The promise of the BeltLine started to come true last saturday. Although the eastside section of the path wasn't quite finished - entrances weren't paved and there was no lighting - it was open to the public during Atlanta Streets Alive.  As always, I was astounded by the latent bicycle culture that materializes anytime there are nice routes provided.

If you thought the only potential path riders in Atlanta were some spandex-clad athletes and maybe a few people with a cheap bike in the back of the garage, well, nothing could be further from the truth. Friends and families zipped along, going to restaurants, visiting neighbors, and finally stopping at the party at Ponce City East as it got dark. The bicycles rolling past me were as diverse and as stylish as the people riding them. I was with hope for the city's future.

Atlanta Streets Alive

We caught just the last few minutes of ASA this past weekend. A few minutes watching the astounding volume of bicycles, skateboards, strollers, people... Then they started letting cars through again and the traffic dwindled away. But for those few minutes, Atlanta once again showed its potential to be great. It's all about the people, getting a brief chance to live the way they want to live.

Equal treatment

At Five Points, police take the "No Turns" restriction seriously - car or bicycle, you'll get a ticket.

Georgia to accommodate bicycles on all state roads

Georgia has reached a neww milestone today with the Department of Transportation's adoption of a routine accommodation policy. Similar to "complete streets" laws, this policy ensures that road project planners and engineers will consider motor vehicle, bicycle, and pedestrian traffic requirements.

The policy is a much needed shift from recent decades, which have left the state with an inventory of public infrastructure that cannot safely or efficiently handle pedestrian and bicycle traffic. As a result, we have been unprepared for the travel demands of aging baby boomers who can no longer drive, or post-suburban Gen Y households seeking traditional walkable neighborhoods. Not to mention, of course, the extra costs, the added safety risks, the lost mobility for Georgia residents due to a lack of alternatives to driving.

After today, our roads can be appropriately configured for actual traffic conditions, not an imaginary world in which every person gets behind the wheel for every single trip. I expect to see vast improvements in mobility, safety, health, and productivity as these guidelines get implemented.

Of course, it will still be important for community members and representatives to show up at planning meetings and project hearings. This policy doesn't mean putting bike lanes on every road, willy nilly. There are many types of bicycle amenities and they are appropriate in different settings depending on car, truck, and bicycle traffic volume, speed limit, etc. - including shared lanes, bike lanes, buffered lanes, side paths, cycletracks, and more. Plus, GDOT really doesn't have any data about bicycle usage, nor do they have any estimates of the number of people who need to bicycle along a particular route but are prevented by the current road design.

To learn more about the new policy and all of the great work that went into it, please visit the Georgia Bikes website!