Gainesville City Commission discusses bike lane control devices, Streatery design
BY JENNIFER CABRERA
GAINESVILLE, Fla. – At the August 28 General Policy Committee meeting, the Gainesville City Commission discussed bike lane control devices and asked staff to redesign SW 6th Street, followed by a discussion about the design and operation of The Streatery.
Bike lane control devices
Staff gave a presentation on bike lane traffic control devices and discussed two projects that have already been designed but not built. The first is SW 6th Street between SW 16th Avenue and SW Depot Road, and the design includes repurposing the outside travel lanes with on-street parking and a 6.5-foot in-street bike lane. The second project is NE 9th Street between University Avenue and NE 23rd Avenue, which includes 5-foot bike lanes separated with zippers.
After being told that redesigning SW 6th Street would delay that project and other in-house projects on the City’s schedule by three to four months, Commissioner Bryan Eastman made a motion to redesign SW 6th Street to include buffered bike lanes and provide physical protection for cyclists, including use of the parking-protected bike lanes, where feasible. Commissioner Casey Willits seconded the motion.
Special Advisor for Infrastructure Brian Singleton clarified that Eastman wanted staff to move the parking lane out to where the bike lane is and put the bike lane next to the curb. He said that in some places, such as in the right turn lane, they are legally obligated to move the bike lane back toward the roadway. Eastman clarified that where there are buffers in the existing design, he did not want staff to necessarily change those sections.
Responding to a question from Commissioner Ed Book about whether the delays would impact safety significantly, Singleton said there were several sidewalk projects that would be delayed, and “every sidewalk project that we’re working on is going to impact safety.”
Eastman said he thought it was important to get the design right on the front end, “and I don’t like delaying anything, including, you know, in-house sidewalk work,… but the sidewalks will get built, and hopefully this is a relatively quick process.”
Willits pointed out that in the northbound direction, the parking is angled and is back-in only, so there would be a possibility of cars backing into cyclists in the bike lane or blocking part of the bike lane. Singleton said they would probably “see how people do,” and if wheel stops are needed to protect cyclists, they could add those later.
The motion passed unanimously, with Commissioners Desmon Duncan-Walker and James Ingle absent.
The Streatery
Chief Operating Officer Andrew Persons said the City’s public call for names for The Streatery received about 1,500 suggestions, with “every permutation of Gator or Tom Petty.” The Streatery was easily the top vote-getter among the finalists: The Streatery, Market Walk, The Stroll on First, GNV Commons, Charles Bradley Boulevard, Garden Street Market, Union & Pleasant Place, and Union & Pleasant Promenade.
Singleton said the street will be curbless and lighting will be “dimmable for ambience.” 40 power receptacles will be available down both sides of the roadway for festivals and events, and adjacent businesses will have more space to expand outdoor seating. The live oaks will remain, and more trees will be planted in the Lot 10 frontage. There will be bollards at each end that can be retracted for maintenance and access. Singleton said the City plans to use non-beveled brick pavers with concrete bands and brick accent pavers. The design includes numerous benches and planters, and Singleton presented festival layouts that accommodate 43 to 64 pop-up tents. Singleton said the price is estimated at $4,500,000, and about $4 million in funds have been identified.
First motion
After public comment, Commissioner Cynthia Chestnut made a motion to support the first option presented by staff (outdoor areas adjacent to businesses are subject to existing sidewalk cafe rules and licensing, the central corridor will be a public space for seating and temporary special events, and the noise ordinance applies), with the roadway opened and closed on a schedule; her motion included naming the space The Streatery, revisiting furnishing options and locations in the future, allowing food trucks during special events, and using $500,000 from reserves to make up the gap. Book seconded the motion.
Mayor Harvey Ward said he would rather let staff figure out where to find the funds instead of saying it must come from a particular fund.
Eastman said he did not want to open the street to cars: “We’re committed to having this be a pedestrian street.”
Willits also said he would not support the motion because he didn’t want vehicles on the street.
The motion failed 2-3, with Book and Chestnut voting in favor of the motion.
Second motion
Book made a motion to ask staff to ask three advisory boards for ideas on how to use the historic bricks, and Chestnut seconded the motion.
The motion passed unanimously, with Duncan-Walker and Ingle absent.
Third motion
Willits made a motion to support the first option presented by staff (outdoor areas adjacent to businesses are subject to existing sidewalk cafe rules and licensing, the central corridor will be a public space for seating and temporary special events, and the noise ordinance applies), name it The Streatery, continue with no regular vehicular traffic, and approve the proposed furnishings and locations. Eastman seconded the motion and proposed an amendment to adopt one of the proposed festival layouts; Willits agreed with the amendment.
The motion passed 3-2, with Book and Chestnut in dissent and Duncan-Walker and Ingle absent.
Fourth motion
Since construction will not be completed until 2026 or 2027, depending on information received from the developers of Lot 10, Eastman made a motion to have staff “explore short-term, temporary ways to program and activate The Streatery space prior to construction, including placement of temporary seating and furnishings and use of food trucks and similar vendors to encourage public use and pilot activation ideas.” Willits seconded the motion.
The motion passed unanimously, with Duncan-Walker and Ingle absent.
Fifth motion
Book made a motion to direct staff to talk to the advisory boards and provide information to the Commission about how to fund public safety, specific to the broad-based downtown area: “That’s everything — that is fire and police and technology and stuff, and what ideas they have.” Chestnut seconded the motion.
Ward cautioned against expecting civilians on advisory board members to “come back and tell us how we fund that. I mean, if where you’re going is a downtown organization that can help fund security, I think that’s a fine idea, but I would feel a little more comfortable being specific… because the idea for funding public safety is taxes. That’s how that works.”
Book agreed, “We don’t want 50 things on a dart board. We need realistic ideas that would help us, that the community would probably support, and then maybe we move forward on that.”
The motion passed 4-1, with Willits in dissent and Duncan-Walker and Ingle absent.
At the end of the meeting, Commissioners indicated that despite advocacy from the disabled community and a Chair letter from the Alachua County Commission, they intend to bring paratransit services in-house, possibly leaving those outside the city limits without transportation to medical appointments.
“ Special Advisor for Infrastructure Brian Singleton”… what’s up with these crazy special advisor titles?
follow the money
At least this makes them feel competent in doing SOMETHING! Because they sure as hell can’t balance a budget…that’s for sure. Now they’re pouring 8 million into another homeless boondoggle, Scottish & Budget Inn’s getting ready for more of the same non contributing citizens. And….we get to drop all the repairs when they tear the place up….which they will surely do.
Bob start here:
Why did Singleton in the matter of weeks, go from being Public Works Director to Special Advisor at City Hall.
Something happened at public works that triggered this:
Start filing records requests and digging, trust me you won’t have to dig deep lol.
Like calling the garbageman a “Sanitation Engineer”!
Leave it to the City Commission to look for another street to screw up in some way or another; whether it’s making 2 lanes out of 3 or 4, (see old Main St), parking spaces on streets, (6th in front of GPD), or making bicycle lanes out of automobile lanes, (8th Ave).
No wonder they’re such proponents for abortions, they make one out of about 95% of everything they do.
??????
Spend, spend, spend. Wait till their hand-wringing when property tax reform comes.
Whatever happened to the subsidized buckster performers on street corners downtown? Were they bumped off by panhandlers or just robbed of their tips?
I travel from on 8th Avenue between Main Street and 6th Street 4 times a day for the last 30 years. I seldom see a bicycle and when I do it is generally crossing 8th Avenue not traveling east-west. Did no-one do a traffic count? Traffic stays backed up on East 8th Avenue and Main Street due to there being only one lane crossing the Street. Whats with the 6 inch concrete car killers as you enter 8th Avenue from Main Street or 6th Street? At least paint them yellow so they show up. I am dumbfounded by the total stupidity of this waste of money.
Ward and his cronies are all bicycle nuts, they have ensured that ALL FUTURE ROAD IMPROVEMENTS in the city will cost more, take longer, and clog traffic because they have ruled every street in Gainesville MUST get a bike lane when improved, hence the nightmare that is NW 6th street; Notice they didn’t up grade NE 6th that would mean they would have to ignore their own rules or having to buy out houses on the side of the road in order to widen it to accommodate these unnecessary bike lanes. People have been bicycling around Gainesville for over 100 years without bike lanes. Enforce bike safety like stopping at stop signs and you’ll stop the deaths we don’t need millions of dollars in bike lanes for 12 bikes a month to use.
They may be bicycle nuts but I sincerely doubt Ward or the others have put their nuts on one in 20 years.
Narrow vehicular lanes reduces speeding. That stretch between main and sixth was used as a car passing lane by many, similar to the current situation on SW 6th from 16th Av to Depot Av. We should applaud anti speeding measures. Roadway design dictates vehicle speed.
You must be great at parties
Invitado is correct on the “traffic calming” effects of narrower lanes, and on street parking encourages pedestrian traffic because the space and parked cars provide protection to those on the sidewak. I’m OK with those changes to selected and appropriate streets like Main below N 8th and above S 16th Ave.
I am opposed to the “streatery”, don’t know how it got started, or what is fueling it. I assume that somewhere the idea has been a wild success and maybe some day I’ll agree it’s a great idea, but not now. I don’t like replacing the brick or removing curbs. If it fails, that makes phasing back that much harder and why remove one of the most historic and character setting elements of the design? With the very successful Bo Diddley Plaze we don’t need another “events” location. How about giving up on selling Lot 10 and putting it to use instead of being a half full parking lot – how many years now has that been it’s only function?
Eastman the Idiot and Weasel Willets did.
Problem is, even using their toes, they can only count up to two and they’re too directionally challenged to distinguish the difference between north, south, east and west.
The idiots that run this city keep thinking that they are going to convince tens of thousands of people to ride a bike to work by *checks notes* making it harder and harder to drive a car with stupid lanes and badly timed lights. I don’t want to take the “mobile homeless shelter” RTS bus, I don’t want to ride my bike 13 miles to work and back every day. I just want to not get caught at horribly timed traffic lights, and have roads stay the same size or get wider if possible.
I think the biggest joke of all are “bike lane traffic control devices” Whatever the “staff” is smoking I hope they are sharing with the rest of the folks because if you think anyone on a bike is going to stop for a “bike lane traffic control device” you have never actually watched people who ride bikes in this town. They weave in and out of the road depending on the lights. Onto the side walk when the walk sign is on and back into the road for continued travel until the next stop light that they just blow through using the same sidewalks once again. I have been yelled at because I was turning right and a bike rider was BEHIND ME while I had my turn signal on and they tried to say I pulled in front of them.
People on Bikes always say they want to “Share” the road but they sure don’t want to share the responsibilities or follow the same rules.
Indeed bike riding has done nothing but diminish over the decades since the ’70s. However, electric bikes are probably more than a fad as I everyone I know who has bought one, loves it. There’s no reason these can’t be used here going to work for 7-8 months of the year, at a much less expensive cost then a car.
Gotta love all the little short snippets of “Bike Lanes to Nowhere” around town that the commission thinks are a priority. Basically it’s just meaningless virtue signaling. I ride a bike 100 to 120 mi a week, (out on rural, mostly unpaved roads, not in the city.) I dread when I have to ride my bike in the city, when I drop my car off to be worked on. The few city roads that have good bike lanes often have debris in the bike lanes forcing cyclists to go out into the travel lanes, and the sorry bike lanes end abruptly, forcing cyclists back into the road or into the sidewalks. And then there’s the distracted drivers on their phones… If the commission wanted to do something meaningful, they would continue the paved bike trail on south from Depot avenue to Southwest 16th…
I don’t know about you guys but I just use the new bike lanes on 6th as a regular travel lane in my car. If we all start doing it eventually the city will get the message.
Just check your mirrors for cyclists first, please!
All municipal chatzkis projects should be put on hold until the budget is balanced and the city is operating in the green.
Essential projects only like infrastructure etc.
If there was ever a time to be filing complaints with state administration now is the time, flood the state department with complaints and demand action.
They are more worried about bike lanes and the 7-10 dollar coffee zone than the hard working citizens of the city.
I’ve spent a lot of time downtown and I’ve noticed that only liberals seem to have the money and time to patronize most of the businesses downtown, aside from those who work down there. Even for them these places are too expensive. They are literally creating their own little slice of heathenism for their personal use by using the city commission and tax payer funds to subsidize their dreams and agendas.
Maybe the city could tell us why they need on street parking on a main thoroughfare. Then why not direct bikes etc, to the slower, safer side streets, instead into direct competition with larger, more dangerous streams of motor vehicles.
Those zipper barriers prevent drivers from pulling over for emergency vehicles or deliveries, trash pickup, or other reasons. If a driver or bicyclist swerves into them, trouble. None of that or the cost matters, though, same as a street closure that contributed to a restaurant going out of business and already paying for a downtown plaza.
Nobody thought to call it The Market Streatery? Too late now. Keeping it completely closed to traffic and parking is unjustifiable. Close it only when it needs to be closed. The manager of the dispensary said someone recently OD’d by the tent near her business’s front door. There have already been at least two shootings at night in that area just this year. If you have a closed-off part of downtown Gangsville, you are inviting trouble.
Closing part of the roads/parking spaces also creates more traffic congestion in that immediate area, and more potential pedestrian injuries or deaths. If you are building a 14-story apartment building by campus with no parking spaces, you undoubtedly will be adding to the volume of ride-share traffic that will be driving downtown most every night. Expand pick-up/drop-off traffic capacity instead of shutting it off.
The bicycle lanes on 8th Avenue are foolish-looking. Do other cities use that same design? The bike lanes in/by Midtown, narrower and with less-ugly barriers, are almost as bad. UF would be using the safest, most proven design, and their bike lanes are maybe 3 or 3.5 feet wide with just pavement striping and no barrier. They briefly tried barriers near Turlington Hall then promptly removed them. More people are likely to injure themselves as a result of the barriers compared to any questionable benefit the barriers may provide. The barriers also make it harder to evade someone jumping out the bushes trying to rob you, swerve out of the way of a car or truck about to back into you, and ride with the most possible freedom and safety. Everybody can see that almost no bicyclists use the new goofy-looking XL bicycle barrier paths. They just take the back streets where there are more trees and less traffic. One of the main bicycle paths runs from by Dominos to by GPD to West University and further south.
I agree the barriers are terrible.