New city roads to include bike lanes, safety measures for cyclists and motorists
Press release from City of Gainesville
GAINESVILLE, Fla. – In a move intended to increase safety and comfort for area bicyclists, the Gainesville City Commission recently approved roadway design changes that add bike lanes or adjacent bike paths to all new city streets. In addition, on existing city roadways wide enough to accommodate them, new bike lanes will be added when the roads are resurfaced. The changes apply to new and existing streets with posted speeds of 25 mph or greater that handle at least 3,000 cars each day.
“These improvements support our Vision Zero strategy to reduce the number of traffic fatalities and serious injuries to zero,” said Commissioner Adrian Hayes-Santos. “And a major part of that is how we design our roads to encourage cycling by ensuring there’s a safe place for bicyclists of all ages and abilities.”
Currently, many local roads include conventional bike lanes where a single, solid white stripe separates cyclists from drivers. Under the changes, new bike lanes will fall into one of three categories: buffered, separated, or protected.
“Buffered bike lanes are wider, not only creating more distance between the bikes and cars but they also enable one cyclist to comfortably pass another,” explained City Planner Scott Wright.
Separated bike lanes utilize vertical barriers like flexible posts to shield bicyclists from vehicles. Protected bike lanes offer even greater safety and comfort for cyclists by using materials such as curbs, planters, or even a parking lane between the bike lane and traffic lane.
“We’ve already started to see these improvements in the Midtown area, just north of the University of Florida campus,” said Commissioner Hayes-Santos, referring to new bike lanes added for cyclists along parts of NW 14th, 15th, 17th, and 18th streets.
According to the National Association of City Transportation Officials (NACTO), there is a clear correlation between the rise in the number of cyclists on city streets, improved access to safe places to ride, and increased safety for riders.
The new improvements support the City’s goals of creating bikeable neighborhoods and connected trails and paths for biking to link community destinations. The changes are part of recent updates to its Engineering Design & Construction Manual and are modeled after standards found in the NACTO Urban Bikeway Design Guide.
Vision Zero strategy… that about sums up their visionary abilities. Vision Blind Pig strategy would also work.
They now have the big bucket of the surtax coming their way. Gainesville gets the biggest bucket after the county. And they can now buy more property owned by Democrat supporters for conservation. What then follows is offsetting property tax payments for affordable housing projects. Hello Gainesville…yet it’s coming to a community around you!
They should have to get register their bikes and get tags to help pay their fair share for using the streets…I don’t see anyone using those paths
Like in the photo with this article…do you see a bicyclist in the photo? No. What a waste of money. Those bike lanes are retarded, Santos Hyphen Hayes has ruined the streets near UF
With the one-waying of the streets too…there’s no parking with all those huge buildings…it’s a hassle getting around in the area.
Commission is finally doing something I like with my tax money. Btw us bicyclists ALSO drive cars and already pay those taxes, what do you want us to do, pay twice?🤔
Which taxes? Registration? I have to register every vehicle I use on the road except my bicycle. I am not in favor of registering bikes, but there’s your precedent.
You need to pay a user fee and pay your fair share commi cheapskate…do you ride with your face mask on too? And it’s retarded that a bicyclist can take a whole lane on NW 6th Street. Try that at rush hour.
Anyone using the road should pay their fair share. That’s fair.
Bicyclists would be safer if they had a nice reflective license plate
On them and police could enforce traffic rules better instead of letting them go. Yeah,
Bikes should have to pay their fair share if they are going to share the road with automobiles.
Well, now you can see where your new 1/2 cent sales tax is going to go; bike lanes. Wider lanes means more bikers riding side by side. I guess we really need recreational bike lanes on state highways, huh? 441, 121, 235, 20 and 26 come to mind.
Every road I’ve seen that has a bike lane has one going each direction, not that that stops people from biking against traffic. You would need way more bike traffic to justify double-wide bike lanes.
Having curbs or posts or other separators between the bike lane and the regular street is retarded. Any real biker would agree. You need to be able to move freely onto the street or the bike lane. This is like the flashing yellow left turn arrows that most visitors from real cities also find really dumb if not dangerous. The new part of South Main looks like it was designed by children, by the way. I’ve almost hit at least one pedestrian who popped out of nowhere from behind one of those stupid spindly-looking palm trees.
Agreed.
Luckily they are just bolted into the asphalt per the photo. Hopefully some enterprising citizen removes them and tosses them down the storm sewers, along with any nearby electric scooters.
Ever see someone riding a bike at night with dark clothing on? They need to have front & rear lights on.
A shiny reflective license plate will let us drivers see them and law enforcement can write tickets for those bike riders who run stop signs.
You would think the city would learn after paying out a million dollars for a guy who hit a .50” sewer cover in the road. If bikes require tags would decrease the thefts of them too…
They need to outlaw skateboards
And electric scooters on the streets.
Those electric rental scooters should
Be registered and pay a fee to be on the road or a bike lane too…