Bicycle Friendly Alternative to Colorado Boulevard

Bicycling in Eagle Rock is pleasant, for the most part. However, to reach the majority of destinations in our town we often have to negotiate with loud zooming cars on Colorado Boulevard, making bicycling less attractive when considering how to get somewhere.

Thankfully there is a bicycle friendly street that can serve as an alternative to Colorado Boulevard but it is perhaps not so well known. This alternative is Las Flores Drive.

Many Eagle Rock residents know that Hill Drive roughly parallels Colorado Boulevard, but the street meanders and, as its name implies, has hills. The conditions on Hill Drive make it not such a bike friendly route for the everyday person looking for a relaxing, laid-back bicycle ride. For those looking to ride a bicycle for small trips in the neighborhood Las Flores is the best way to avoid cycling on Colorado Boulevard and to avoid hills.

Las Flores is a little disjointed, but otherwise serves as a perfectly good alternative to Colorado Boulevard for casual bicyclists as it is a relatively calm, flat and low traffic route. Where Las Flores interrupts between Eagle Rock Boulevard and Maywood Avenue you can make a small jog onto Hill Drive for a block and continue back on Las Flores. Below is a Google Maps image showing Colorado Boulevard represented with a red line and the Las Flores alternative I have come to use in blue.

As you may notice, you can still reach a considerable amount of destinations by using Las Flores rather than Colorado Boulevard. From the Eagle Rock Plaza to Trader Joe’s and everything in between – still reachable – requiring only minimal interaction on Colorado Boulevard when arriving at your destination and saving the casual bicyclist a lot of stress.

According to Google Maps taking Las Flores doesn’t add terribly much distance to one’s journey; only half a mile more if you’re traveling the entire Las Flores route to avoid Colorado Boulevard. On a bicycle an extra half mile is negligible and it is unlikely one would traverse Las Flores from Townsend Avenue to Sumner Avenue for the majority of their journeys anyway.  In my experience any added distance taking Las Flores over Colorado Boulevard  is well worth it to not having to contend with intimidating conditions on our main street.

The next time you need to run a small errand which you would typically make by driving on Colorado Boulevard, consider cycling on Las Flores– it really is quite nice, and relaxing. And given the price of gas these days, being able to choose the bicycle for small trips could be a nice way to save a few bucks.

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Can Separated Bike Lanes Save Colorado Boulevard?

Colorado Boulevard, the commercial center of Eagle Rock, will undergo a transformation if the initiative Take Back The Boulevard can maintain the momentum it is experiencing at the moment. A lot of ideas about how to improve the boulevard are being circulated– everything from angled parking to sidewalk extensions, to increased greenery, to bike lanes, and more! Just the other day Eastsider shared the idea of reversed angle in parking as solution.

While there are many popular ideas, I feel that it is important to reflect on the mission of this worthy effort to reclaim our main street from the dangerous freeway it currently resembles. Take Back The Boulevard seeks to transform Colorado Boulevard into a safe, sustainable, and vibrant street in order to stimulate economic growth, increase public safety and enhance community pride. Given that we cannot accommodate all the possible ideas being discussed due to limited space on the street I would like to share why I believe a solution that includes protected bike lanes, also known as cycle tracks, could fulfill as many of the desires of this initiative and is perhaps the most promising solution available.

Protected bike lanes essentially place a bike lane along the curb and place car parking to the left of the bike lane as a buffer separating motorized traffic  and bicycle traffic. To read more about protected bike lanes concept check out the Los Angeles Department of Transportation Bike Blog’s recent post explaining these facilities.

So, installing protected bike lanes along Colorado Boulevard would result in what is known as a ‘road diet’, the removal of one travel lane in each direction. The new found space would be used to accommodate the proposed cycle tracks. Road diets have been proven, nationwide, to increase safety for all users. They have also been known to better the flow of traffic. Read about them here.

However, before I continue, let me share a couple rough drawings I made of what these protected bike lanes just might look like on our boulevard.

This first image is supposed to a rendering of Maywood Avenue and Colorado Boulevard, looking East.

Current Appearance

Via Google Maps Street View

Sketch Including Separated Bike Lane

(From left to right) Sidewalk, separated bike lane, bus stop island, motorized traffic

Now what does separated bike lane do to fulfill the mission of Take Back The Boulevard? Well if one examines my rough sketch there are a few things being accomplished

1) Most obviously a safe space is created to allow travel for cyclists that doesn’t force cyclists to mix with pedestrians or automobiles. This facility will encourage more than just young fearless people to cycle. There is no pressure to ‘keep up’ with motorized traffic and provides an environmental, sustainable means of traveling along the boulevard

2) The bus stop is moved to an island that frees up space on the sidewalk and allows for speedier bus service as buses won’t have pull up to a curb. Bike racks can be placed on this island to again free up space on our precious sidewalks. This bus island also reduces conflict between bicyclists and buses– often bicyclists and buses ‘leap frog’ each other as a bicyclist passes a bus that is stopped then the bus passes the cyclist once in motion again. This removes such conflicts.

3) Crossings for pedestrians is made shorter by allowing them to wait at a refuge alongside the bus stop island.

4) While the moved bus stop frees up sidewalk space, the former bus stop space could also be used to plant trees to provide more greenery.

5) Greater buffer between pedestrians and automobiles, making outdoor dining (where it is available) or mere strolling more pleasant as the increased distances makes the sidewalks less noisy from cars whizzing by.

6) Cars will not be allowed to travel as recklessly as in the past since they will only have two lanes. This will likely result in more civilized speeds and careful, conscious driving. As Tom Vanderbilt notes in his book Traffic, when we make roads forgiving to motorists (like by allowing excess number of lanes), motorists tend to drive sloppier. It’s these kind of excessively wide streets that encourage illegal speeding, and unfortunately result in deaths too.

Here is an other view of the separated bike lane looking West on Maywood Avenue and Colorado Boulevard

Current Appearance

Sketch with protected bike lane

This remains a very rough sketch but I would like to highlight the benefits of this proposed configuration

1) Again a safe space for people of all ages to cycle is created

2)Pedestrian crossings become shorter by allowing the creation of a small refuge

3) The protective barrier between bicyclists and automobiles allows an opportunity to plant trees and other greenery in what is currently just plain asphalt

I realize it may be difficult to completely understand these drawings, however there are also existing examples of where similar spaces have been created. Take a look below where Colorado Boulevard could look for inspiration

Better bus boarding, reduced conflict between cyclists and buses. Photo via Paul Krueger’s flickr http://www.flickr.com/photos/pwkrueger/5133809157/

Protected bike lanes can accommodate many parking spaces for cyclists. Given that protected bike lanes are proven to increase the number of trips by bike this would likely be good for business along Colorado Boulevard’s storefronts. Photo via Paul Krueger’s flickr http://www.flickr.com/photos/pwkrueger/5134416434/

Protected bike lane in Long Beach. Photo via Waltarrrrr’s flickr http://www.flickr.com/photos/waltarrrrr/5650654370

Unlike other proposed solutions to fix Colorado Boulevard, configurations similar to what I share in this post consider all users– pedestrians, bicyclists, transit users, and motorists.

Pedestrians get more spacious sidewalks by moving bus stops to islands, shorter crossings through the refuges, greater buffer from automobiles through the separated bike lane

Bicyclists get safe travel space away from automobiles and pedestrians

Transit users get loading platforms that will make getting on and off the bus, easier and faster

Motorists get safer streets that make traveling at the speed limit easier to do, they won’t have to change lanes to pass bicyclists. Potentially shorter waiting times at lights as pedestrians will be able to cross faster thanks to the pedestrian refuges.

Everyone gets a safer configuration, everyone will benefit from increased opportunities to plant greenery by some of the pedestrian refuges. This solution allows flexibility in space. Since bus stops will move to islands sidewalk space formerly used to accommodate the bus stop can be now used to plant trees, install benches, or simply allow a wider space for pedestrians. Colorado Boulevard is currently flooded with cars, this solution will make cycling, walking, and taking the bus more attractive than they currently are and reduce the demand for car parking, one of the problems of the way Colorado Boulevard is configured today.

I’d like to compare this solution to the proposed ‘reverse angle in parking’ that the Eastsider shared the other day. The angled parking creates more parking spaces for cars and could potentially create curb extensions at intersections for pedestrians. This solution also claims it could reduce conflict between bicyclists and cars pulling in/out of parking spaces but if cars stop suddenly to start parking bicyclists will have to swerve around– a not so safe action to take.

While it is an attractive solution in some respects it is awfully car centric. This design will do little to encourage more people to cycle or make bicycling safer. It seems to do nothing to make bus travel easier either. It also, while it will create a buffer between pedestrians and moving automobiles, will rather confine the sidewalk space. I have experienced firsthand that cars tend to pull in to angled parking spaces so that part of the car hovers over the sidewalk, making pedestrian space feel cramped. It also seems that by creating more parking spaces this solution will only encourage driving and wouldn’t be very sustainable, nor make the street more vibrant, in complete contrast with the goals of Take Back The Boulevard. On the other hand, encouraging multiple modes of travel as a thoughtfully constructed cycle tracks can do, the street will be less car centric (and more sustainable) and filled with people rather than cars (and be more vibrant). Because we have limited space I support a solution that will accomplish as many of the goals of Take Back The Boulevard, and implementing separated bike lanes seems to be a promising solution.

Further readings about Colorado Boulevard:

Some Reasons I Support Separated Bike Lanes

A post where I share additional reasons why I support separated bike lanes: “ In making the case for a calmer, more bike friendly Eagle Rock sometimes those who oppose the idea contend car traffic will slow down too much. However, as local resident Jack Burnett-Stuart points out

‘ It is 1.6 miles from the post office to Swork [via Colorado Boulevard]. If the average speed was reduced through a variety of traffic slowing measures (including changing the speed limit, but does anyone pay any attention to that?) from say 40 mph to 20mph, that would add 2 minutes 24 seconds to the time the trip takes ‘ “

Some Facts and Thoughts About Colorado Boulevard

Specific facts detailing current traffic levels of Colorado Boulevard: “Colorado Boulevard is a major highway class II, projected to carry between 30,000 and 50,000 cars daily. Traffic counts available from the LADOT website from the past 15 years shows that Colorado Boulevard seldom carries above 35,000.”

Some Simple Facts

Some simple, yet unfortunate facts about the danger of a car centric Colorado Boulevard: “…there has been approximately one reported accident a week over the past five years. More than half of the accidents involve injuries.

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The Struggles and Potential of Eagle Rock Boulevard

In my last post I explored some traffic information about Colorado Boulevard. The results were surprising, showing that Colorado Boulevard on average carried no more than 35,000 average daily trips (the street is designed to carry between 30,000 and 50,000 average daily trips). Unfortunately Colorado also proved to be a rather dangerous street, but when the street resembles a freeway in width and speed in a popular downtown, the many crashes that have occurred along the Boulevard may not come as complete shocks.

In this post I thought I’d look at Eagle Rock Boulevard – our other major boulevard – as it runs through Eagle Rock, and Glassell Park.

First I compiled counts of intersections that have been monitored more than once. The counts are all available from LADOT though I have turned the numbers into easy-to-read charts that show the observed volumes recorded between 2001 and 2009 for the various intersections. Eagle Rock Boulevard is a major class II highway like Colorado Boulevard, designed to carry between 30,000 and 50,000 average daily trips as shown on the map below from the LA General Plan Transportation Element.

(From LA General Plan Transportation Element Highway Map)

Description of street designations and their capacity (from LA General Plan Transportation Element)

All the observed intersections show that Eagle Rock Boulevard can barely carry the minimum 30,000 ‘average daily trips’ it is built for, this is particularly true for the street south of Verdugo Road. Sometimes segments of Eagle Rock Boulevard struggle to reach 20,000 ADT or ‘average daily trips’. The image left shows a description of how a Major Highway Class II should be designed.

Because Eagle Rock Boulevard fluctuates in the number of lanes it has, in showing the observed traffic counts I divided the street into 4 ‘segments’. As map shared earlier above indicates, Eagle Rock Boulevard is considered a Major Highway Class II the entire length south of Colorado Boulevard despite the changes in widths and number of lanes. I am sharing the counts in sequential order as the intersections appear if one were to travel South on Eagle Rock Boulevard.

Red= 2 lanes in each direction, no bike lanes. Green= 3 lanes southbound, 2 lanes northbound, bike lanes on both sides. Purple= 3 lanes in each direction, bike lanes. Blue=2 lanes each direction, bike lanes.

The traffic volumes have  many jumps and great declines but the picture across all traffic counts is rather clear. Rarely does Eagle Rock Boulevard reach its designed minimum, sometimes struggling to reach half of that when observing intersections in the Glassell Park portion of the street. The street is designed to certain widths and to provide certain number of lanes but if not enough cars are using it, the space simply is wasted as unused asphalt.

Do the low traffic counts result in a successful street? Unfortunately no. While cars may be provided with ample space, pedestrians and cyclists are left with close to nothing. Sidewalks exist though South of Verdugo Road they become very narrow and sometimes unnavigable as the occasional tree or telephone pole block the entire sidewalk. As one goes south of Eagle Rock Boulevard the bike lanes become narrower and narrower until they verge on bothersome and dangerous. Eagle Rock Boulevard is also a popular transit corridor, serviced by the Metro 84 line taking students to school and bringing people downtown. However, many of the bus stops lack bus schedules, benches, or shelters, again this is increasingly true and apparent as one goes south on Eagle Rock Boulevard. As a general observation, the street provides fewer accommodations in the Glassell Park portion of the street. This is rather unfortunate as this is where one sees the most walking, cycling, and bus use on a consistent basis.

And while cars may benefit from not encountering traffic jams, the street is not much better for motorists from a safety perspective. As with Colorado Boulevard I tried finding crash or safety statistics for Eagle Rock Boulevard. Perhaps as a relief, there was less information on Eagle Rock Boulevard. What I did find comes from LAPD Operations Central Bureau.

Top 5 Traffic Collision Intersections of past 6 months as of January 2011:

Los Feliz Blvd/Riverside Drive, Figueroa St/Avenue 26, Alvarado St/Reservoir St, Eagle Rock Blvd/Verdugo Rd, and Figueroa St/La Loma Rd

Top 5  Traffic Collision Streets of past 2 years as of January 2011:

Figueroa St, Los Feliz Blvd, Fletcher Drive, Eagle Rock Blvd, and Riverside Dr.

"# of T/C" means "number of Traffic Collisions"

Like Colorado Boulevard, Eagle Rock Boulevard is very dangerous and there is a lot of space on the street that could go towards improving conditions for all modes of travel.

While Colorado Boulevard receives a lot of attention from the community as a street that needs improvements it could be argued that Eagle Rock Boulevard is in much more dire need of help. There is no reason that cars should be given superfluous space at the expense of other modes of travel. When something so essential as decent sidewalks are lacking and the street itself is documented for its danger it seems fairly straightforward that changes need to be made– as the traffic counts show, there’s already plenty of space that could be used to create a more  safe, complete street– it just isn’t being utilized.

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Some Facts and Thoughts About Colorado Boulevard

It is common to accept the automobile as the primary means to move along Colorado Boulevard, or to reach the many destinations that line our well-known part of town. However, I recently found myself asking why driving is the primary means and I found myself curious about the actual amount of traffic that passes by, and other statistics about the street. Colorado Boulevard is a large part of our community, why not be curious about it, right?

Colorado Boulevard is a major highway class II, projected to carry between 30,000 and 50,000 cars daily. Traffic counts available from the LADOT website from the past 15 years shows that Colorado Boulevard seldom carries above 35,000.

Some recent traffic counts along Colorado

Traffic counts of our famous Eagle Rock/Colorado Boulevard intersection over the years.

Where are these people coming from that drive along our Boulevard? In trying to solve this puzzle it may be useful to know that 40% of trips in America within 2 miles from the home and 61% of trips are within 5 miles of the home. This indicates that a considerable amount of traffic along Colorado is local. But perhaps most of us already figured as much; I can recall a recent issue of the Boulevard Sentinel a resident suggested most of traffic along Colorado was local. Determining the exact percent of traffic along Colorado that is local may be difficult, but it is largely acknowledged that a sizable portion is local– that is, the cars reaching destinations along Colorado are likely within 2 or 3 miles of their home if one were to ‘guesstimate’.

If it can go undisputed that a considerable portion of Colorado Boulevard traffic is local – especially considering that the 134 freeway lies parallel for people traveling greater distances – I also want to know why so many locals do drive to reach destinations along the Boulevard. Lately I’ve heard many complaints about the lack of availability of car parking for some of the more popular destinations. Eagle Rockers have also noticed a consistent rise in gas prices, which is increasingly taking a toll at our collective pocket books. If people are going to spend hard earned money in economically challenging times and personal frustration to reach a destination on Colorado by car and have a parking space it can be concluded that people mostly do so because the automobile remains the most pleasant and most convenient option. That or we love driving ourselves crazy. I prefer to believe the former is true.

So driving is the most pleasant and convenient option for most. However, the street is surprisingly unsafe if one chooses to motor. As pointed out at fellow Northeast LA blog, Bipediality, for approximately the three miles that Colorado Boulevard runs through Eagle Rock, 226 crashes occurred between 2005 and 2009– that works out to about one crash a week in that time period. Additionally, Colorado is among the top 5 collision streets in the LAPD Operations Central Bureau. Seeing as 600 speeding tickets were issued in the wake of the horrific 2008 crash, it may not surprise you that one of the top five collision factors in the Central Bureau in 2011 is unsafe speeding– like the freeway kind of speeding Colorado Boulevard invites daily.

In short, there isn’t much good that can be said of Colorado Boulevard – it does not provide  enough car parking, it carries relatively low volumes of traffic while providing 80% of the street to cars, traffic collisions and speeding are frequent, and the street remains unpleasant for those traveling on foot or bicycle or wishing to dine outdoors at one of our many eateries.

When locals could conceivably walk or cycle to reach the many hot spots along Colorado it seems driving is more of an endurance than choice people make freely when traveling along our main Boulevard because of its car-centric design.

This is why it is my firm belief that more people, most certainly locals, will choose to walk or cycle along Colorado if we can make it pleasant and convenient– but how do we achieve a street that truly encourages walking and cycling?

Because Colorado barely exceeds the minimum it is engineered for, the street could be made more efficient, safe and invite all modes of transportation if space were reallocated to pedestrians and bicyclists. Undoubtedly a street that is more pleasant will also be good for business. The reallocated space wouldn’t even be much of a loss to motorists as it appears cars have a superfluous amount of space to begin with. Protected bike lanes, sidewalk or curb extensions, more crosswalks… these are some of the things that have been demonstrated to increase foot and bicycle traffic where implemented. More bicycle and foot traffic means fewer people worrying about car parking and other frustrations associated with driving. Also, the space turned over to these modes of travel means cars are less likely to misbehave because the street won’t look or feel like a freeway through the neighborhood– the street simply won’t allow the degree of speeding and other unsafe behavior. Taking space from cars and giving it to pedestrians and bicyclists, a ‘road diet‘, has long been a proven safety enhancement on streets where they are implemented A street that gives people viable, pleasant choices in travel means transport can be more space efficient and our town will also be to accommodate more people and traffic in the future if necessary.

In Highland Park, with limited space a concern, this picture shows we can address the issue: 6+ bicycles in a spot only 1 car can fit.

Realizing the surprising low volumes of traffic passing by given Colorado’s width, the many collisions and dangers the street presents, the inability to adequately fulfill current parking demands, gas prices, etc… a redesign of the street that allocates greater space to pedestrians and bicyclists seems promising. In recent months Long Beach and San Francisco have shown that pleasant and convenient streets to walk and cycle on will increase the demands for these modes of travel. As far as Eagle Rock is concerned with piles of evidence at our feet it seems our community has nothing to lose, and so much to gain if we had a redesigned Colorado that favors people over the automobile. A transformed Colorado can made more efficient, more safe, more pleasant, good for business and truly reflect the small town feel of our community.

And as I’ve mentioned before, a more pleasant, convenient and safe Colorado doesn’t have to remain a dream. Please considering volunteering to or becoming a member of The Eagle Rock Association to aid their efforts in making a better Colorado a reality through their newly planted ‘Taking Back the Boulevard’ initiative.

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Bike Lane on Fair Park Avenue

IMG_0746 a photo by Walk Eagle Rock on Flickr.

Did you notice? This block of Fair Park Avenue was repaved recently and in the process received a glorious bike lane. I don’t ride on Fair Park often and I have not been in the neighborhood lately so I don’t know when this actually happened but it is a wonderful movement towards a more bikeable Eagle Rock. Yes it only spans one block, between Maywood Avenue and Eagle Rock Boulevard and only 1188 feet long according to google maps. But consider this– Maywood is a low traffic street and Eagle Rock Boulevard already has a bike lane south of Westdale Avenue. The ER Blvd bike lane is supposed to be completed and run all the way to Colorado Boulevard in the near future as that portion of the street is in the ’5-year plan’ of LA Bike Plan. Sounds like a bike network is quietly brewing in Eagle Rock…

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What a Welcome!

Back in Eagle Rock for a brief visit and Friday, my first day back, I was greeted with many positive sights, making me optimistic for a safer, livelier, more active, and more pleasant neighborhood environment. Here’s what I saw:

Just five minutes into my walk and I saw some kids with active transportation: skateboard and bicycle

Some activity, and a bicycle on the corner of La Roda Avenue and Yosemite Drive

New bike lane on Fair Park Ave in front of Eagle Rock Elementary!

Active Farmer's Market

Ped Power!

My walk through Eagle Rock ended on the corner of Eagle Rock Boulevard and Colorado Boulevard. I waited for a friend  before we proceeded to take the 84 bus to catch up with an other friend. In about 15 minutes of waiting I saw plenty of people on bicycles.

Eagle Rock Cycle Chic?

And some students happily walking

It was a good day for walking and biking in Eagle Rock. After I got on the 84 I saw about nine more cyclists and many more people on foot. And why not? It was a beautiful day and surely people would enjoy the day properly, walking and cycling to get places, if they didn’t feel forced into their cars.

Today was an especially inspiring day and I was reminded of a component of this blog which hasn’t been active lately, my ‘reasons to walk Eagle Rock’. Looking through my old posts I noticed I left off on #7. To see my other reasons to walk Eagle Rock, check the tag “Reason to walk Eagle Rock”.

Reason #8 to walk Eagle Rock: Appreciate the neighborhood by going for a walk, it is a great way to connect to the community, especially if you haven’t been around the block lately. Discover a bike lane, enjoy the farmer’s market on an especially fantastic day and go places with a friend, or two!

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Pedaling Revolution and Eagle Rock

I recently read Pedaling Revolution: How Cyclists Are Changing American Cities. A great book covering political history of cycling in America, why Portland and Davis have succeeded in high rates of cycling, insights from various perspectives throughout and more. The book is short, easy to read, informative, engaging and anyone interested in bicycling as transportation should try to read it sometime. Bicycles aside, it was still an enjoyable book, you’ll likely only skip a few pages if you aren’t into bicycling but just want something good to read.

Now, other than recommending this book and gushing about how much I enjoyed it, I have an ‘Eagle Rock angle’ to add. This was a pleasure read so I didn’t want to take notes or think more than I had to, but there were times when I couldn’t help but to think of Eagle Rock and our local street designs and I would like to share some of those moments here.

“You know, if safety was our societal goal, we’d definitely get rid of automobiles” [Peter Jacobsen, Sacramento Public Health Consultant]

In Eagle Rock, safety, in relation to automobiles in the neighborhood, seems a constant issue. I remember when a driver struck a student heading to ERHS on Yosemite a few years back, there was talk of adding a traffic signal at a crossing which remains only marked with some paint. It seems every so often that a student is unfortunately struck while heading to or from ERHS.  I am fortunate that my worst experience involved a car nearly hitting me and my two friends when the driver refused to grant us our right-of-way when walking home. But not even experiences like that should ever occur directly adjacent to schools (or anywhere else).

Things get worse when residents think of Colorado Boulevard. The notorious crash of 2008 and the over 600 traffic citations that ensued after the collision. The cars that crashed into Swork. Daily speeding. Daily failure to yield to pedestrians.

And York Boulevard, even at one lane in each direction managed to foster a crash just over a month ago. I think if safety was the number one goal for Eagle Rock, we could do a lot by reducing space dedicated to cars and turning it over to the community.

“This not-very-rich city had the density to support a more lively street life. Many people are close enough to walk downtown, although few do. And then suddenly… you know whose fault it is? It’s the cars, it’s the manufacturers fault. People will drive as fast as they feel safe. And with all of the sound proofing and hose power and improvements, they feel they can go faster. These roads were designed for 1960′s autos. What we’re left with is old road technology and new auto technology. Now they don’t think they’re driving fast, they don’t think they’re speeding.” [From a city's public works director]

Vincent Avenue adjacent to ERHS. Walking distance from downtown Eagle Rock.

Again Colorado Boulevard springs to mind, when trolley lines where removed. New found space was turned over to cars, a mistake many of us are still trying to reverse. My anecdotal experience consists of traveling with drivers who exceed the 35mph limit (it is a limit not a minimum), as I briefly expressed in this LA Streetsblog article. These are not necessarily bad people, but they just don’t know how fast they are going with all the modern technology in cars. We should engineer the streets so that speeding is not an issue.

“More parents are driving their kids to school and…. high school now has a parking lot crowded with the cars of affluent students who could easily bike or walk but prefer the status of driving.”

Student parking lot at ERHS

Eagle Rock High School, somehow whenever a class year reaches driving age, teens who were previously chauffeured or walked or took the bus now drive themselves. Anyone living in Eagle Rock or Northeast LA really doesn’t have an excuse for driving to school– there’s Metro, DASH, walking, bicycle, skateboard, etc. I hesitate to make this reference, as I risk making others think “we’re not Europe!”, but in the Netherlands I have heard of students cycling up to 15km (about 9 miles) to get to school daily in more harsh weather than we are used to. I guess the only excuse one can make is that it is too cheap, too easy, and too glorified to drive to school, you would be a fool not to do so if you have the ability.

“… the old commercial center, a still pleasant traditional Main Street collection of businesses– although it has been it has been eclipsed in the minds of most residents by the shopping centers on the outskirts.”

Eagle Rock still has many historic buildings along its main boulevards with fun, unique, pleasant places though funnily (or not) enough, our center is also eclipsed newer developments along our ‘outskits’. By the CVS/Mc Donalds/ Vons corner of Colorado Boulevard and Figueroa Street; the Starbucks/CVS development on corner of York Boulevard and Eagle Rock Boulevard; the Walgreens/Starbucks development on Eagle Rock and Colorado; and on the Eagle Rock Plaza on the Glendale/Eagle Rock border.

“they lived in the… old streetcar neighborhood… which has good bus connections and a large number of businesses within walking distance.”

Not the best picture, but that's the 780, eastbound, on Colorado and ER Boulevard

Eagle Rock is serviced by many buses (780, 180, 181, 84, 83, 81, ER/HLP Dash…) and of course Eagle Rock has many businesses within walking distance as it was once a city, and then a streetcar town, accommodating denser design while our town was being built.

“Most of the time it just feels so good to be outside. Some days I’ll find myself riding… and the sun is setting… and you just go ‘My God, we live in such a gorgeous part of the world”

Perhaps not 'beautiful', but scenery that can be appreciated when one steps out of the car and REALLY observes their surroundings

We may not have an ocean view outdoors, but anyone in Eagle Rock can always look to the mountains, the sky, the few remains of nature close to us; go to high points in Eagle Rock and gaze at the urban landscape fused with nature; watch the sun rise or set or watch clouds travel; almost any way you slice it, we live in a gorgeous part of the world, we just need to look with our own eyes. The only problem is, we don’t notice or appreciate our surroundings traveling at 20mph+ in a metal machine that protects users almost completely from nearly any elements of their surroundings. Bicycling, more so than driving, reminds us we are humans and that we live. We get to slow down, and be part of our surroundings rather than obliviously rushing from place to place by car, breathing recirculated air, setting our own temperature, unable to look anywhere than ahead of our bullet-like travel.

And so, I recommend Pedaling Revolution, and I recommend that if you haven’t walked around town lately, or bicycled to get somewhere, do so.

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Video: York Blvd Bike Lane

This video is a few days old, so some of you may have seen it already, but here it is on the blog just in case… My ride on part of the new York Boulevard bike lane with some commentary. The bike lane is greatly appreciated but I wish we would further improve them. A smooth, colored bike lane would do wonders to increase physical and subjective safety of cyclists on York.

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Difference Between LA and Copenhagen Bridges

“Not enough space for bicycles on existing streets,” this is a common argument against providing bicycle infrastructure on Los Angeles streets, as it is in most cities with low cycling rates. This argument is subjective and ‘enough space’ simply depends on where the city’s priorities are. Here in LA, a typical street may look like this:

Image via Google Maps

Or from the street level, like this

Street view of Fletcher Drive bridge. Image via Google Maps

These pictures of Fletcher Drive, a typical Los Angeles street in appearance and width, show that cars easily dominate the majority of the available space and pedestrians are left narrow sidewalks.

Of course, it doesn’t have to be like this, to have a street dominated by cars while there are minimal provisions for pedestrians and zero provisions for bicyclists. If anything, walking and cycling should be prioritized because these modes of travel are more accessible to people of all ages, of all incomes, of all abilities.

So where am I going with this?

I recently watched a video demonstrating how Copenhagen has achieved its high cycling rate of over 30% of trips by bicycle. One thing in particular caught my attention during the video, this bridge:

Dronning Louises Bridge

The Dronning Louises bridge in Copenhagen looks very similar to the Fletcher Drive bridge in Los Angeles and appears to be similar width. According to estimates off Google Maps it is revealed that the streets (not including sidewalks) in fact are quite close in width, Fletcher is about 51ft wide with conservative estimate and Dronning Louises is about 54ft. However, the big difference is that cars, bikes, and pedestrians have all been fairly distributed space in Copenhagen and cars dominate on Fletcher Drive, as they do all over Los Angeles. (If you look closely at the picture above you may also notice that on Dronning Louises bridge the car space was reduced from two to one travel lane in each direction by extending the width of the bike lanes.)

And what happens when space is more evenly distributed? More people choose to cycle or walk.

Some may remember bicyclists did temporarily reclaim space on the Fletcher Drive bridge without compromising the number of vehicle lanes, but this was short lived and the guerrilla bike lanes were removed. We could easily make conditions for bicyclists and pedestrians more pleasant in Los Angeles, it’s just a matter of allocating space more equitably.

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This is Eagle Rock When We…

…choose to make the car king, when we endorse driving by making 1-mile trips to the store behind a steering wheel.

There are no excuses for driving as much as we do, and those of us fortunate enough to live in Eagle Rock and Highland Park are blessed with very walkable, bikeable communities. Not to mention the almost perfect weather year-round and exceptional transit services for Northeast LA…

The power is really within us, the people of the community. Politicians and car lobbyists may push, but considering the majority of traffic in Eagle Rock is local, we can make our home a quiet, safer place with nicer air. All we need to do is change our habits. If you make more of your local travel without a private automobile, you are contributing to a more pleasant, livable Eagle Rock. What kind of Eagle Rock do you want?

One that looks like this

Credit to Waltarrrrr, originally from his blog http://www.highlandpark.wordpress.com

Or one that looks like this

When LA was graced with cicLAvia on 10-10-10

This may seem unattainable but all it takes is getting out of your car and supporting a less car-centric community.

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