Figueroa For All!

(Screenshot from Figueroa For All’s website– the Cypress Park Neighborhood Council meeting for Tuesday has been cancelled.)

Readers of this blog are probably familiar with Take Back The Boulevard (TBTB) – Eagle Rock’s community initiative to revitalize Colorado Boulevard through transforming the street to create a more pedestrian friendly environment. However, readers may be unaware there is a similar grassroots movement afoot to do the same for North Figueroa Street– Figueroa For All (or fig4all as it is known on twitter).

Figueroa For All, as its recently launched website states, seeks to make North Figueroa a more livable street– this includes advocating for bike lanes on the street between Colorado Boulevard and San Fernando Road. Figueroa For All’s website will be the go-to place for anyone wishing to keep up with or support the initiative’s efforts.

Are you interested in helping Figueroa For All and bringing bike lanes to North Figueroa? Here are four things you can do:

1) Write an email addressed to bikes@asnc.us and cypressparknc12@gmail.com sharing your support for buffered bike lanes on North Figueroa Street. Your email can be brief, here’s a sample letter:

To Whom It May Concern,

My name is (insert your name), I live in (insert your zip code). I support the implementation of buffered bike lanes on North Figueroa Street as a measure to improve safety for all road users on the street. Figueroa is a dangerous street, especially for pedestrians, and buffered bike lanes will make it easier to cross the street safely.

Thank you for your time,

(Your Name)

(Your Address/Zip Code)

Feel free to cc Council Members Ed Reyes (councilmember.reyes@lacity.org) and Jose Huizar (councilmember.huizar@lacity.org) in your email.

2) Attend public meetings and speak in favor of bike lanes.

The Arroyo Seco Neighborhood Council will hold a meeting TONIGHT, May 20th. The meeting will start at 7 p.m. and the meeting location is Ramona Hall, 4580 N Figueroa St., Los Angeles, CA 90065.

(The Greater Cypress Park Neighborhood Council will hold a meeting as well in the near future but a specific meeting date and location has yet to be determined.)

If possible, bring someone with you to the meeting– every voice will have an impact.

3) Sign this online petition which will be delivered to the local neighborhood councils by the Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition

4) Pass on this information to anyone you know that may support bike lanes on North Figueroa Street.

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Addressing Concerns With Implementing Bike Lanes on Colorado Boulevard

(“Creating bike lanes by reducing the number of lanes available to motorists will hurt businesses,” one of the many arguments presented against bike lanes on Colorado Boulevard. See “Bike Lane Concern #4″ below to find out if bike lanes are really likely to hurt local business)

Bike lanes on Colorado Boulevard, as planned in the Los Angeles Bike Plan, are coming closer to being a reality– a meeting on March 27th hosted by council member Huizar’s office will be held to determine based on community input how to move forward, if at all, with bike lanes on Eagle Rock’s main street.

During on-going opportunities for community input throughout phases of the Bike Plan formation, the Bike Plan’s environmental impact review, and most recently at a public hearing regarding the results of the environmental impact review comments have been mostly positive. However, now concerns about the potential impact bike lanes may are popping up in growing numbers. There is nothing wrong with this, concerns are well warranted for any proposed changes in town and a change to Colorado Boulevard’s public right-of-way will affect daily travel for many.

To gain a clearer perspective of what the current circumstances are and what may possibly change as a result of bike lanes being implemented, it may be beneficial to have the recurring concerns and questions people have regarding bike lanes on Colorado Boulevard actually be addressed. That’s what this blog post will attempt to do– address concerns that have been raised in conversations about bike lanes in the community.

Bike Lane Concern #1: “Shouldn’t we spend money on (insert priority here) instead?

• With city services getting cut left and right many rightfully feel bike lanes should not be a priority for the city. Some say we should spend the money on something more important, like police officers, keeping libraries open, after school programs, paving streets, etc. Important as these services are, the money that would be spent installing bike lanes on Colorado Boulevard would come from a portion of the 2008, voter-approved, Measure R specifically intended for bicycle and pedestrian safety improvements. Also,  re-striping streets to create bike lanes is relatively cheap– even if the money could go elsewhere there are few services that it could substantially fund.

Bike Lane Concern #2: “Reducing the number of lanes available to motorists will cause a traffic nightmare!”

• It seems intuitive– removing the number of lanes available to motorists will cause traffic to back up, especially during peak-hours, so much so that drivers will move at a near crawl. According to the Los Angeles Department of Transportation’s (LADOT) own estimates, converting one lane in each direction to create bike lanes on Colorado Boulevard will only impact peak-hour travel (morning and evening rush hour)– adding no more than about 3 minutes to the time it takes to travel the three miles from Eagle Rock’s border with the City of Glendale to Eagle Rock’s border with the City of Pasadena. To put things in perspective, this is the equivalent of listening to one extra song on the radio during one’s commute, and this is under the LADOT’s “worst-case scenario” estimate. The reason for the minimal impact bike lanes are projected to have on Colorado Boulevard is likely because the street carries very little traffic relative to it’s engineered capacity. The street is engineered to carry between 30,000 to 50,000 trips per day yet for traffic counts conducted over the past 15 years seldom has the street carried above 35,000 trips per day. Colorado Boulevard’s relatively low levels of traffic become evident when there are unexpected lane closures during rush hour and traffic manages to move just fine.

Bike Lane Concern #3: “The street is just fine the way it is– no need for bike lanes.” and  ”If the street isn’t broken, don’t fix it.”

• This concern with bike lanes is entirely subjective, though because the street carries little traffic relative to it’s engineered capacity and because an average of a crash a week occur on Colorado Boulevard there is reason to believe that the street is not fine and that it is broken, statistically speaking. Year after year the leading causes of crashes along Colorado Boulevard are speeding, failure to yield right-of-way, and running red lights– all these things happen when a street is engineered poorly and encourages dangerous, illegal behavior. Following a horrific crash in 2008 caused by an illegal street race over 600 tickets were issued to people for speeding on Colorado Boulevard. The crash, but especially the 600 speeding tickets issued in the wake of the crash, demonstrate the street is surely broken if so many people are unable to adhere to the current 35mph speed limit.

Bike Lane Concern #4: “Bike lanes will be bad for local business”

• Nobody wants to hurt local businesses– they make Colorado Boulevard the attractive, interesting street that it is. Without local businesses, Colorado Boulevard would be indistinguishable from any other business corridor lined with big box retailers and chain restaurants. Why bike lanes would hurt local businesses any more than maintaining the status quo of daily unsafe speeding and weekly crashes is unclear, though the logic seems to go something like this: “Bike lanes will slow down traffic on Colorado Boulevard so much so that people will stop patronizing local businesses because it will take too long to make a quick visit to their favorite restaurant or boutique.” There could be merit to this argument though there is not hard evidence to suggest that reducing the number of lanes available to motorists will be bad for business. A case study of the business corridor along York Boulevard in Highland Park, just south of Colorado Boulevard, by UCLA student researcher Cullen McCormick demonstrated that reducing the number of lanes available to motorists to create bike lanes on York Boulevard did not hurt business. Meanwhile, a growing number of studies in other cities show bike lanes are actually proving to be beneficial to local businesses. Perhaps worst for local business is relying on people to drive to there in the face of escalating gas prices and limited amount of convenient parking. Why not make cycling a pleasant, viable option so people don’t have to spend money in gas and parking to patronize their favorite local business?

Bike Lane Concern #5: “Reducing the number of lanes available to motorists to create bike lanes will hurt emergency response times!” and “We need to maintain the number of lanes available to motorists so that we don’t delay emergence responders!”

• Naturally nobody wants to delay emergence responders and potentially risk losing lives because people can’t get medical attention quickly enough. It is very understandable and commendable to have safety be a prime consideration. However, perhaps this concern is a little overstated, let’s explore why.Firstly, the local Los Angeles Fire Department (LAFD) Station on York Boulevard has not raised concerns to the LADOT about being able to respond to emergencies. In Downtown LA, at the request of the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD), the LADOT will remove a bike lane on 1st street. If there were a significant impact on the ability for emergency responders to reach their destinations because of bike lanes on York Boulevard, the LADOT would remove the bike lanes immediately.
• Also, as noted by Tom Vanderbilt, author of Traffic: Why We Drive The Way We Do and What It Says About Us, generally speaking any time saved by emergency responders by not implementing a traffic calming measure is negligible. In fact, Vanderbilt notes the status quo is likely more dangerous– as he succinctly puts it “speeding cars have surely claimed more lives than speeding responders have saved.” If we turn to York Boulevard again, we see what bike lanes may mean for Colorado Boulevard. The number of crashes on York Boulevard went down following the implementation of a “road diet” that reduced the number of travel lanes available to motorists. Part of York Boulevard went on a “road diet” in 2006 and utilizing traffic collision data available through UC Berkeley’s Traffic Injury Mapping System one will note that from 2002 to 2005, there were 92 crashes on the section of York Boulevard that would eventually go on a “road diet.” From 2006 to 2009 that same stretch of York Boulevard saw only 61 crashes. Comparing pre- and post- “road diet” data on York Boulevard show additional safety benefits.  The number of misdemeanor and felony hit-and-runs are on a decline and as are the collective number of visible, severe, and fatal injuries. Collision data from York Boulevard suggests there is reason to believe that reducing the number of lanes available to motorists will make Colorado Boulevard safer and reduce the need for emergency responders to go to the scene of preventable crashes.

Bike Lane Concern #6: “Are there enough people cycling to warrant reducing the number of lanes available to motorists?” or, “do bicyclists really deserve bike lanes until they constitute a significant proportion of daily travel on Colorado Boulevard?”

• There are a number of ways to approach this though the LADOT’s simple response to this concern is that the bike lanes are intended to increase the number of people the choose to cycle for local trips. People sometimes respond to this by saying “Eagle Rock Boulevard has bike lanes but hardly anyone uses them.” This is true, and this is most likely because the bike lane does not provide sufficient subjective safety for the average person to feel comfortable cycling in it. Many people who oppose bike lanes say “I wouldn’t feel safe riding in a mere painted bike lane, drivers can still veer into it.” This is why the proposed bike lane design on Colorado Boulevard is a more substantial, a design called a “buffered bike lane,” that has has demonstrated to have vastly increased the number of journeys made by bicycle on Spring Street in Downtown LA. The Eagle Rock Boulevard bike lane is a good example of what a low quality, minimal bike facility produces– low levels of cycling.  Additionally, the LADOT has frequently stated at public meetings that the more complete a network of bicycle facilities there is, the more people will cycle. Part of the reason why few people use the bike lanes on Eagle Rock Boulevard is that in addition to providing low levels of subjective safety, the Eagle Rock Boulevard bike lanes only connect to the one other bike facility– the bike lanes on York Boulevard (which did not extend beyond Avenue 54 until recently).
• Though perhaps a better way to address this concern is to compare it with curb cuts on sidewalks. Relatively few people actually benefit from curb cuts, intended to allow people with disabilities to cross the street. More often on Colorado Boulevard one will see a person pushing a stroller than someone in a wheelchair utilizing a curb cut to cross the street.  This concern asking if there are enough bicyclists to warrant bike lanes is ultimately an ethical question, something which is entirely subjective– some say “yes” while others say “no.”  However, because we live in a democracy, and the bike lanes would be installed in public space, it seems that the percent of traffic bicycling constitutes should not be a prime consideration of whether or not to implement bike lanes. While few people currently cycle in Eagle Rock they are just as entitled to safe, pleasant travel as motorists and pedestrians are– aren’t they?

(An older man doing some utilitarian bicycling approaches Colorado Boulevard from Townsend Avenue)

Bike Lane Concern #7: “Removing lanes available to motorists to create bike lanes only benefits a small minority”

• Related to Bike Lane Concern #6, this concern is that reducing the number of lanes available to motorists to create bike lanes on Colorado Boulevard will only benefit a small margin of the local population and therefore is unfair or unacceptable. While this concern is again largely subjective, there is some reason to suggest that more than a “small minority” would benefit from bike lanes on Colorado Boulevard. First, the proposed buffered bike lanes are likely to improve safety for all people on Colorado Boulevard– whether they travel by car, foot, or bicycle. As has happened on York Boulevard, safety improvements benefit everyone – not just cyclists – who travels, lives, and patronizes businesses along the street . Fewer emergency responders are sent out to clean up crashes when safety improves. Fewer people get into crashes when a street becomes safer. People are less likely to be delayed by crashes if a street becomes safer. And so on… Also, because buffered bike lanes on Colorado Boulevard are likely to increase the number of people cycling to destinations along the street, people who continue to drive will benefit from reduced competition for scarce parking spaces. Because buffered bike lanes will likely reduce the number of people cycling on the sidewalk, pedestrians will benefit from a not having to negotiate limited sidewalk space with bicyclists. Because bike lanes on Colorado Boulevard will likely slow down motorized traffic to be in better compliance with speed limits, pedestrians will benefit from being able to cross the street easier. Because gas prices continue to rise year after year, anyone unable or unwilling to keep up with the price of gas will benefit from having bicycling become a more viable, safe, and pleasant option for local trips. The reality is that maintaing the status quo on Colorado Boulevard is worse than any perceived negative impacts implementing bike lanes will have. Nobody benefits from the dangerous speeding the current situation encourages. Nobody benefits from feeling compelled to drive a mile to the grocery store because bicycling is seen as unsafe and unpleasant. Nobody benefits from parents chauffeuring their children to school by car during rush hour. Perhaps a better question is– what are the benefits of maintaining the status quo?

Closing Remarks

Proposed bike lanes on Colorado Boulevard seem to be of high contention but there is little reason for this to be so. Let’s recall that the LADOT projects no more than an additional three minutes to travel time if traveling the three mile entirety of Colorado Boulevard during peak-hours. In other words, bike lanes will only have a minimal impact on a small number of trips being made during the rush hour and most of the time bike lanes will have have virtually no negative impact on travel times of motorists. Because there are a lot of potential impacts – both positive and negative – how about we still move forward with buffered bike lanes but do so provisionally for a year to evaluate the impacts of the bike lanes? What is being proposed on Colorado Boulevard is not radical– it’s a simple re-striping of the street, it can easily be reversed or adjusted (with funds from Measure R) if necessary. Long Beach recently installed a pair of physically separated bike lanes (which reduced the number of lanes available to motorists) on a year trial to study the impacts and the findings have been quite positive. See the video below to learn what kind of an impact separated bike lanes had in Long Beach, skeptics may be pleasantly surprised and perhaps be willing to give bike lanes on Colorado Boulevard a chance.

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Some Thoughts on Outdated Bikeway Designs

(This is a non-Eagle Rock specific post mostly consisting of thoughts on bicycle infrastructure design standards that dictate bikeway design in Los Angeles)

When bicycling on the streets of Los Angeles I am expected to ‘share the road’ with motorists. On quiet residential streets this is rarely an issue, cars seldom go above 20 miles per hour. But even on residential streets there is the occasional pressure to speed up or move aside when a motor vehicle approaches from behind. However, residential streets are pretty manageable and subjectively safe for myself, and the many people I see who simply enjoy to go for a ride around the block. Intersections are not an issue either as residential streets are usually narrow with little traffic.

However, the comfort utilitarian and recreational bicyclists feel on residential streets quickly disappears when traveling on major, commercial streets. One of the biggest hindrances to people choosing the bicycle for travel is how dangerous larger streets with greater amounts of traffic feel.

Now I am an everyday bicyclist and I have no problem negotiating with motor vehicle traffic, or making left turns like a motor vehicle. I expect motorists to needlessly discriminate me by shouting, honking, and telling me to get out of the way. But this is not the reality I want to experience. When traveling by bicycle I’d prefer to be separated from motor vehicles traveling over 20 miles per hour;I do not want to breathe in exhaust, feel cars zoom by, or put up with the noise pollution and increasingly distracted drivers. And I’m not the only one who feels this way. There are many more who cite their number one reason for not bicycling more often being how unsafe and unpleasant conditions are, being forced to mix with motorized traffic to go to the grocery store, a friend’s house, or local restaurant.

So what is being done to address the concerns of the many people who want to get on their bicycles but don’t? Well, here locally in Los Angeles the city has a Bicycle Master Plan which seeks to create a 1,600 mile network of bicycle facilities over the course of the next 30 years. The city hopes that in those 30 years bicycling will eventually make up 5% of the city’s traffic.

Almost half, 700 miles, of the 1,600 miles of bicycle facilities will be on the a backbone network– that is, this backbone of the bicycle network will be on the heavy traffic streets many are currently afraid of. So what will the facilities on these major streets look like? Currently bike facility designs are largely dictated by: The American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO); California Highway Design Manual (CHDM); and the California Manual of Unified Traffic Control Devices (CAMUTCD). What these design guides recommend will likely dictate what LA’s backbone network of bicycle facilities on major streets will look like.  What do these manuals have to offer?

Facilities offered in AASHTO and CAHDM are:

• Class I Bike Path: Completely separated right-of-way for exclusive use by bicycles and pedestrians
• Class II Bike Lane: Provides a striped line for one-way bicycle travel on a street or highway
• Class III Bike Route: Provides shared use with pedestrians or motor vehicle travel

It is well known that the majority of people will refuse to start bicycling unless safe, separate facilities are provided. Anecdotally, when I ask my non-bicycling friends, my grandfather, my sister and mother– they all answer that they would love to cycle more if they had separated bike paths to use. This can also be observed where people do cycle most– bike paths such as the LA River Bike Path. Admittedly the majority of users on LA’s bike paths are recreational riders, but a few points can perhaps explain why: Current bike paths are largely isolated and are difficult to integrate into any kind of travel other than recreational; current bike paths are often linear, uninterrupted paths, optimizing them for sporty recreational travel; the facilities feel safe enough to use for recreational purposes (unlike any parallel streets).

Naturally, it seems bike paths would be recommended for installation on major streets, right? Let’s see what the CAHDM say about providing bicycle facilities…

“Pavement markings alone will not measurably enhance bicycling.”

The CAHDM admits that mere painted bike lanes are not too effective in enhancing bicycling. While painted bike lanes not physically separated from motorized traffic have been shown to increase bicycling marginally and enhance the experience a little bit, they are unsatisfactory to the majority of people. The existing bike lanes throughout Los Angeles demonstrate this very well.

So perhaps we could provide bike paths adjacent to motorized traffic to enhance the bicycling experience and get more people riding? After all, bike paths are the most desired kinds of infrastructure among non bicyclists and they are the most utilized pieces of bike infrastructure that do exist despite their lack of accessibility to the majority of people. Well, not according to the CAHDM:

“Bike paths immediately adjacent to streets and highways are not recommended. They should not be considered a substitute for the street, because many bicyclists will find it less convenient to ride on these types of facilities as compared with the street, particularly for utility trips”

The reasoning for not providing bike paths adjacent to streets is in complete contradiction to the reality. Many potential bicyclists would find bike paths adjacent to streets more convenient (and safe, and pleasant) than mixing with motorized traffic, given that the facility is designed well. One of the greatest concerns people currently have with cycling is lack of subjective safety from being required to mix with motorized traffic. Adjacent bike paths would reduce moments required to mix with motorized traffic to intersections and driveways.

Alright, so maybe no bike paths adjacent to streets. Perhaps bike lanes can be placed between the curb and parked cars to make facilities that feel safe enough for everyone? I frequently hear this as a solution from people who would like to cycle more or at all but currently don’t. The CAHDM doesn’t think so:

“Bike lanes shall not be placed between the parking area and the curb. Such facilities increase the conflict between bicyclists and opening car doors and reduce visibility at intersections. Also, they prevent bicyclists from leaving the bike lane to turn left and cannot be effectively maintained.”

Again, the reasoning surprises me. Given the average number of people traveling in a car is less than 2, bicyclists are more likely to have conflict with car doors opening from the driver’s side, where bike lanes are currently placed. As for reducing visibility at intersections, parking is seldom allowed close to intersections for this very reason– visibility. Additionally motorists already have to look for pedestrians on their right-hand side. This should not make it difficult for motorists to look for bicyclists at intersections, if parking is not permitted and the potential pedestrians need to be taken into consideration already. Left-turns are certainly not an issue for pedestrians, why would a bike lane between the curb and parked cars be much different? A similar motion can be made by bicyclists. In fact this is the solution often offered  in the Netherlands and Denmark where bicycle facilities are placed between the curb and parked cars.

Example of left-turn for bicyclists in Copenhagen, Denmark. Credit: Between Yellow and Blue

Example of how cyclists make lefts in the Netherlands. Credit: Mark Wagenbuur

Cyclists are hardly ‘restricted’ when placed between the curb and parked cars if the facilities are engineered properly like in the Netherlands and Denmark, the countries with the highest levels of bike usage in the western world. Additionally, just as there are mid-block crossings for pedestrians, the same could be provided to bicyclists if placed between parked cars and the curb. This could arguably allow greater freedom of movement than when cyclists are forced to use the same lanes as motor vehicle traffic where mid-block U-turns are often not possible or allowed.

One wonders, how are intersections to be handled according to the CAHDM? Here is more, general discussion of intersections:

“Most auto/bicycle accidents occur at intersections. For this reason, bikeway design at intersections should be accomplished in a manner that will minimize confusion by motorists and bicyclists and will permit both to operate in accordance with the normal rules of the road.”

This sounds good in theory, but the reality is that there is ZERO evidence of intersections in Los Angeles and much of California where any thought has been made to minimize confusion by motorists and bicyclists. In fact, the CAHDM at current suggests two ways for bicyclists to make left turns at intersections, with or without bicycle infrastructure.

“A prevalent type of accident involves straight-through bicycle traffic and right-turning motorists. Left turning bicyclists also have problems as the bike lane is on the right side of the street and bicyclists have to cross the path of cars traveling in both directions. Some bicyclists are proficient enough to merge across one or more lanes of traffic to use the inside lane or left-turn lane. However, there are many who do not feel comfortable making this maneuver. They have the option of making a two-legged left turn by riding along a course similar to that followed by pedestrians.”

The CAHDM shares two ways for bicyclists to make left turns. Knowing there is inconsistency in how bicyclists make left turns seems it would INCREASE confusion. Credit: CAHDM

The above excerpt is interesting for a couple reasons, it admits that there is trouble with through cyclists and right turning motorists as well with cyclists turning left. The first problem, through cyclists conflicting with right turning motorists has already been addressed in the Netherlands and Denmark– both these countries have made efforts to mitigate this type of conflict. If safety is the highest priority, the issue could be dealt with by reducing speeds at intersections by requiring a sharper turn from motorists through design, as is seen in the Netherlands. It could also be dealt with  by having separate signal phases for through cyclists and right turning motorists altogether.

The second problem, that of the left turn, the Highway Design Manual admits that most people would rather not have to cross one, two, or some cases three lanes of motor vehicle traffic to make a left turn like a motorist. This is especially true where speeds are between 30mph and 50pm, as they are on Colorado Boulevard in Eagle Rock.

Yet despite knowing the majority of people would prefer to make a two-legged left similar to pedestrian design, seldom have intersections in California been designed to accommodate, encourage, or guide this style of movement. Interestingly, the diagram from the CAHDM showing the two-legged left displays a movement very similar to the diagram showing a left turn for cyclists in Copenhagen and it would only require paint on the ground to mimic this treatment.

Furthermore, by having two different ways for cyclists to navigate an intersection, a cyclist’s movement is more ambiguous and arguably increases the potential for conflict with motor vehicle traffic because there is no consistent way to expect a cyclist to navigate an intersection.

So what can we do when implementing bicycle facilities in LA?

Well, the Danish and the Dutch have addressed the concerns the CAHDM by experimenting with bicycle facility design for well over 30 years. Contrary to what the CAHDM implies are drawbacks of bicycle facilities that physically separate cyclists from motor vehicle traffic, bicyclists in Denmark and the Netherlands are the safest in the world… and they are frequently separated from motorized traffic on major streets, and they have no trouble making left turns.

It is time to raise the bar for bicycle infrastructure design in California. We know what will create more bicyclists, separated facilities. We know how the majority would be comfortable making left turns, it is written in our state Highway Design Manual. There are several places around the world (and increasingly here in the United States) to look for design solutions yet we do zero to accommodate, encourage, or pursue this.

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A More Pedestrian and Bike Friendly Yosemite Drive: Part 2

Note: In my part one post for how to make Yosemite safer I suggested some kind of barrier for private auto use yet still allowing buses and emergency vehicles to pass.  If that is wanting too much, I still think there is much which can be done to improve the safety of the many pedestrians that use this street. Simply lowering the speed limit is about the cheapest way LADOT can promote safety for all. Here in part two I would mainly like to address speeds along Yosemite Drive.

What comes to mind when you think of Yosemite Drive?

Eagle Rock High School? Yosemite Park? Bilo’s Liquor Store? The Teen Rock Center? Fraternal Order of Eagles Center? 181 bus route? Rockdale Elementary? Connects North Figueroa Street to Eagle Rock Boulevard? Adjacent to Eagle Rock Elementary? a predominately residential street?

I personally have memories of cross country and track practice, running along Yosemite before navigating other streets to get to ideal streets for running, like Hill Drive or La Loma. I also think of walking or biking to and from a friend’s house.

Do you think of the street as one suitable for a 35mph street limit?

The reality is rather unfortunate. Despite so many qualities which would make Yosemite an ideal neighborhood street – housing a park, a couple corner stores, a cafe, churches, two bus routes and a great connector to all of Eagle Rock’s major streets – one of the major factors detracting from this is a 35mph speed limit on this predominately residential street. Despite being a narrow street only accommodating one lane of travel east and west, cars are encouraged to go the same speed as they would on parallel street, Colorado Boulevard. Colorado Boulevard of course is Eagle Rock’s widest commercial street and holds not one, but three lanes of travel east and west in addition to planted medians and left-turning pockets.

Perhaps it is unfair to say 35mph is Yosemite’s speed limit, while it is mostly 35mph, there are two, albeit brief, 25mph zones by Rockdale Elementary and Eagle Rock High. And naturally, the only way one knows if they are in a school zone is signage.  However, those speed limits are only ‘enforced’ though when “children are present”. And if a car encounters a child outside of the school zone, yet heavily residential street? The car can continue zooming at 35mph.

But why isn’t all of Yosemite a ‘school zone’ with 25mph, or lower, speed limits? Children are abound all over this street everyday and surely more would have a greater degree of subjective safety if cars were slower, and feel more comfortable walking along Yosemite. As conditions are kids are still running to the corner store, waiting at one of the many bus stops along the street, going to Yosemite Park, Saturday school, Sunday church, PTSA meetings or other school-related gatherings at one of the nearby schools, participating in Students Run LA on weekends between 6:00-8:00AM and between 3:30-5:30PM on weekdays ( in recent years Eagle Rock High School has had one of the largest SRLA groups in all of LAUSD with 70+ students participating), going to a friend’s house, going to the Eagle’s Landing Cafe and the Teen Center… Children are not contained to the two school zones and safety should not be compromised outside of school zones, especially when the street is heavily used by kids.

In the 70′s, when the below photo of Yosemite Drive was taken, the street had a speed limit of 30mph. In addition to a lower speed limit you see three girls with bicycles, an almost unthinkable sight for Yosemite today.

 

Speed limit is displayed in the far left of the photo. Credits: LAPL Photo Collection

Google view of Yosemite today, the speed limit is posted in approximately same location, at 35mph

 

Though naturally, LADOT has a strange way of assessing speed limits. It seems it would be much more reasonable, considering Yosemite’s conditions (narrow street, heavily used by children, services a park,etc…) that the speed be set  so students, people living along the street, park visitors have a greater feeling of subjective, and physical safety.

If the speed limit cannot be lowered, perhaps the locations along Yosemite that have traffic lights could be converted to traffic circles? Considering children constantly cross the street throughout the week, a raised crosswalk might be in order…

The bottom line is, in my opinion, that 35mph with zero traffic calming devices on this very community, residential, and family oriented street is unacceptable and unsafe.

There is reason to be optimistic though, the most recent draft of the LA Bike Plan calls for Yosemite Drive to be converted to an “Enhanced Bike Route”. Current bike routes consist simply of a green sign on a pole that reads “Bike Route”. This practice does not increase physical or subjective safety, and is widely acknowledged as useless among cyclists, and LADOT staff alike. So, it is hoped that an ‘enhanced’ bike route may do more to increase safety, and encourage cycling. I will try to keep Eagle Rock updated on LA Bike Plan progression and specifically how The Plan relates to Eagle Rock.

Fun Fact: Did you know Colorado Boulevard is a designated Bike Route? It’s unbelievable but it is true, the corner of Colorado Boulevard and Eagle Rock Boulevard has one of the bike route signs.

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