The December 2009 edition of the Manual for Uniform Traffic Control Devices (MUTCD) has been released by the Federal Highway Administration. Say what? What is the MUTCD? It is the federal standard for signs and pavement markings, so you see the results of it every time you are out on a roadway. More importantly, it specifies how and when many traffic controls can take place, so has an influence much broader than just what you see.
A good introduction to the impacts on bicyclists and pedestrians is on Bike Portland at http://bikeportland.org/2009/12/16/new-fhwa-rules-will-give-engineers-more-tools-for-bike-traffic/.
It has been a hard week of bicycling commuting for me. The winter snow and ice have made my trips slow going, doubling the time it takes to make my simple two mile journey. Before the storms hit, my backup plan was to simply walk to work if the conditions got too bad. But after traveling the roads for a week, it became apparent that walking may be even tougher. Very few sidewalks had been cleared, offering pedestrians only the option of walking out in the street with the cars. Muscle Powered’s Dan Allison recently wrote a letter to the editor discussing just this issue.
Shovel those sidewalks!
Clear sidewalks for City’s School Children
by Dan Allison (originally published in the Nevada Appeal)
Our recent snowfall, the biggest since January 2005, has left our sidewalks deep in snow. Many people have cleared their sidewalks already, and those who did so Monday afternoon or Tuesday morning, and had direct sunlight on Tuesday, have clear and dry sidewalks.
Many students walk to school in the snow, some because they chose to, and others because their families have no other transportation options. An uncleared sidewalk is a great hazard to these students, whether they are walking on the snow or are forced into the street.
On behalf of all students in Carson City, I’d like to thank those homeowners, apartment managers and business owners who promptly clear their sidewalks after a storm. Whether on their way to school or the bus stop, these students will be safer because of your effort.
It may be that the city’s snow removal policy, which accepts that sidewalks will be blocked, has not changed, but in actual practice, the city’s snowplow drivers have been much more careful about not throwing snow onto sidewalks this time around.
Drivers, please keep in mind that children and adults will be forced into walking on the edges of the streets until sidewalks are cleared or melt off. Please slow down and give them a wide berth — they are our most vulnerable users and are doing the best they can getting where they need to go.
Dan Allison
Safe Routes to School Coordinator
NDOT diagram - Lupin Dr and Hwy 395
Three Muscle Powered members, Anne Maquarie, Tim Rowe, and Dan Allison, attended the NDOT public meeting last night at Fuji Park on adding a northbound lane to Hwy 395 from Jacks Valley Rd to Old Clear Creek Rd. There were few other members of the public there, and only one of them spoke.
When Tim asked what consideration had been made for bicyclists during the construction period when there would be a concrete barrier on the right side of the highway rather than a shoulder, he got blank looks and a long pause from the NDOT engineers and Manhard consultants. They clearly had never thought about it.
Anne asked about how bicycles were going to be accommodated in this project. The best answer they could give was that bicycles would be taken care of in future projects, including the Hwy 395 – Hwy 50 interchange. The interchange is at least five years away, if not longer, whereas this project would be finished within a year.
Muscle Powered Board and friends
Join your Muscle Powered and Bike Carson friends for two back-to-back events at the Doppelgangers on Wednesday, December 16.
The Muscle Powered Board of Directors will meet from 6:30 to 7:30, reviewing and celebrating our accomplishments for the year, which are many and incredible given that we weren’t going to do much this year. We’ll also talk a bit about the coming year and our board, in preparation for the January annual meeting. The board meeting is open to any member of Muscle Powered, not just board members, so if you’ve been wanting to find out more about what we do and who does it, come find out.
Following, there will be a Bike Carson & Muscle Powered end-of-year celebration with pizza and beer. Hang out with your friends and make new ones! I’m sure there will be stories of road biking and mountain biking and walking and hiking, and much gloating and dreaming over the coolest bikes.
Doppelgangers is at 302 N Carson St, in downtown. We aren’t going to make formal reservations for the pizza time, but if you let us know you are coming, we can clue in the staff and help them serve us better.
There are three meetings this week (that I know about) that might be of interest to Muscle Powered members and supporters.
Wednesday, December 9 is the regular monthly meeting of the Carson Area Municipal Planning Agency (CAMPO) and Regional Transportation Commission (RTC). The closure of Old Clear Creek Rd will again be on the agenda with informational item G-3. The following meeting, on Wednesday, January 13, will have considerable impact on bicycle and pedestrian issues. Please put that January date on your calendar, and we’ll tell you more about the agenda items about a week before the meeting.
Wednesday is also a NDOT information meeting on adding a lane to Hwy 395 northbound between Jacks Valley Rd and Old Clear Creek Rd. There are two bike implications here:
- By widening, the highway is made even less bike friendly. I think we should ask for an informal bike path (not a multi-use path meeting federal standards) to be constructed on Vista Grande between Jacks Valley Rd and the current end of pavement behind the shopping center, a bit south of Topsy Ln. This would provide an alternate route for people going north-south, and also access to the two shopping centers without using the highway. This Vista Grande Route is shown on the bike map as a “planned principal route”, and is in the Unified Pathways Master Plan as well.
- As part of the project, the Lupin Dr – Hwy 395 intersection would be redone. This is the one opposite Old Clear Creek Rd, where the frontage road and Clear Creek Rd come out to the highway. This was previously designed, but I don’t know what it looks like. This intersection is currently the end of the Route 395 bike route, but it need not be since it could cross here to Old Clear Creek Rd, and then on Vista Grande, and then to the path mentioned above. Since NDOT designed this, I’d be willing to bet that they forgot to accommodate bicycles, so now is probably our last chance to get it changed.
There is a meeting announcement at http://www.nevadadot.com/pub_involvement/meetings/displaydocument.asp?MeetingDocument=395TN.htm&ID=496. Of course it doesn’t provide any diagrams or specifications. The meeting will be at Fuji Park/Fairgrounds Exhibit Hall, 4:00 to 7:00, with a formal presentation at 5:30 and information and discussion the rest of the time. This is an informational meeting, not a hearing, so there probably will not be a chance to talk to the whole group at once, but you can certainly make your views known to the NDOT people and others.
The Carson City Board of Supervisors will be having a special meeting on Thursday, December 10, to hear about the “Nevada’s Working Capital” program for redeveloping the area around the Carson Nugget. Tammy Westergard of Carson City Office of Business Development, and Sara Jones of the Carson City Library, have invited everyone to this meeting. The best way to find out more is to go the website at http://www.nevadasworkingcapital.com/. The meeting will start at 6:00PM in the Sierra Room of the Community Center.
Stewart St at the curve, with divided road
The Stewart Street Extension opened in early November (Nevada Appeal article), connecting William Street (Highway 50 East) with Roop St. This project is part of an effort to provide options for getting north-south in Carson City so that Carson Street can be narrowed. The new street segment is divided in some areas (as at right), with right turn only controls going onto or off the street, and part of it is a 3-lane configuration, with two travel lanes and a turn lane (as below).
The new street does not include bicycle lanes. The lanes are wide enough for sharing the lane, which according to the AASHTO Guide for the Development of Bicycle Facilities (“the bike guide”) is 14 feet or more. It does not have share the lane signs.
Stewart St, 3-lane configuation
I’ve ridden on the street a number of times since opening, and I like it. It is much preferable to Roop because it has less traffic and better lane width. The problem of course is that Stewart Street to the south is narrow without lanes or wide lanes, and Roop Street to the north is the same, so it is an isolated segment of bike route.
What do you think? Do you like it or not? Do you feel more or less safe than on a road with striped bicycle lanes? Does it need share the lane signs? [W11-1 and W16-1p] or [R4-11] are the two options.
The classic problem with bicycle lanes is that they accumulate debris as all the vehicle debris (cars parts and items that blow out or drop out, intentionally or unintentionally) and natural debris gets swept into the bike lane by passing cars. Though bike lanes do get street sweeping treatment, it happens less often than any of us would like. Do shared lanes like Stewart St have this problem any less or more than streets with striped bicycle lanes?
As a vehicular cyclist, I (Dan Allison) prefer shared lanes to bicycle lanes. When using a bicycle lane, I have to come out to, or to the left of, the bike lane stripe at every intersection in order to prevent drivers from turning right in front of me or into me. This is the famous “right hook” that accounts for half of all driver-caused crashes. When there is a shared lane, I naturally just move into the center of the lane at every intersection. However, there is a lot of disagreement about this in both Carson City and nationally, with a lot of people preferring painted bicycle lanes. Of course budgets influence what is built, since having a five or six foot bicycle lane often requires a bit more right-of-way for the roadway.
The input of Muscle Powered to Carson City Public Works will influence whether we see more of or less of these shared lane situations in the future, and that is why I’m asking for you opinion. Speak up!
An inspirational video and story of youth getting on bikes and getting involved in bike advocacy.
Walk Score result and map
While exploring information about the walkability of neighborhoods, I came across the Walk Score website (also available as an iPhone application). Walk Score uses an algorithm based on the distance from your house to various amenities. The primary source of amenities that Walk Score uses is entries in Yelp, an online review service whose mission is “to connect people with great local businesses.” Entering my own address, I was shown a score of 85 – very walkable. A map shows symbols for the amenities, including ones that are obvious such as schools, grocery stores, restaurants, and other businesses (as well as some more questionable things such as Burger King and McDonalds).
Here’s a good look at what happens when you reclaim the urban environment from heavy motorized use!
Veronica Moss Visits Times Square
by Clarence Eckerson on Streetfilms.orgShe’s back! The woman you love to hate (and hate not to love) Veronica Moss, a Washington, D.C. lobbyist for – ahem! – the Automobile User Trade Organization (A.U.T.O.) In this “chapter”, she’s getting her first gander ever at the new pedestrian-friendly Times Square and she invited Streetfilms along to record her virgin journey.
Continue reading and watch the video over on Streetfilms.org
Dangerous by Design
As promised, the new Dangerous by Design report has been released by Transportation for America and Surface Transportation Policy Partnership. The full report is at http://t4america.org/resources/dangerousbydesign/, and the Nevada section is available at http://t4america.org/docs/dangerousbydesign/nevada.pdf.
Carson City looks quite good in the report because it did not have any traffic fatalities in 2007-2008, the period covered by the report. However, we have had two pedestrian fatalities in 2009, Eric Pryor and Denise Lohman, which is quite significant for our population size (54,867). There were also one or more fatalities in earlier years. If there are no more pedestrian fatalities in 2009, the rate would be 3.65 per 100,000 people, among the highest in the country. The resulting Pedestrian Danger Index for Carson would be 135, also one of the highest in the country. Of course for a town the size of Carson City, where one pedestrian death more or less can make a big difference, statistics will vary widely from year to year, and a rate of 3.65 may be no more typical than a rate of 0.
Las Vegas just missed the national top ten “worst” list, coming in at eleven. Nevada as a whole is above the national average, heavily influenced by both the population and the rate of fatalities in Las Vegas.
