Yesterday, the LA County Board of Supervisors adopted the county's first Bike Master Plan (pdf) since 1975 (we're guessing the old one had an entire section devoted to banana seats). Work on this latest iteration has been underway since 2008, according to Supe Zev Yaroslavsky's website, and it means a huge expansion for bike infrastructure in unincorporated parts of the county--the current system has 144 miles; the new plan adds 832 miles more. The plan will be implemented over the next 20 years. Here's what it outlines:
-- 273.8 miles of bike lanes
· These are one-way lanes that "are defined by pavement striping and signage used to allocate a portion of a roadway for exclusive bicycle travel." The plan also specifies that they run to the left of a parking lane if the street has one.
-- 71.8 miles of bike paths
· These are a "paved right-of-way for exclusive use by bicyclists, pedestrians, and other non-motorized modes of travel" and are physically separated from auto traffic. Most of the county bike paths will run along creek and river channels and the beach.
-- 463.6 miles of bike routes
· These have a marker, but no actual lane for bikers. Often represented by sharrows.
· A motion could allow engineers to bump these up to bike lanes "with a minimum of red tape in suitable locations."
-- 22.8 miles of bike boulevards
· These are "local roads or residential streets that have been enhanced with signage, traffic calming, and other treatments to prioritize bicycle travel. Bicycle boulevards are typically found on low-traffic / low- volume streets that can accommodate bicyclists and motorists in the same travel lanes, without specific bicycle lane delineation.
· A motion introduced yesterday mandates that these include traffic-slowing measures like speed bumps.
-- Another motion introduced yesterday asked for more bike parking at county facilities and for a report on the 10 areas with the highest obesity rates so that the county can focus on adding bikeways in those neighborhoods.
-- The same motion asked for the removal of the bike route along the Sepulveda Channel in Mar Vista; neighbors worried it would draw crime.
The plan in its entirety will cost $331 million. Alexis Lantz of the Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition puts that in perspective: "That's only a third of the 405 widening project."
· County gets a new bike plan at last [Zev Yaroslavsky]
· Here's LA County's First Bike Master Plan Since 1975 [Curbed LA]
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