Biking in B'game: How many lanes are enough?

I'm a biker.  Sorry, I mean I'm a bicyclist.  I love my route past the country club, up Cortez or Cabrillo, through Ray Park, around the hospital, across ECR at Ray, down California on the bike lane, cross at Broadway and over the Rosalie O'Mahony foot/bike bridge (never saw Rosalie on a bike), through Bayside Park, south along Sanchez Lagoon, through Meta/Facebook and Coyote Point to the harbor and back along Bayswater.  That means less than 5% of my ride is on an official bike lane and I'm fine with that.  I choose Bayswater over Peninsula Ave. for obvious reasons, and I'm fine with that too.

The DJ had an article about the impending bike lane extension and loss of a car lane south of B'way 

The California Drive Bicycle Facility Project — once complete this October — will create a continuous bike lane through the city from Murchison Drive to Peninsula Avenue. The current phase will build bicycle lanes on a 0.8-mile portion of California Drive between Broadway and Oak Grove Avenue, continuing the current bike route that links Murchison Drive to Broadway.  However, five of the businesses and property owners on California Drive between Carmelita Avenue and Broadway have said they never received any notification about the project.

One of those businesses is Kerwin Galleries, which specializes in art sales. Gallery employee Mary Matsunaga said they didn’t know about the project. Had the city given the surrounding businesses proper notification, Matsunaga said they would have spoken up earlier.   “Those metered spaces are precious to us. California Drive is a busy street and by eliminating that it could severely impact our business,” Matsunaga said.

Another concerned business owner, Robert Vernazza, has owned Lou’s Auto Repair for 30 years and said California Drive is very rarely used by cyclists, but the parking spaces are always being used.

The reaction around town has been pretty negative.  I don't know Ms. Hallen, but her letter to the DJ rings of authentic understanding of the local flow

I can’t understand why the Burlingame City Council wants to put bike lanes on California Drive from Broadway south to Burlingame Avenue.

On Carolan Avenue maybe 50 yards to the east of California Drive on the other side of the railroad tracks there are excellent bike lands with very little traffic going from Broadway to Oak Grove during most of the day. And further south going from Oak Grove to Burlingame Avenue is a stretch in front of the Burlingame High School where there is hardly any traffic except when school is about to start or just getting out.

If bike lanes were put on California Avenue, I doubt that any bicyclist would want to use them since they would be biking alongside one lane of very heavy traffic where there were once two lanes of medium traffic. It would be a lot more helpful if bike lane signs were put on California Avenue at Broadway, Oak Grove Avenue and Burlingame Avenue saying that excellent bike lanes were just to the east on the other side of the train tracks.

Lois Hallen

Burlingame

I can't improve on that statement of the situation except to add that BART ridership is sinking like a rock and bicyclist access ain't gonna change that.  And the idea that all of this is temporary until we find another quarter of a billion dollars to do the Broadway grade separation--and actually do it--seems unlikely.

Comments

[Gerald Weisl]

Don't forget that El Camino will be severely impacted as our City government has given Caltrans the thumbs up to nearly clear-cutting the eucalyptus trees. That could take a few years. I wonder, then, if it's a good idea to have fewer lanes on California Drive to accommodate increased vehicular traffic??
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I'm mindful of bicyclists on city streets and they are a truly minuscule percentage of the traffic on California Drive. If the number of bicyclists increases by a thousand percent, that number would still qualify as a "minuscule percentage."
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Motor vehicle drivers are required to pay for licensing their cars, in addition to paying hefty fuel taxes.
What costs are born by bicyclists to pay for riding on the roads?
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[Sam]

This other letter to the Journal gets to the meat of it. We are dealing with an ableist vocal minority. Period.

The many initiatives to accommodate bicyclists over the interests of automobiles are misguided. Although bicycles have less environmental impact than automobiles, our society will never transition to bicycles being the dominant mode of transportation.

One cannot carry groceries, large objects or heavy objects on a bicycle. Many people are physically unable to ride a bicycle, or the distances people must travel are too far. How many bikes do you see parked outside a doctor’s office or a home improvement store or a shopping mall? Bicycles are great for college campuses and other places where young people are concentrated but are impractical in a larger suburban and city environment for anything other than recreation.

Removing large numbers of parking spaces so a few people can pass by on a bike a few times a day is ridiculous in terms of the inconvenience it causes to many for the benefit of just a few. Narrowing driving areas of roads to create bike lanes only increases the danger for those driving cars in the diminished space available.

Bicyclists are a vocal minority, but still a minority. Please stop granting concessions to this group that does not represent anywhere near the majority of people. Hybrid and electrical cars will continue to reduce the environmental impacts of automobile travel and we should put our resources into ensuring this happens.

Michael Grubb

San Mateo

[Peter Garrison]

The above comments show such common sense.
Save lives and money.

[Lemming R US]

The main fire station is on California. I would think the Fire Department might have a say in this crazy idea.

[Broadway]

People don't ride bikes in Burlingame because they don't feel safe. I know of a bunch of fellow parents who won't let their 11-13 year old kids ride to BIS because it's too dangerous. It's too dangerous because of parents who drive like menaces to BIS. Side note: those kids will have not a moment's independence until they themselves start driving, having had no firsthand prior experience as a road user in anything other than a car.

There were, according to the BPD, 32 traffic collisions involving cars on the streets of Burlingame in the month of March -- more than one per day. There were 11 documented injuries from these collisions. 4 were 'hit and runs'. 1 was a DUI. We should be trying to slow our streets down. A protected bike lane would protect our high schoolers going to BHS on bikes. It will make it safer for all of us to cross the street. The city should have reached out to the businesses about that block because there could have been alternative designs that don't take away parking. But that doesn't mean that putting bike lanes in is irresponsible.

[Mom]

What a pile of random BS. You don't know what people feel. And what does BIS have to do with our main commercial street, huh?

Why don't you get out on YOUR BIKE with your kid and teach them to watch traffic and stop at stop signs?

There were 32 accidents last month. So what? There's probably 32 accidents every month. Just like all the other crimes. You want to put the accident rate on steriods at Broadway? Shove more cars into few lanes. Job accomplished.

[Broadway]

@mom, that's a great suggestion. I do get out on my bike with my kids and teach them to watch traffic and stop at stop signs. Seriously, I want them to be able to move independently in the world and be responsible. And they can't drive yet. So they use the streets on their bikes and on foot to get themselves around. The collisions are pertinent to this discussion because they cost a great deal -- in our quality of life, our public resources (for example, the time spent by our BPD and public works department trying to keep the streets safe) and our health and safety. Two people were killed this fall crossing California Drive at Oak Grove. These costs aren't generally discussed because we all drive and nobody likes the idea of a solution that would restrict something they do. But the costs of car-focused streets are there, and they are appropriate to raise on this thread.

[Peter Garrison]

Safety tips for pedestrians:

Daylight savings puts the low sun in drivers’ eyes four times a year during commute hours. Be careful at sunrise and sunset.

Don’t wear black and notice when you’re in shadows.

Remember drivers don’t always clear their vision around the car’s cabin supports, rear view and side mirrors. This is especially dangerous at intersection turns.

Drivers: Check all your cabin blind spots. My rear view mirror will completely block my view of a car to my right at an intersection.

As a commercial pilot I learned to “Keep your head on a gimbal.”
I also learned that the one bug spot on your windscreen could hide an oncoming aircraft.

[Handle Bard]

This has gotten way off track from the real issue. There is a bike route that parallels California on Carolyn. Duh!

Why harm some small Burlingame businesses that have been providing services to Burlingame for years (the glass shop, Kerwin gallery) for a bike lane that is redundant to the one on Carolyn? I use it sometimes, it works and it is both north and southbound so no dodging another biker. WTF?

[hollyroller@ gmail.com]

It would be GREAT if I had a job where I could roll out of bed, eat breakfast, put on some horrible Spandex, shoes that really hurt, warm up, ride my bike to work, take a shower, get the "Business Suit" on from my Locker, tell my other DB Bikers how dangerous the ride to work was, and settle into an Ergonomic Massage Chair.
Like Motorcycles, riding any two wheel "transportation" in a Heavy Trafficked City is dangerous. So take responsibility for your decisions to ride a Bike in an area that you know is dangerous. Roads were made for Cars. Not Bikes. If you are frightened by the other 99.5 of people that do not ride a Bike to work. Check yourself. You might not be as much as a "Wildman" as you think

[resident]

I'm reeling. hollyroller is making sense. Just reeling.

[John Kevranian]

I have heard that once the parking spots are removed on California Drive between Broadway and Carmelita, vehicles going northbound will no longer be allowed to make a left turn to the driveways of the businesses or left turn going out. Imagine hundreds of cars everyday making a left on Carmelita and impacting residential neighborhoods such as Carmelita, Laguna, Paloma and El Camino. Anyone wanting to do business with the businesses on California Drive will have to drive through Broadway and impact traffic and also impacts Broadway businesses. I guess Broadway does not have enough car traffic. Has the city contacted the entire neighborhood of this impact?

[hollyroller@ gmail.com]

Thanks resident. I also do Tarot Readings.

[Joanne]

Why would they need a bike lane on California if there already is one on Carolan and it is a street with less traffic?

Meanwhile in San Mateo they eliminated over 200 parking spaces on Humboldt between Peninsula and Third Ave.

Back in the 80's I would never let my kids ride a bike to school because I felt it wasn't safe. Today it's even worse.

Let's be honest we don't live in Copenhagen!

[Laura]

I know two business owners that were NEVER told that this would be done and it is going to have a negative impact on their business. In fact, I was the one that sent them the article as they and other business's on California Ave., had not been notified. I find it hard to believe, that where in Burlingame, you need to have public hearings to remove a tree, that they can take lanes away from a major street and remove parking, without even consulting the property owners on that street. It's a bit astounding actually.