If you’ve ridden down the protected bike lane on Kinzie Street recently you may have noticed that a significant number of the flexible posts have been removed. The removal comes almost one year after first being installed and follows suit with what other cities like New York have done.  

On some sections of the protected lane, the flexible posts are now just spaced further apart. In other sections, like in the photo shown here, posts remain only at intersections or crosswalks to help guide cars to their lane, but leaving some mid-block stretches of the lane with no posts.

Perhaps the most important thing to keep in mind from a safety perspective is that the lane of parked cars remains as a physical barrier separating people on bikes from moving traffic, and posts also remain where there are no parked cars.

While there have been some reports of cars parking in the bike lane, the Chicago Department of Transportation (CDOT) is monitoring the situation daily. If you see cars parked in a bike lane, you can report them to the police.

The fact that CDOT is comfortable enough to remove some posts is a sign that drivers, bikers and pedestrians alike have become accustomed to the protected bike lane. Also, fewer posts cuts costs and is less intrusive on the roadway.

Actice Trans has heard some concerns from the public and from aldermen that the posts add too much clutter to the street. Some people find them confusing and unsightly. If the same safety improvement can be achieved with fewer posts, then this can be a great example of less being more.

Protected bike lanes will still provide protection for people on bikes and will become a staple of roadway design in Chicago in the years to come. The fact that users of Kinzie Street have adapted as quickly as they have is a positive sign of things to come.

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Congress is in the final stages of negotiating a new transportation bill, and we need your help!

Contact your members of Congress today—take action here!

Congress has spent more than two years trying to agree on transportation policy and is approaching a critical decision point for the next federal transportation bill.

The Senate recently broke through party politics to pass a two-year bill, MAP-21, with bipartisan support. However, the House leadership refused to consider this bill. Currently the House and Senate are trying to negotiate their differences.

Nationally, biking and walking account for 12 percent of all trips and 14 percent of all traffic fatalities, but only 1.6 percent of federal spending. Transit use is growing nationally and in Chicagoland—both CTA and Metra have seen significant increases in ridership.

Statewide and nationally, people are shifting their travel habits and driving less—and especially with volatile gas prices, more people want good transportation options than ever before. Biking, walking and transit create more jobs per public dollar spent, and these modes are healthier and more environmentally-friendly than driving a car.

Several Illinois members of Congress are playing a key role in negotiations. Now is the time to send them a clear message that biking, walking and transit need to be a priority!

Take action here!

The Elston Avenue protected and buffered bike lane project -- which is being installed as I write this post -- will feature the first protected bike lane to go in this year (buffered bike lanes were installed last week on Roscoe and Campbell).  

Stretching from North Avenue to Milwaukee Avenue, the new lane is part of the Elston Avenue Safety Improvements project, which includes 1 mile of protected and buffered bike lanes.  

One thing is certain, a whole lot of people will be a whole lot safer on their commute given how much bike traffic Elston sees on a daily basis. Check out CDOT's monthly bike counts to see the number of cyclists passing the Milwaukee/Elston intersection.  

Stay tuned for more updates on protected bikeway projects, and if you want to show your support for these projects, consider signing on to Active Trans' Bikeways Campaign.     

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The Chicago Department of Transportation (CDOT) today released an ambitious two-year Action Agenda (PDF) and joined the growing Vision Zero movement, aiming to eliminate all traffic crash fatalities in Chicago within 10 years. We’re excited to see such a commitment in this document toward safety, active transportation and complete streets. It’s also refreshing to see a comprehensive, truly multi-modal approach, addressing all transportation options (including driving), rather than compartmentalizing biking, walking and transit.

Here are some highlights that caught our eye to help break it down for you (including some paraphrasing).

Safety

• Reduce total roadway crashes and injuries from all roadway crashes, each by 10% every year.
• Develop strategies, and action plan, and funding resources to being transformation of residential streets to a 20mph standard.
• Work with the Police Department to integrate greater enforcement of pedestrian and bicycle protection regulations into officers’ regular duties and activities.
• Provide non-motorized traveler safety trainings for taxi drivers and city fleet drivers.

Pedestrians and public space

• Install countdown pedestrian signals at 300 intersections in 2012 and, if funding is available, 100 more intersections in 2013.
• Install Leading Pedestrian Intervals (LPI) at 100 intersections in 2012 and, if funding is available, 100 more intersections in 2013.
• Open some boulevards or other major streets to pedestrians, bikes and non-motorized uses exclusively on selected weekend periods.
• Investigate the feasibility of new plazas and patios in underutilized portions of the public right of way and implement pilot site locations by 2013.

Bicycling

• Develop policies and standards for bicycle signals and leading bicycle intervals, deploy at least 10 pilot locations in conjunction with protected bike lanes, and collect data for evaluation.
• Renew 125 miles of existing on-street bikeways by 2014, updating configurations as necessary.
• Improve cycling conditions on Chicago streets in several ways: install 100 miles of protected bikeways and 10 miles of neighborhood greenways by 2015, and install 10 additional miles of bike lanes and marked shared lanes each year.
• Challenge business associations and other partners to install at least 10 additional on-street bike parking corrals by 2013 toward a target of 25 by 2014.

Transit

• Improve CTA on-time performance.
• Increase the average daily CTA ridership on a majority of routes.
• Support CTA’s ongoing efforts to advance long-range “New Start” rail network expansion plans, including southern extensions of the Red and Orange Lines.

Trails

• Begin concept design for rebuilding North Lake Shore Drive from Grand to Hollywood; explore potential Lakefront Trail improvements during Phase 1 engineering
• Begin the design of the Weber Spur Trail that will connect the Elston Bike Lane, the Sauganash Trail, and upcoming Forest Preserve and Village of Lincolnwood trails.
• Begin the design of the North Branch Riverwalk Trail connection under the Addison Street Bridge.

Other

• Remove obsolete (and costly-to-maintain) 60’s-era roadway overpasses at Western Avenue over Belmont and at Ashland Avenue over Pershing Road and replace each with attractive, modernized intersections that meet Complete Streets standards.
• Increase the percentage of potholes patched or fixed within 72 hours.
• Encourage the Illinois Department of Transportation (IDOT) to remove the arbitrary cap placed on Safe Routes to School funding; instead, apply the formula the federal government uses in providing the funding to states (i.e., by number of school-age children enrolled).
• Develop a “dashboard” to report progress against goals and actions from this report (and elsewhere) as Key performance Indicators (KPIs). Progress on the KPI goals will be published on CDOT’s website.