urbanMSP

http://www.startribune.com/local/minnea ... 02101.html
Washington Avenue project paves the way for future roads

Hopefully Washington north of Hennepin be restriped with bike lanes in 2015 that the new cycletrack is somewhat useful for somebody.

I guess the article didn't mention it. They plan on re striping to Plymouth. Wash Ave will go down to one lane each side, bike lane, center turn lane.

They presented the plan at North Loop comm assoc meeting.

Hopefully the interim bike lane striping extends across the 35W bridge. They're not nearly as useful if they dump bikers back into the vehicle lanes while it's still a car sewer.

Thanks. Sorry, the internet has trained me to not read the last few paragraphs of any article.

Interesting that they're doing a 4-to-3 on Washington in the North Loop, since it's at the upper limits of what even progressive jurisdictions consider acceptable traffic levels for that treatment (about 20k per day). I thought Hennepin County had refused 4-to-3s on streets over 16k or 17k.

I thought I remembered there being bike lanes on the 35w overpass and continuing about halfway down the block towards Cedar.

Hope so. IMO(o), once you get east of the northbound ramps, the traffic is down enough to make bike lanes not such a necessity. And, of course, many bikers would be turning left onto Washington or 15th or 2nd or whatever that chunk of street in front of Republic is called, and wouldn't be in the bike lane anyway.

Journal (includes Streetmix): http://www.journalmpls.com/news-feed/bi ... north-loop
Hennepin County page: http://www.hennepin.us/residents/transp ... restriping
PDF of proposed layout: http://www.hennepin.us/~/media/hennepin ... oposed.pdf

The traffic numbers I've seen still show 19,000 cars/day through the North Loop west of the trench, and 21,000 east of the trench. That doesn't jive with my anecdotal experience, which has traffic dropping off significantly west of the trench.

It seems like the plan they're showing in the PDF is prety good fit for the realities I see on the ground.

The city is going to have to come up with some significant new funds to maintain all of these protected bike lanes they want to build. It's going to be much more involved and expensive than the old bike lanes they're replacing.

Anyone know how to make a striping plan such as that? PM me. There may be money in it for you.

The city is going to have to come up with some significant new funds to maintain all of these protected bike lanes they want to build. It's going to be much more involved and expensive than the old bike lanes they're replacing.

How much more expensive is it to maintain a protected bike lane compared to a non-protected lane?

Unfortunate news: https://twitter.com/mplsbike/status/583661201743294464

The reconstruction has been pushed out another year.

I was starting to suspect as much when it was left off all of the recent press releases touting Hennepin County's 2015 construction projects.

Restriping from Hennepin to Plymouth in North Loop, including bike lanes (and major road diet from 5th Ave N to Plymouth) is apparently still on though. I suspect this will happen in late summer or early fall, since they have only just begun public hearings and whatnot.

With the reconstruction postponed, perhaps the designers can reconsider one point:

It seems as though the corner radii have mostly been enlarged. Is this correct? If so, it's not a good idea.

The National Association of City Transport Officials (NACTO) wisely points out that larger urban curb radii create dangerous intersections with unsafe turning speeds (See: http://nacto.org/publication/urban-stre ... ner-radii/).

Yet, unless I'm blind, they've been enlarged. Look at the corner of 3rd & Washington for instance (See: http://www.hennepin.us/~/media/hennepin ... ouncil.pdf). They're huge! Seems like a major step back.

And while they're at it, perhaps they can shorten the block-long "right turn" lanes, include bus-bulbs, and give a wee bit more thought to the protected bike lane intersection crossings...

^this. I'm very concerned about this redo... We need to tighten up corners, not do the opposite.

I'm also concerned about the bus pull-outs. This is still going to have multiple lanes in each direction: We should be building bus bulbs, not bus caves. https://streets.mn/2015/05/18/the-import ... bus-stops/

I think that's partially driven by the way the protected bike lanes are handled at the corners, right? The actual raised curb radius for the pedestrian crosswalks are pretty tight.

I think that's partially driven by the way the protected bike lanes are handled at the corners, right? The actual raised curb radius for the pedestrian crosswalks are pretty tight.

I don't think so. The bike lanes are also going to be raised (level with the sidewalk), aren't they?

My read is that they are raised until they get to the intersections, and then they must drop down to street level (based on where the ADA pedestrian ramps are located). In the PDF, I think the dark black lines represent a full raised curb.

If the black lines are the raised curb, then there are still quite a few that arc very broadly.

Regardless, it seems like the designation of the space for cyclists will likely be ignored by motorists under this scenario. A good video posted in the comments of a streets.mn article highlights the point (final comment: https://streets.mn/2013/05/29/all-the-be ... eet-level/). It begins: "The most important feature of this design is this protective traffic island." Without a clear physical demarcation of space, it seems highly likely that the broader radius (in grey) will become the default traffic turning radius. Here is the video explaining the theory: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FlApbxL ... e=youtu.be

It is unclear how Hennepin County intends to for the cycle track to meet the intersection, cross it, and relate to the pedestrian realm. As the above video very simply illustrates, an effective design for this exact situation already exists. There is no need for Hennepin County to reinvent the wheel here.