Bicycle Infrastructure

[jw138]

By "infill station", you guys are referring to a Nice Ride infill station, right? Orange Line infill station seems like it might be out of scope for this particular meeting (though it would probably be good to bring it up and keep the pressure on). The nearest Nice Ride station is at 36th & Bryant so this would be a really good spot for another one. The closest one to the east is at 38th & Hiawatha. I'm guessing they'd put it on the west side of the bridge though because of the proximity of Nicollet. To the south, Lake Nokomis.

[MNdible]

Yeah -- if they're really only re-decking the bridge (that is, replacing only the concrete deck that sits atop the existing girders, pylons, and footings), they're not going to be able to do anything that would include a BRT stop, or even make it BRT ready. Compare the structure of this bridge to 46th Street, and you'll see that they're very different animals.

You'll also be limited in making it much wider than it is now -- you could probably cantilever the deck a bit further off of the girders, but only a bit. That shouldn't be too much of an issue because without freeway on-ramps, this bridge doesn't need to handle the heavy turning movements that 46th sees, and so is probably wide enough to accommodate bike lanes, wider sidewalks, etc. within its current width.

[grant1simons2]

Take the survey so they can improve the midtown greenway!

https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/midtowngreenway

[LakeCharles]

Does anyone know why the bike lanes on 42nd St end at Cedar? To the west there are fewer parked cars, and the road appears to be 2 ft wider, so it would be even easier to fit in lanes, but they stop. Why is that?

[VAStationDude]

Parking

[LakeCharles]

Parking

But absolutely no one parks there. There is always just one car parked between Bloomington and Chicago. Plus there would still be parking on one side of the street. Can you elaborate a little on that one word answer?

[VAStationDude]

My point exactly. Few parked cars and lower traffic volume west of cedar. Much (the majority?) of drivers use cedar and 46th rather than 42nd. I've never been uncomfortable riding on 42nd without bike lanes.

[LakeCharles]

My point exactly. Few parked cars and lower traffic volume west of cedar. Much (the majority?) of drivers use cedar and 46th rather than 42nd. I've never been uncomfortable riding on 42nd without bike lanes.

I agree. But did the city really say "We'll have lanes go up to Cedar and then stop because people can just ride in traffic easily from there"? What about between Cedar and Bloomington, where it is not as easy? This seems like a really shoddy way to build bike infrastructure.

[Uptown46]

Mostly the lanes end at Cedar because they were a county project and 42nd is only a county road east of Cedar. I think they finally put in sharrows between Cedar and 17th (3+ years after they indicated this would be done) but only to show the connection to the next nearest bike facility.

[mattaudio]

It has nothing to do with parking, and everything to do with the fact that 42nd St between Cedar and Minnehaha Aves is a Hennepin County roadway (CSAH 42) since CSAH 46 ends at Cedar (due to Lake Hiawatha). When Hennepin County did a mill and overlay about 3 years ago, Standish-Ericcson and others pushed to get facilities, which we see today. In fact, they've changed slightly every year to see what works best (especially the two painted fake-medians for crosswalks).

This year, Minneapolis painted sharrows 600 feet west to 17th Ave to connect to the Southern Bike Connection. We're hopeful that City of Minneapolis can do a full bike lane treatment when they overlay the street, which is currently in the CIP for 2018. There is indeed nearly zero parking demand on the stretch from 4th to Cedar.

Speaking of this area, I encourage anyone affected by this area to stop by our community open house for the county's 46th Street project coming up on October 21. There will be a community preferred option presented to get public feedback.

Also, I've been pushing for advisory bike lanes on Bloomington Ave south of 38th Street, and a few council members seem open to the idea. So if you want to have a slightly improved bicycle connection to businesses on this corridor, send in a good word for this option.

Edit: I guess Uptown46 and I were typing over each other.

[LakeCharles]

Mostly the lanes end at Cedar because they were a county project and 42nd is only a county road east of Cedar. I think they finally put in sharrows between Cedar and 17th (3+ years after they indicated this would be done) but only to show the connection to the next nearest bike facility.

That answers the question. Thank you!

[grant1simons2]

Noticed a lot of new "fancy green paint" while riding down 3rd St today! Marking where the bike lanes are crossing over at almost each intersection.

[EOst]

They've been putting them up around town. I've seen them recently at 1st and Franklin and 11th and Franklin too.

http://www.ci.minneapolis.mn.us/bicycle ... S1P-138896

[EOst]

The Mpls Bike Coalition sent out a rendering of the 3rd Ave protected bikeway design:



If anyone knows where the rest of this presentation(?) can be found, I would love to see it.

They also said this:

For more than a year, our number one bikeway priority has been a north-south protected bikeway in the heart of downtown. This is especially critical with Nicollet Mall being completely closed next year. And the City has responded! The City has proposed a redesign of 3rd Avenue S from the River to 16th Street near the Convention Center. It includes a protected bikeway--including the first planter protected bikeway in the City for several blocks--and greening improvements. Some of the pictures look really amazing.

As anyone who bikes downtown knows, it has been a challenging summer with all of the construction. With your support--we'll be asking for it over the coming weeks--this time next year, biking downtown could be completely different with a spine of protected bikeways on 3rd Avenue S and Washington Avenue.

We are reviewing the details of the 3rd Avenue Redesign proposal and will be sharing more detailed thoughts later this week along with several ways you can get involved.

[mattaudio]

(Not that I'm complaining, but)
Does anyone know why 3rd Avenue was two-wayified through Downtown long ago? It was once a northbound street, right? Converted when 2nd lost southbound capacity due to bus lanes? Or to simplify things to the north at the 3rd Avenue Bridge?

[MNdible]

As far back as my recollection goes, I don't remember Third ever not being a two-way street. I've always assumed that the connection to the bridge was the reason why.

[MNdible]

Given the pattern of the one-way streets, I can see why you would think that it used to be one-way northbound, but is it possible that it's just how things worked out when the two grids smash together -- i.e., that the fact that 1st Avenue was northbound meant that Marquette would be northbound, and therefore 2nd Avenue would be southbound?

[froggie]

To my knowledge, 3rd has always been 2-way.

[trigonalmayhem]

What the hell? Please tell me this will happen AFTER the buses move back to Nicollet? The current situation is too much of a hot mess to even imagine bike lanes right now. I love bikes but is anyone ever going to stand up for bus lanes around the city?

[acs]

I'm with trig on this one. I'd much rather see transit lanes on 3rd way before bike lanes. Doing so would allow buses to be taken off Nicollet mall which would significantly improve the pedestrian realm there and also provide a faster north/south transit route through the heart of downtown. look, protected bike lanes are nice, but they are no substitute for quality transit and pedestrian facilities.