Bicycle Safety

Last Tuesday, the San Jose City Council voted unanimously (9-0) directing the city’s transportation department to draft an ordinance prohibiting bicycling on sidewalks along five streets in the city’s downtown: 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and San Fernando. The ordinance would except children aged 12 and under, adults transporting children of those ages, and police officers.

Mayoral candidate Sam Liccardo and District 3 City Council candidates Don Gagliardi and Raul Peralez all sought to demonstrate their support for improving cycling conditions in the state's third-largest city at both September's San Jose Bike Party and the inaugural San Jose Bike Life Festival.

How bikeable can Mountain View become? Last Monday, the city welcomed Alta Planning + Design President Mia Birk to help kick off an update to its 2008 Bicycle Transportation Plan. Birk had plenty to share about how Portland transformed itself into one of the best cities for biking in North America.

San Jose Department of Transportation (SJDOT) officials announced at a community meeting Wednesday evening that a downtown sidewalk cycling ban is again under consideration, explaining that the “Walk Your Bike” signs and banners installed in December 2013 had largely failed to convince bicyclists to ride in the streets rather than on sidewalks.

Last Monday, San Mateo's City Council reviewed a draft report ahead of the last step in the permitting process for the city's ambitious Hillsdale Pedestrian/Bicyclist Bridge over Highway 101. The bridge has been needed ever since the interchange was rebuilt and expanded in 2002, which made crossing the highway more hazardous for people walking and bicycling. The following evening, city staff hosted a community meeting to gather residents' preferred design alternatives for accessing the bridge from the surrounding neighborhoods.

About 150 residents attended a community meeting last Wednesday hosted by the San Jose Department of Transportation in the Willow Glen neighborhood to introduce plans for new bike lanes and sharrows on six streets west of downtown. The projects would complement four less extensive bikeway projects on streets east of downtown which were presented on August 6.

About two dozen residents attended a San Jose Department of Transportation (SJDOT) community meeting last Wednesday, where staff gathered public input on four upcoming bike lane and sharrow projects planned for east San Jose streets. Five other projects, which will add bike lanes and sharrows to streets west of downtown -- and, to the chagrin of some, replace some parking along Park and Lincoln avenues with continuous bike lanes -- will be presented at a community meeting this Wednesday at Gardner Community Center, 520 West Virginia Street, at 6 pm.

On August 6 and 13, San Jose Department of Transportation officials will present plans to improve traffic safety on ten streets that its Bike Plan 2020 identifies as key links in the city's proposed 500-mile bikeway network. The improvements include new striping for both conventional and buffered bike lanes, bike detection for traffic signals, sharrows, sidewalks and curb ramps, and the removal of some turn lanes and curbside auto parking.

Santa Clara County is still operating under plans that assume it can build its way out of traffic congestion by adding more lanes of traffic, plus new overpasses and underpasses, to the county's 62 miles of expressways -- dangerous arterial roadways that were "upgraded" decades ago with freeway-like ramps and overpasses. This is in stark contrast to the 21st-century approach taken by other cities and transit agencies in the region, which are planning for reduced traffic volumes by centering future urban growth around transit corridors and high-quality networks for walking and bicycling.