Pedestrian Safety

Yesterday, I took a ride on a Jump electric bike on Market Street. Ryan Rzepecki, the CEO of Jump, was riding alongside. When we stopped, we talked about how nerve racking it is to ride on Market. We also discussed how comfortable it is to ride in Berlin, where, in many places, rather than stripe a bike lane on the street (American-style, in the gutter, as on Market Street) they stripe it on the outer edge of the sidewalk.

This video came to Streetsblog's attention last week, shortly before the 4th of July holiday. It was posted on 'SF Bikealot's' Youtube channel (Streetsblog has been poking around to try and find SF Bikealot's identity, but so far without success. We hope he'll reach out to us to discuss this video and some others on his channel.)

There's a problem with trying to do a pop-up meeting on the corner of 20th Avenue and the Ulloa in the Sunset District--and that problem is wind.

Streetsblog tipster Dan Crosby brought this to our attention: due to road work on San Jose, the intersections with Guerrero and Dolores are even more confusing and dangerous for people on bikes.

Hoodline is reporting that a cyclist was killed yesterday at around 5:30 p.m. in a collision with a car at the intersection of Silver and Alemany Boulevard. The San Francisco Bicycle Coalition says the victim's name was Moises Chavez, a 51-year-old man. "Our hearts are heavy this morning and our thoughts are with family and friends of the victim," they wrote on their Twitter feed.

Streetsblog caught up with Russo on Friday near his office in downtown Oakland to talk about how he's settling in, what he thinks of the strides Oakland has made so far, and how he will shepherd the department towards a safer, more equitable and more sustainable future.

As Streetsblog readers are surely aware, when it comes to public transit, pedestrian safety, and above all good bicycle infrastructure, the Dutch are the global champions.

There are now four design options for a San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA)'s project to add parking-protected bike lanes, possible transit lanes, and wider sidewalks on Howard and Folsom Streets in SoMa. All four of these designs are pretty darned good. All four have pretty good protected bike lanes.

Before everyone heads out for the Memorial Day weekend, Streetsblog wanted to do a quick update on yesterday evening's successful Valencia Street human-protected bike lane protest in the Mission District.