Category: bicycle lane

“Why I ‘cheated’ at the light, while cycling”

Keihy Moore on her bicycle. Photo: Keihly Moore

 Got this email from my friend Keihly Moore (one of the key architects behind some of Charlotte’s Park(ing) Day events in previous years). After getting her dual degree in architecture and urban design from UNC Charlotte she’s now working in Boston.

Anyone who knows her knows she’s a dedicated and avid bicyclist. She even rode to work during the extremely deep snows in Boston last winter, getting featured in an article by the Boston Globe. (See “Employees get creative to reach work.”)

Her note highlights one of many challenges cyclists face when riding in traffic. Though she’s a careful, law-abiding cyclist, she realized that in some situations, it felt safer to violate the traffic signal. What do you think?:

Bike lanes and sharrows can’t solve the traffic light issue.

“I rode a different route in today because I had to drop my car off at an auto-body place. Most of the way in on the new route had bike lanes (thank God) but traffic was still moving 40+ mph, when it wasn’t stop and go – mostly stop. I’m not the cyclist that runs red lights. I follow the rules. But this morning, with aggravated, distracted, grumpy drivers surrounding me, all I wanted to do was to get out in front of them, away from them. And I realized it’s because cyclists have the odds stacked against us. The rules are not set up for us. Admittedly, today, I stopped at all the lights, but I left sooner than the other cars on three lights because I wanted to get out in front – and it worked. I was still safe, but I left the exhaust, anger, and dirt behind me.

It seems to me cyclists should have advance green lights (like pedestrians do). It’s safer for everyone, and cyclists are more visible.

I still hate it when other cyclists are dangerous and run red lights, weaving in and out of traffic. But I think there is a certain threshold where it is OK to get out in front before the light changes.
So I never thought I’d say I liked beating those lights, but I felt it was necessary for my safety and sanity.
Thoughts? Glad I wasn’t hit this morning,
Keihly

Better signaling and separated lanes, of course, could help prevent this kind of dilemma. But most U.S. cities, Charlotte included, are a long way from being able to offer those things. In the meantime, what’s a careful cyclist to do?

Another road diet, this one for South Tryon

This is a street project I can love. The city wants to widen the sidewalks on South Tryon Street over I-277, plus create bike lanes. The picture above is an artist’s rendering of what it might look like, looking north toward the skyline. Note the lovely Charlotte Observer building at left, just over the bridge. Here’s what it looks like now. The idea is to make South Tryon Street between Stonewall Street (the corner where the Observer office and the Gantt Center sit) and Carson Boulevard (the street formerly known as Independence Boulevard until I-277 was born) more suitable for pedestrians and bicyclists. If you want to hear more, there’s a public meeting today at 5:30 p.m. at the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Government Center, in room 280.

The city intends to start with a 90-demonstration project, starting March 15. They’ll temporarily restripe the lanes on the pavement and put up bollards. Tryon will go from four lanes to three – two northbound and one southbound – between Stonewall and Carson. “It’s going to require some signal phase tweaking” for the traffic light at Morehead and Tryon, says Jim Kimbler with the Charlotte Department of Transportation.

The goal is to turn the excessively wide four-lanes into three lanes with better sidewalks, especially over the bridge. Currently when you walk over the I-277 bridge you’re on a 5-foot back-of-curb sidewalk looking down on traffic zooming below. It is not pleasant. And because I work at that spot I can report that traffic on Tryon is usually sparse. Jay-walking is routine, and easy.

Why a demonstration project? The bridge is state-owned, as is South Tryon south of Morehead, so the N.C. DOT has veto power, and it wants to make sure that the changes won’t foul traffic or hurt the bridge. If the state agrees the “street diet” will work, then the city will move forward.

Tryon between Morehead and Carson isn’t as wide as the section over I-277. Kimbler said the sidewalks there won’t be widened right away, because the city hopes development in the near future will produce better sidewalks. Let us hope that is the case, or that the city will improve the sidewalks if no development ensues in a year or so. The photo here is what the sidewalk is like now. It is not a scene that makes your heart sing.