Well, you have this fella to blame.
His name is Jeffrey Novotny, an engineer who is a consultant for the DOT. I caught up with Jeff at Tampa City Hall yesterday afternoon when he was gave a presentation about extending the raised Crosstown Highway to the Gandy Bridge in south Tampa.
Why did Jeff leave out bike lanes on Gandy Blvd?
Jeff said Gandy is too dangerous to ride a bike.
Well, not if you include bike lanes Jeff.
For the record, I bike Gandy Blvd. all the time -- with or without bike lanes. If you know bike laws and know what you're doing, you can bike on any road.
4 comments:
Why there are no bike lanes?
Because they don't want us there. I'm sure he is the type that holds his hand on the horn and comes at me, just to let me know he doesn't want me on the road.
Just one more sign of the attitude of local government has towards bicyclists.
A few years ago Waters Ave was repaved and once again they intentionally did not stripe bike lanes.
@CyclerJim -- they do it all the time, violating their own mandate in the process (at least for DOT-controlled roads). What about the grand Busch Blvd. repaving? They missed bike lane striping there, too.
Who should we write to at DOT to insist that they comply with their own policies and re-stripe this road immediately, AND never use this consultant again? If you're writing such a letter yourself, Alan, can you post it so we can copy from it?
I've ridden Gandy a few times. Had no problems. I don't feel I need a bike lane, but then I have no problem asserting myself and taking what I need. Still , bike lanes would probably help Gandy. Seems like Gandy has a lot of bicyle accidents. Everyone that I remember hearing about involved a cyclist on the sidewalk.
@CyclerJim -- Waters Ave, at least east of Dale Mabry (which I don't think has been repaved) - that's a scary road. Might be a little better with bike lanes but not much. People are constantly changing lanes to get around stopped cars because of the lack of a dedicated turn lane for much of the road. Too many driveways. Just too much going on. And that neighborhood seems particularly hostile to cyclists for some reason. That eastern chunk of Waters is one of the roads I put in the "Hell NO" category. West of Dale Mabry may not be striped but the lanes are wide enough and the traffic smooth enough that even with all the big truck traffic it wouldn't bother me.
I ride to the Bike Coop fairly frequently to volunteer so I'm going to Waters and Armenia from the USF area. I use Linebaugh to go west to Armenia. I also use N Boulevard (that's a stupid street name) instead of Florida.
BTW - N Blvd, great bike road for going north-south if your route isn't going south of Sligh. Or coming from downtown, north of Hillsborough. If that road went over the river and connected it would be my favorite road.
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