Safe-Routes-to-School (SRTS) grants are supposed to improve bike and pedestrian access to schools. The city of Fremont has discovered a new way to use this funding source: to widen intersections and remove bike lanes. Cyclists biking past Irvington high school now have to contend with this:
You can see where the bike lane used to be. It was removed to make way for an additional left-turn lane. Cyclists now have to “share” the lane with 40+ mph traffic through a heavily used intersection. The Grimmer Blvd bike lane is a key part of the south Fremont Bike Plan, providing a connection to the new Warm Springs BART station. As well, pedestrians at the Grimmer/Blacow intersection will now have to cross 2 additional travel lanes.
Incredibly, this was all made possible by a California SRTS grant, which provided the bulk of the funding of the intersection “improvement” project. Fremont cleverly split the project up so that the SRTS grant paid for the expensive new signal and sidewalk changes, while the the new left turn lane was paid with non-SRTS funds.
Council gave the project a CEQA negative declaration (i.e. exempt from environmental review) because it would have “minor” impacts. The Staff Report to Council makes no mention of the bike lane removal. This raises the troubling question as to whether Fremont City Council or Caltrans was aware of the bike lane removal in approving the project.
The removal is permanent? It looks to me like it’s temporary during construction. That still sucks, of course, showing how disposable bikeway space is. It’s always the first thing to be sacrificed.
The old layout of the intersection had “pork chops” that blocked the bike lanes.
Multiple emails were sent to the city of Fremont and Caltrans to find out if this is permanent, but have not gotten any replies. When public works people don’t respond, that is a bad omen. I’ve also spent a considerable time at the intersection, looking at lane widths, curb locations, etc. It isn’t obvious how to still fit a bike lane.
And even if the bike lane removal were temporary, there is still the issue of the ped impacts. They removed a pork-chop, but also added new lanes, so the $400k grant brought no real improvement in walking conditions.
Have you heard back from the city? They just told me that the bike lanes were removed temporarily and that the final project will have 7-foot bike lanes striped “in the next week or so.” There will also be double left-turn lanes “at each approach,” with their own signal phases.
Thanks Melanie, I did hear back from the city. Caltrans also sent a copy of the intersection plans from the grant application, which do not show any double left-turn lanes.
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The old bike lane looks wide. I can see them replacing it with a 4-foot gutter lane.
I agree that Fremont’s bike/ped mitigation should be better, so that they maintain a safe environment for people biking and walking throughout the project’s construction process. However, there is no indication that the bike lane is being removed permanently as part of this project.
I can’t access the final design schematic, but the SR2S grant application concept for this project shows a continuous bike lane, improved by the removal of the pork chop islands: http://fremontcityca.iqm2.com/Citizens/FileOpen.aspx?Type=4&ID=2038
Yes in 2016 we can certainly do better than unprotected, paint-only bikeways, but this project’s removal of the right turn slip lanes is certainly a step in the right direction.
The schematic does not depict the 2nd left turn lane.
But removing the bike lane doesn’t create enough space for an additional turn lane either. My guess is that the leftmost through lane is being converted into the second turn lane. I personally hate double turn lanes on surface streets anywhere, but I don’t see any evidence of the bike lane being permanently removed here.
Removing 2 bike lanes (in each direction) plus narrowing the median gives enough space to add a 2nd left turn pocket lane.
[…] rail extension to the University of Washington opened this week to “great fanfare.” Systemic Failure jeers the city of Fremont, California, which used a Safe Routes to School Grant to remove a bike […]
[…] Fremont uses Safe Routes to Schools funding to make the street in front of a high school less safe by removing a bike lane to make room for a […]