Call me crazy, but I am the type of girl who likes to go to public meetings about road construction. They speak to me about the promise for a better future. I especially like the ones when I know at the end of the awful, dirty, dusty, jarring process, a new bike lane will be born.
So I was excited about the FDOT upcoming meeting to roll out the $2.5 million dollar project on A1A in Miami Beach, from Fifth Street to Lincoln Road. I have been waiting for this project for years, watching the funding shift to and fro from year to year in the Transportation Improvement Plan (TIP, yes I get excited about them too!) I was happy because last spring, the Department came up with a Bicycle Master Plan for all of A1A in District 6 that called for a bike lane on almost all of Collins Avenue!
Be still my heart!
I was thrilled to see in this project moving forward, with a projected start date of May 2013. They plan to narrow the parking lanes, narrow the travel lanes, reconstruct a few blocks to gain ROW, all the right moves…… BUT
My heart stood still…..
THEY DID NOT INCLUDE THE BIKE LANES.
So where oh where did the bike lanes go? And for whom will the ROW be?
Looks like that gained right of way is being added to allow for an exclusive left turn lane throughout the whole segment, i.e. MORE CAR TRAFFIC!
You can make a difference in putting this project back on proper footing!
Send an email to any of these FDOT officials and ask them to include a bike lane in Project Numbers 250236-1-51-01 and 250236-3-52-01. SRA1A/Collins Avenue from 5th Street to Lincoln Road. You may even want to remind them they already said they would!
Copy the local elected officials in Miami Beach:
COME TO THE PUBLIC MEETING
MONDAY, October 25, 2011
Miami Beach Regional Library
227 22nd Street, Collins Park, Miami Beach
6:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m.
This is more than a RRR. This is a chance to enhance mobility by improving modality for bicycles by designating a lane in which to build the share.
Hope to see you there.
8 Responses to No Bike Lanes Planned For Collins; Extra ROW Used for A New Left Turn Lane
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FDOT has a problem. Collins Avenue is way too congested. The congestion leads to a high number of crashes. FDOT has to make the street safer.
The solution they present is old classic Old School FDOT. Too many cars travel here on a daily basis to fit on the street? Add another lane to hold more cars! Take two feet from this parking space, three feet from that travel lane, move a couple of curbs here and narrow a few feet of sidewalk over there and WALAH! A new road is born. More people can use Collins Avenue at the same time!
While we agree that FDOT’s core mission is to move more and more people and goods efficiently through the State, adding more cars by adding another travel lane to Collins Avenue is the wrong way to approach it.
The only salvation to Collins Avenue is increasing the number of people using the road with out increasing the number if cars that use it.
You do that by taking that spaced gained by compressing what you have and adding a dedicated bicycle lane. Everyone on Collins Avenue on a bicycle is not in a car. It’s just that simple.
An added bonus is that you get the bicycles off the sidewalk, which makes that byway safer for those who choose to walk or push a baby stroller.
With that higher car capacity, only comes more congestion, which leads to more aggravation and aggression and more accidents. We cannot build more room for cars as a way out of our traffic mess in Miami Beach. Our economy depends on more people here than were here last year. We need more people, not more cars.
FDOT also has unintended consequences with its “build more traffic strategy.” The current design has made the margin for error on the street much more narrower, by forcing SUV’s and Hummers into scarcer, skinnier parking spaces and shrinking the travel lanes so there is little room to move around. When the new roadway reaches capacity, (which will occur the week after the completion of this project), you have the same safety issues you hoped to cure, only with more cars on he mix. And less room for bicycles.
FDOT. Please. The reason we have public input in these processes is to help you when you have gone wrong. As a member of the public, a citizen of this Country, a resident of this State and a user of this road, I beg you, please. Follow Federal Law: the 2005 Safe, Accountable, Flexible, Efficient Transportation Equality Act. SAFTEA-LU is supposed to provide for transportation that enhances the environment, promotes energy conversation, improves quality of life and reduce traffic congestion. Your plan does the opposite. Putting in the bike lane is what needs to happen on this road.
Follow the Florida Statutes: 333.065
Bicycle and pedestrian ways along state roads and transportation facilities.
(1)(a) Bicycle and pedestrian ways shall be given full consideration in the planning and development of transportation facilities, including the incorporation of such ways into state, regional, and local transportation plans and programs. Bicycle and pedestrian ways shall be established in conjunction with the construction, reconstruction, or other change of any state transportation facility, and special emphasis shall be given to projects in or within 1 mile of an urban area.
Your own Bicycle Master Plan for A1A in District 6 calls for a Bike Lane on this part if Collins Avenue.
Build the bike lane, FDOT. Build the bike lane.
Pretty please?
…Not to mention, we’ve seen the implementation of one of the nation’s most successful bike-sharing programs on Miami Beach. Let’s join the ranks of enlightened, modern urban planning and re-think this roadway design. Help us catch up to the rest of the modern American cities that are embracing bicycle infrastructure. Hell, we’re not even asking for a protected lane here, just some mere paint.
what collins needs are wider sidewalks. pedestrian traffic is very heavy yet the sidewalks are 5 or 6 feet with lots of obstructions. unfortunately you can’t fit everything and wide sidewalks are needed more than bike lanes. of couse fdot’s excuse for that is that this is an rrr project.
Wider sidewalks would be nice too, although it is not an either/or discussion. within the context of this project bike lanes are more valuable than a left turn lane. between wider sidewalks and a bike lane, it would depend on how narrow the travel lanes are…you could probably fit in a cycle track with enough sidewalk space to safely accommodate cyclists and pedestrians
This is just ridiculous. I agree with everything Gabrielle says here. Collins needs bike lanes, heck, it needs a proper sidewalk 2 adult people can walk on side by side without bumping into light poles and parking machines.
Perhaps we should be advocating for wider sidewalks and sharrows instead? Not sure there is enough ROW for bike lanes if we widen the sidewalks. For the most part traffic moves slowly on Collins. Putting Collins on a road diet (with wider sidewalks) and sharrows is a good alternative solution.
Felipe:
Its a RRR for the most part. They are going to do two blocks of reconstruction to move the sidewalks to gain the two feet they need to gain 10 throughout the coordior. Adding the bike lanes now is the key to widening the sidewalk at the next reconstruction.
By building the shares of other travel modes, bicycling and pedestrain, we can re allot the limited right of way when the time comes. The parking on Collins is what is wrong. That needs to go into a wider sidewalk. But we have to get people out of that cars to do that….
Its a classic chicken and egg story. These bike lane right here right now are the egg. We must make sure we are united in our efforts to get the bike lanes back in this project. They were in at the conception, and out now. The extra ten feet they made is the bike lane. I do note that in the Bicycle Master Plan, doing these two blocks of sidewalk was $$$ prohibitive in the near future for the bike lane. See how fast they program it for cars?
We must be united in our efforts to get the lane now. Please send the officials an email, and ask one other person to do the same. They can not listen when we do not speak up.
I’m eager to hear how the meeting with FDOT went on the Collins Ave project, if someone who was there can add a post. Thanks.