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Roosevelt and University Bridge bike lanes finally green

I was beginning to wonder if they forgot. Or maybe they ran out of money, I thought. It has been months since the bike lanes on Roosevelt, 11th and near the University Bridge went in, and I noticed from the start that there were sections marked “green.” Yet time passed and still no green.

But the green is here! While I was about to take the photo above, I saw some guy ride straight through the cones and all the way up the middle of the green bike lane while crews scolded him. Don’t really know what he was thinking, but it didn’t look like he did any damage. Maybe he was just too excited…

I also noticed green bike lanes on Roosevelt just north of 45th (near Trader Joe’s). Those will be a great help, since that stretch can be a little chaotic with people trying to enter and exit the Trader Joe’s parking lot and others trying to cross the bike lane to make a right onto 45th. The green will hopefully make drivers more aware of bikers and remind them to look closely before crossing into the lane.


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11 responses to “Roosevelt and University Bridge bike lanes finally green”

  1. Have they done anything about the bike lane suddenly disappearing after directing you into a raised island if you try going straight to 11th?

    1. Karl Johnson

      Nope. Still haven’t done anything about this.
      Horrible design, it should have the cyclists moving out and joining the lane early (like on Union just west of Harvard) so that cars can turn right. Instead, it has the cyclists hugging the right all the way up to the island, causing more car/bike conflict and then forcing the cyclist out into the lane last second, amongst high speed traffic.

      Awful. Some improvement.

  2. Ian

    @eldan. That has bothered me so much since they put in the bike lanes there. There seems to me to be no reason for them to have not cut back that island the 18″ it would require to have continued the bike lane all the way through that intersection. I’ve noticed that SDOT loves to abandon bicycle infrastructure about 100 ft before intersections where you need it most. Dumping a bike lane into a turn only lane doesn’t improve safety for anyone.

    1. Karl Johnson

      Hear hear!

  3. David Amiton

    Tom – I was wondering the same thing about the green so I checked in with SDOT ~2 weeks back and was told they ran out of the green material and had to reorder more. Anyways, I saw the crews applying last night and was pleased to see the intersection completed on my ride in this morning!

  4. Kristen

    @eldan – That pinch point (it’s actually where the bridge structure starts) is definitely a bit dicey – I have been squeezed going both north and southbound by people thinking there’s enough room for a car and a bike. It’s a structural limitation, but it seems they could have done more with markings. I wrote to SDOT about it. Now I make a point to take the full lane before the pinch point.

    1. I think taking the full lane is the only safe thing to do there, so I do it too. So far I haven’t had any aggro from drivers, but it does worry me a little.

      1. Karl Johnson

        Me too. Taking the full lane here is the way to go. I often find it gives cars a chance to turn to the right there easier anyway, so no problems so far either, and I’ve been doing that since they completed this “improvement”.

  5. William C Bonner

    I’ve wondered about the green paint and it’s friction coefficient. It seems to me to be shiny green, and more slick than the surrounding roadway.

    I don’t commute by bike, so I’m not overly familiar with it, I’m just interested in opinions. (I telecommute, so I actually use less gas for my commute than if I were to bike.)

  6. alexjonlin

    The main thing is that paint is cheap, while removing part of that island would require quite a bit of money. Not that it wouldn’t be worth it, but they don’t have any money right now.

  7. Elliott Jones

    Anyone else think green bike lanes are useless? I never notice them when I’m driving and don’t feel safer or more visible or anything while biking. Especially the ones I’ve ridden on around town that are like 2ft long…

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