Arlington Vision Zero

[zsionakides]

@lordofthemark 198706 wrote:

21st street is in Ward 2. Bike advocates in DC have noted that DDOT has aggressively delivered bike infra in Ward 6 (strongly pro bike CM Allen) and Ward 2 (CM Jack Evan’s effectively neutered, and most ANCs pro bike.)Not so much in wards 3, 4, 5, and especially 7 and 8.

Wards 2 and 6 cover downtown, the mall, and most the major employment areas in DC. Increasing bicycle accessibility in those employment centers is key to increasing bike commuting and should eventually drive greater demand in the residential oriented outer wards.

OTOH, Arlington and Alexandria have done almost nothing for cyclists in the employment centers, focusing more on their trail networks, which end short of where commuters need to go.

[CBGanimal]

@zsionakides 198713 wrote:

OTOH, Arlington and Alexandria have done almost nothing for cyclists in the employment centers, focusing more on their trail networks, which end short of where commuters need to go.

Like the New and semi improved Ballston Mall (Quarter)! No good all day parking!

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[lordofthemark]

@zsionakides 198713 wrote:

Wards 2 and 6 cover downtown, the mall, and most the major employment areas in DC. Increasing bicycle accessibility in those employment centers is key to increasing bike commuting and should eventually drive greater demand in the residential oriented outer wards.

OTOH, Arlington and Alexandria have done almost nothing for cyclists in the employment centers, focusing more on their trail networks, which end short of where commuters need to go.

Downtown DC improvements will help with bike mode share in other wards (and also from Arlington and Alexandria – arguably its easier getting to the downtown DC bike infra safely from South Arlington and from Alex than from parts of Ward 4, certainly from wards 7 and

But from what many of my bikeDC friends seem to say, that is not the reason for the prioritization of improvements in W6 and W2 (the east downtown PBL on 9th would do more to get people downtown than the new PBLs near the soccer stadium). Its politics.

In general politics constrains staff. Staff can’t act without support from electeds. Electeds (mostly) look over their shoulders at (often autocentric) voters.

[LhasaCM]

@lordofthemark 198718 wrote:

Downtown DC improvements will help with bike mode share in other wards (and also from Arlington and Alexandria – arguably its easier getting to the downtown DC bike infra safely from South Arlington and from Alex than from parts of Ward 4, certainly from wards 7 and

But from what many of my bikeDC friends seem to say, that is not the reason for the prioritization of improvements in W6 and W2 (the east downtown PBL on 9th would do more to get people downtown than the new PBLs near the soccer stadium). Its politics.

In general politics constrains staff. Staff can’t act without support from electeds. Electeds (mostly) look over their shoulders at (often autocentric) voters.

Correct. I’ve heard the same from DDOT staff directly – part of the logic behind the anticipated timing of the different projects on their “20 miles by 2022” plan is less of when design/construction can be complete and more of what can be done with minimal opposition vs. what will require a lot of public outreach and effort to make happen. When DDOT staff have only so many hours to work on projects, the rational choice is to put those hours towards projects that can be completed more easily rather than projects that require battle after battle after battle in public meetings. The hyper-local role that ANCs play in the process further complicates matters (even with a friendly CM, an unfriendly ANC meant DDOT staff had to take an inordinate amount of time to get the two blocks of protected bike lanes installed on P SW between 4th and 2nd). Heck – even the plan going forward for 20th/21st NW represents a horrible compromise to avoid the one day/week farmer’s market in exchange for completely missing the connection to the heavily used R Street NW. Add to that the notion of bike lanes as a sign of gentrification and things can get really dicey for any sort of project.

That’s where some of the changes proposed in DC as part of the various pending Vision Zero bills would be a big help – by writing certain requirements into law, the staff get political cover to do what’s right in more cases.

[dasgeh]

@arlcxrider 198631 wrote:

As a daily user of Quincy, I respectfully disagree that it’s a “seriously good project.” Southbound especially it’s a non-stop sh!t$how between Fairfax and Glebe. It starts with the never-ending utility work at Fairfax that has all but obliterated the lane between 9th and Fairfax. Then there’s the habitual lane blockers at the Marriott Residence Inn, the Domino’s pizza delivery guys that dart across the lane without stopping (or looking), and the Mercedes dealer–their trucks constantly park in the lane just north of Glebe. In my view there are far too potential interruptions, drop-off zones, driveways (pizza), and other minor intersections for the lane to operate successfully, absent a massive increase in enforcement activity. 5 times out of ten I have to “take the lane” on Quincy.

@zsionakides 198632 wrote:

Quincy St was watered down before it even got to the public for discussion – it had gaps in even the most bike friendly design which was not even up to NACTO standards, which it’s supposed to be per the actual plan the county adopted. I would not let my young children ride on what came out of that design.

Southbound from Fairfax-Glebe is a shit show – it was designed 2017-18 and implemented 2018 — before the revised Bike Element called for better. The post-Bike Element project was Fairfax – 13th — and the part north of Washington will actually be done once the Ed Center redevelopment is done, and the design will be up for review then. The final design is full protection Fairfax – Washington(except for the very beginning and end of that southbound – beginning is a bus stop and end is a right turn mixing zone). While I 100% agree there should be better MOTs (plans for our streets, etc during construction), the Carpool construction is not part of the Quincy project.

@zsionakides 198632 wrote:

The Columbia Pike cycletrack was easy as it didn’t require making any tradeoffs, except investing money in the corridor.

The Columbia Pike was a HUGE lift that involved convincing the DoD to include the cycletrack in the project. It’s different tradeoffs than reallocating space from parking, but it took serious leadership to get the cycletrack in the plans. It was not easy. (Also, fun fact: It’s not Arlington’s money. DoD is building as compensation for taking VDOT’s land.)

@chris_s 198634 wrote:

Gotta disagree here. Goals should be concrete and we should strive to meet them.

I think the structure of the Bike Element works: Vague goals that translate to specific action items and clear performance targets. And it makes sense to draft it from the broader to the more specific. I wouldn’t expect Arlington to *ensure* safety for everyone. “Plan for” or “design for” or something else sure, but not “ensure”

[dbb]

@dasgeh 198730 wrote:

The Columbia Pike was a HUGE lift that involved convincing the DoD to include the cycletrack in the project. It’s different tradeoffs than reallocating space from parking, but it took serious leadership to get the cycletrack in the plans. It was not easy. (Also, fun fact: It’s not Arlington’s money. DoD is building as compensation for taking VDOT’s land.)

That is true. It went from a point of a blended bike/ped path to separate paths. That is great. I suppose the frustration is how hard the bike community had to push to make that happen. In a Bike Friendly Community, why wasn’t the government doing the pushing before the cycling community had even heard of the project?

@dasgeh 198730 wrote:

I think the structure of the Bike Element works: Vague goals that translate to specific action items and clear performance targets. And it makes sense to draft it from the broader to the more specific. I wouldn’t expect Arlington to *ensure* safety for everyone. “Plan for” or “design for” or something else sure, but not “ensure”

So when do you think the concrete should happen? Unless the requirements are unequivocal, the easy path is to round the corners. The staff is busy and the builders want to go fast. We miss the opportunity to inject the requirements early, when they are easiest to incorporate. That often makes a program level policy turn into project level fights. The challenge with fighting at the project level is it takes more attention by the bike community and cyclists are against the “the project is too far along to change”.

[zsionakides]

@dasgeh 198730 wrote:

The Columbia Pike was a HUGE lift that involved convincing the DoD to include the cycletrack in the project. It’s different tradeoffs than reallocating space from parking, but it took serious leadership to get the cycletrack in the plans. It was not easy. (Also, fun fact: It’s not Arlington’s money. DoD is building as compensation for taking VDOT’s land.)

The county had plenty of leverage in the land sale and didn’t use it initially. Considering DoD agree to the cycle track after the fact, I’m sure they would have agreed early on with little push back considering it’s a very small part of the overall costs. Instead Arlington had to come back and ask for the cycle track later. It’s Arlington’s money in terms of value for the land and not getting better value for it.

It’s the same issue with negotiating with ANCC. Arlington could have came out with a much bigger ask – say an easement for a path all the way around the course or allowing legal usage of the road through the club for cyclists which would have huge benefits – but they limited the ask to a small path.

[dbb]

Not sure the County had much leverage at the transfer. As I understand it, Congress gave the DOD the power to condemn the land. The earlier agreement was then abandoned as DOD had more freedom with condemnation.

[zsionakides]

Condemnation goes through a court, so it’s still in DODs interest to negotiate a deal. The condemnation limits the county’s ability to walk away, but not to negotiate.

[sjclaeys]

Speaking of vision zero, that is what car drivers have right now of cyclists and pedestrians waiting to cross Lynn Street northward at the IOD due to the new huge “sidewalk closed” sign. Not seeing anyone, they are even more willing to ignore the no right turn sign during the leading crossing interval. I will “strive” to not get injured or killed.

[arlcxrider]

@sjclaeys 198739 wrote:

Speaking of vision zero, that is what car drivers have right now of cyclists and pedestrians waiting to cross Lynn Street northward at the IOD due to the new huge “sidewalk closed” sign. Not seeing anyone, they are even more willing to ignore the no right turn sign during the leading crossing interval. I will “strive” to not get injured or killed.

I was once telling a non-native English speaker that often the sequence of words has a lot of bearing on the meaning, such as the difference between a “firm mattress” and a “mattress firm.” Or in this case, “zero vision” and “vision zero.”

[dasgeh]

@zsionakides 198732 wrote:

The county had plenty of leverage in the land sale and didn’t use it initially. Considering DoD agree to the cycle track after the fact, I’m sure they would have agreed early on with little push back considering it’s a very small part of the overall costs. Instead Arlington had to come back and ask for the cycle track later. It’s Arlington’s money in terms of value for the land and not getting better value for it.

It’s the same issue with negotiating with ANCC. Arlington could have came out with a much bigger ask – say an easement for a path all the way around the course or allowing legal usage of the road through the club for cyclists which would have huge benefits – but they limited the ask to a small path.

There was no land sale to ANC — This is a taking by the federal government. My understanding is that the push came from staff — yes, we’ve spoken up in support of ArlCo staff but ArlCo staff has been pushing for the separated facilities this whole time. (There had been negotiations for a land sale but they were ended when Congress put the taking in a federal statute).

As for ANCC – I don’t know the story on those negotiations, but I know they happened before I was involved in this stuff – so > 6 years ago (and I’m pretty sure more than 10).

[lordofthemark]

@dasgeh 198751 wrote:

As for ANCC – I don’t know the story on those negotiations, but I know they happened before I was involved in this stuff – so > 6 years ago (and I’m pretty sure more than 10).

I was not involved as I have never lived in Arlington, but my impression was that there was significant pushback from the politically influential country club, and getting the connector (tied in with emergency vehicle access) was considered a big win by everyone in the bike community.

Getting a path all the way around a private club sounds really hard – Virginia code tends to protect property owners, and even when one is asking for a zoning waiver the concessions asked for have to be relevant.

[chris_s]

@lordofthemark 198752 wrote:

I was not involved as I have never lived in Arlington, but my impression was that there was significant pushback from the politically influential country club, and getting the connector (tied in with emergency vehicle access) was considered a big win by everyone in the bike community.

The membership of the club hated it so much they sued their own governing board for agreeing to the easement.

[zsionakides]

@dasgeh 198751 wrote:

There was no land sale to ANC — This is a taking by the federal government. My understanding is that the push came from staff — yes, we’ve spoken up in support of ArlCo staff but ArlCo staff has been pushing for the separated facilities this whole time. (There had been negotiations for a land sale but they were ended when Congress put the taking in a federal statute).

Any taking requires reasonable compensation even if put in federal statute. In general the preference is going to be for negotiating a sale, vice having to go through litigation to get it. The condemnation basically locks Arlington into negotiating a deal or taking their chances in court.

This is similar to homes being taken by the State for a highway or other public project. A property owner can’t simply refuse a sale. They either negotiate or go to court and get a settled agreement, which may or may not be more favorable.

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