Maine Avenue sidewalk "trail" is now open

[Justin Antos]

It’s a great and welcome improvement, for sure. How do others here navigate the southern end, to continue south on Water Street? Heading south, do you take that sharp right and go across the fish market driveway and into the little roundabout? Hop the curb back onto Maine Ave?

[Mikey]

The Maine avenue sidewalk trail is definately improved but still a mess during cherry blossom season, especially when crammed with out of town tourists who do not know that this is a busy bike trail. I got some rude comments yesterday riding through, despite slowing to a crawl, ringing my bell and announcing my pass. “Doesn’t look much like a road to me” was what I heard.

Also I think they stopped the trail about a 1/2 block short. Now all of the bicyclists are forced to weave through the heavy traffic at the fish market as people come off of water street looking for parking; pretty dangerous spot. If sidewalk was extended all the way down to Phillips garage, or better yet took up one of the 3 lanes of Maine avenue all the way to 6th street, it would be a lot safer.

just my 2c.

[KLizotte]

No matter what fancy trail name they attach to it, it’s still a sidewalk and not really fit for mixing peds and cycles. If they are unwilling to carve out a place for cyclists on the road with say, a cycletrack, then they should paint part of the sidewalk as “cycles only.”

The examples of highly functional ped/cycle infrastructure overseas makes this half measure really frustrating.

[5555624]

@Justin Antos 17008 wrote:

It’s a great and welcome improvement, for sure. How do others here navigate the southern end, to continue south on Water Street? Heading south, do you take that sharp right and go across the fish market driveway and into the little roundabout? Hop the curb back onto Maine Ave?

Travel west to east? I take the street. If I am going to cut over to Water Street, I use the second fish market driveway. If the fish market is busy, I avoid cutting through it.

[5555624]

@KLizotte 17017 wrote:

No matter what fancy trail name they attach to it, it’s still a sidewalk and not really fit for mixing peds and cycles. If they are unwilling to carve out a place for cyclists on the road with say, a cycletrack, then they should paint part of the sidewalk as “cycles only.”

I only take the sidewalk traveling towards the bridges and Jefferson Memorial. (The last week, I’ve avoided it due to the influx of cherry blossom tourists.) While it is now wider and makes it easier to pass cyclists heading the other direction or pedestrians, it’s not much better. Pedestrians still walk two and three abreast, they just walk with a little more separation. The first picture on DDOT Facebook page says it all.

[creadinger]

I pretty much agree with all the comments above. The improvements are welcome, but it doesn’t solve anything. I was hoping they’d make a little semi-separated bike lane so bikes could ride counter to the traffic on the road and peds could stay on the sidewalk. Last summer I noticed that that stretch was a popular place for buses to drop off 40-60 people at a time making it virtually impassable without being a huge disturbance.

Coming from the Douglas bridge, heading to the 14th St. bridge, is there a way around that section which would be suitable for rush hour and tourist season?

[MCL1981]

@essigmw 17009 wrote:

…but still a mess during cherry blossom season, especially when crammed with out of town tourists who do not know that this is a busy bike trail.

I think that sums up the entire downtown core of DC for the next few weeks. An assessment of this “oversized sidewalk” would be more accurate after the throngs of tree happy tourists leave.

[PotomacCyclist]

I think the sidewalk might be more useful in non-peak times and of course, after the peak tourist season. While there will still be a lot of tourists through the summer, there won’t be quite as many after the cherry blossoms are gone. (I’m not necessarily bashing the tourists either. They bring in a lot of dollars to the local economy. But it might be nice to have better education about trail and sidewalk courtesy. Maybe informational pamphlets in tourist guides could help.)

[rcannon100]

I agree with the above.

To me, reading between the tea leaves, this was more about taking parking (and therefore revenue) away from the hated fish market, than it was about establishing a good pedestrian / bicycle trail. If it was about being a trail, as one person said, it would not have stopped 1/2 a block short – and it would have cleaner lines that would not result in parking meter slaloms.

Our biggest problem is those of us over in the 12 & D St SW neighborhood (the north side of Maine Ave here), cant safely get across Maine Ave to the Jefferson.

That said, whatever the motive, an improvement is an improvement. It is an improvement. I know several bikers who now describe it as there preferred route. I am glad that DC is committed to these type of solutions; now we need to get NPS to work on their part of Maine Ave.

[5555624]

@creadinger 17062 wrote:

Coming from the Douglas bridge, heading to the 14th St. bridge, is there a way around that section which would be suitable for rush hour and tourist season?

At Maine and 9th Streets SW, head up to Banneker Circle and take the Case Bridge over to Haines Point. At the end of the sidewalk, head down to Buckeye Drive and make a right. Make a right on Ohio Drive SW. Head up and under the bridges, then up onto the 14th Street Bridge. (Alternatively, instead of heading down to Buckeye Drive, you could make a right and go through the Park Police parking lot, then right on Ohio Drive SW.)

This is my “Cherry Blossom Route” and avoids the Maine Avenue sidewalk, crossing East Basin Drive SW, and most of the mayhem in front of the Jefferson Memorial.

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