[paulg]

How about ‘the popular team!’

Welcome Josh!

oh.. and I’m actually a signed up dues paying team 20 member.

[paulg]

Hi team 20! And thanks Brian for being our Captain.

Reporting for duty. Looking forward to ‘riding’ with you all. I like the peer pressure at this time of year, it gets me out when it’s cold and raining outside.

I commute 3 or 4 days a week 12 miles each way and sometimes manage a whole week. Weekends is usually sleazing it or a mountain bike ride with my kids. last year I resolved to ride every day and only missed 2 and even though I did a lot of 1.2 mile rides on the non commuting days, it really ticks up your points, which in this game means prizes! So keep getting out every day, even if it’s only a sleaze ride coz it’s worth it.

So what’s our team name going to be? ’20 Mule Wagon Team’ ? :o)

[paulg]

Thanks for posting that. I agree, there should be signage or something letting bikers know that the barrier could raise after a car has gone through or if it’s broken, as it quite often is that it’s dangerous to try riding over it in case it lifts just at the wrong moment.

I admit that I always ride around, even if the barrier is down, but I’m a regular rider through that area.

I hope the injured riders get well soon.

[paulg]

@Emm 165835 wrote:

Yep. I bike it almost daily, and it’s one of the sketchier spots on my commute.

I don’t think many of the riders coming up from 4MRT to the MVT realize they need to yield to the northbound bikes and peds already on MVT coming down the little hill from the bridge. The yield sign seems to get ignored pretty often… Also, people going south on the MVT to 4MRT often don’t yield to the people already on the MVT heading north and coming down the hill from the overpass. I think they assume since they’re going straight they have the right of way, even though straight is actually leaving the MVT. The sight lines on that corner are awful if you’re on the MVT heading north and trying to look out for south bound cyclists/peds.

I agree!
On my way to work in the morning I ride East on the 4MRT and the go left and ride South on the MVT. I never use the trail connector to make this turn, instead I ride another 20 feet or so to the little block paved area with the information sign and if it’s clear I turn left onto the MVT. The fence on the bridge completely blocks the view of riders coming north bound and going just a little further allows me to see in both directions. It’s fine doing that at 6:30am in the morning but during a busy weekend people hang out at the info sign so not as easy. I’m sorry to hear someone got hurt there, and thanks for the reminder for me to just pay more attention at that point.

[paulg]

Thanks very much for the info everyone. Very much appreciated. I’ve passed it on.

Paul

[paulg]

@notinthe18 154999 wrote:

This is a real problem. There’s an ART facility there and I feel like every time I pass there (esp. around 8 AM) there’s a bus blocking the bike lane. Probably 9 days out of 10 for the last few weeks.

This should stop in a few weeks when they open up the new ART bus facility across the road. (the same project that gave us the new buffered bike lanes). the ART buses have to stop near the ART bus office on the West side of the road to download the data from their day which is why they park there. Not making excuses for them just saying why they do it. I believe when the new facility opens across the road the ART buses will park there and can download their data from there.

Paul

[paulg]

Paulg reporting for duty.

Spinal Tap is one of my favorite movies so any reference to that works for me.

‘This goes to 11’ ‘One higher’

Looking forward to logging lots of miles for the team! Let’s do this!

[paulg]

I noticed the milling on South Eads doesn’t go all the way down to Glebe Road. It stops at about the boundary between the ART bus facility and the WMATA depot.

My issue with that is the new complete streets plan

https://projects.arlingtonva.us/projects/south-eads-street-complete-street/

shows the new bike lane arrangement for Eads of which a lot is installed already i.e. to the North from Arlington Ridge Road, and I thought this current project would finish the job off by extending new paving and striping all the way to Glebe Road. Which it isn’t. The road surface is in very poor shape in the remaining section of Eads just north of Glebe so it really needs some large patching or milling and paving just like the entire road to the North.

So I swapped some emails with Jeremy (Very responsive Project Manager for Arlington County). and he said that no the current paving done as part of the ART bus facility does not go to Glebe and nor does the striping.

I’m going to contact the complete streets rep and see what they say.

Does anyone at Bike Arlington know about this project and when the last section will be completed?

[paulg]

I contacted Jeremy at Arlington County yesterday just to make sure they were going to start paving this week.

reply here:

Paul,

There was a water line break last week that put the operation behind a few days. You might have noticed they were still doing work down by the S. Eads Fort Scott intersection. My projects paving crews should be jumping over to Route 1 and then getting back to S. EADS Thursday/Friday. The Arlington Water Sewer Streets contractors advised me they would be done Thursday.

I will ask that my contractor sweep the bike lane today.

Thank you

and then he made a further reply:

Paul,

Looks like they were able to get back to S.Eads. Should be a few days and you will have brand new asphalt.

Sent from iPhone

Jeremy R. Jenkins

CONSTRUCTION MANAGEMENT SPECIALIST

So the long wait might soon be over!!

[paulg]

No problem jsperson.

Jeremy also followed up with me this AM which I appreciated:

Paul,

Did you see an improvement yesterday? I spoke with the contractor performing the work and they were supposed to do a much better job sweeping, and making sure that the bike lane was not obstructed.

Schedule Update:
We went ahead and scheduled the new paving for the week of 11/7/16.

We thank you for your patience as we try and get these upgrades ready for the public.
Thank you
Jeremy R. Jenkins

CONSTRUCTION MANAGEMENT SPECIALIST

I replied that the road did seem to be swept which does remove the debris and I thanked him for that but the steel plates and patches for the sewer work were still a major problem. But I guess we only have to survive for 2 more weeks and South Eads should be surfaced from Glebe all the way to fort scott. with new bike lanes to match those to the north.

I can’t wait.

[paulg]

I contacted Jeremy at Arlington to say what a mess the street was currently in and how it was hazardous to cyclists and here was his prompt reply:

Paul,
*
The current work going on in the roadway is being performed by Arlington County Water Sewer Streets and is unrelated to our project.* However I do know the people running that work and I will take this up with them right away.* I will also walk this today and make sure there is nothing my contractor needs to do in order to make this safe due to their work.*
*
Schedule:
We should be paving within the next 4 weeks (waiting on the WSS crew to finish up).* It will be 100% complete by the end of November and you will have the permanent plans per our design at that time.* You should have no further issues from that point on.
*
Thankfully we only have a few for weeks to deal with the construction in the road and then the biking community will have brand new separated biked lanes.
*
Thank you
*
Jeremy R. Jenkins
CONSTRUCTION MANAGEMENT SPECIALIST

[paulg]

jsperson

I agree and have contacted the Arlington project manager for the ART bus facility who seem to have caused all the mess. There were some large potholes that appeared and they did kind of fix those.

Anyway he was very responsive so I would send him an email with pictures. I know they are planning to resurface the entire road from Glebe to fort Scott sometime this fall. Jeremy Jenkins is the Arlington PM and his email is below.

jrjenkins@arlingtonva.us>

He probably won’t be able to help with the buses and I’m not sure that the steel plates and other temporary but hazardous road surfacing might be another group. Perhaps the treatment plant?

Let me know what you find out and I can send an email too.

Paul

[paulg]

I agree. I went to the public meeting at the Aurora Highlands Community Center and the vast majority of those attending did not vote for the ‘preferred’ option that they’ve chosen. Might as well not have held the meeting.

What recourse do we have at this stage?

[paulg]

@Steve O 142821 wrote:

So this seems like something that should be brought to the attention of someone. It may actually be fixable, but I doubt whoever could make this decision has any idea that there is a hazard there. Given that at least three people on this forum report being taken down I would guess that there have actually been scores, if not hundreds, of unreported crashes.
MDOT, perhaps? Prince George’s County?

I commute through there so know that joint well. It is exactly as you say: a joint between the two sections of concrete but it has metal plates on either side of the gap. The concrete is nice a grippy on that bend so you can make fast turns but if you are turning on the metal plates I bet your wheel could slip out. If it’s wet those plates would be like an ice rink.

At that point I always make the turn without running wide onto the joint, if pedestrians are present I make sure I’m not leaning over too hard on the joint.

[paulg]

Hi there team ate dean. There goes the autocorrect again. Sorry was a little late joining up. Looking forward to it. I’m Paul by the way.

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