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@zsionakides 182467 wrote:

The WWB path is next to a 10 lane expressway, the PBLs and sharrow Army Navy Drive path are next to 10 (soon to be 11) lanes of I-395 with no sound wall, and the Washington Blvd path is next to a 6 lane expressway.

In none of these cases is there a sound wall outside the path, trapping the noise / exhaust / debris on the trail. With no place for these things to dissipate, the riding environment will be MUCH worse on the future I-66 as designed.

The Custis Trail detour earlier this year between Oak and Quinn offered a nicer riding surface, but it was noticeably unpleasant due to exhaust and noise being trapped above the bike route.

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@dasgeh 182245 wrote:

What? To get from the upstream Memorial Bridge sidepath to the RCP trail is super easy — when you get to the ramp from RCP to Memorial Bridge (first road crossing, no light), just turn left on that first sidewalk. Down the hill and you’re on the RCP trail.

I think he may be taking RCP southbound toward Ohio Drive and the Tidal Basin, and doesn’t want to go all the way up to Peters Point to access it.

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@bentbike33 181716 wrote:

According to this NPS web page, “The westbound sidewalk will close first from fall 2018 until fall 2019.” I’m guessing that means the north (upstream) sidewalk since that is next to the lanes where the cars usually go west.

I too would think that “westbound sidewalk” means the upstream side. But when one continues reading, the details of NPS’s ped/bike detours correspond to the case where the downstream sidewalk is closed and the upstream sidewalk is open. So it’s unclear at best.

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@huskerdont 181380 wrote:

I feel like these lanes are some of the worst for dooring in the county, at least of the lanes I regularly travel. I always ride right on the line, or even in the lane when passing those stupid shuttle buses that are too wide for the parking spaces.

Agree.

I guess the bike lanes on Clarendon Cannonball (especially Courthouse to Pierce) and Lynn St in Rosslyn are theoretically worse. But those ones are so horrendous that I simply take the lane all the time without a second thought.

The problem with Fairfax Drive is it’s just barely wide enough that I feel uneasy when trying to claim a whole lane. (Plus it’s flat so I’m slower than on Clarendon or Lynn.) So I also often hang right around the white line there. Which begets an additional challenge: make oneself appear unpredictable enough to frighten would-be buzzers into keeping their distance.

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Glad to hear you are okay. As you know, dooring can be a lot worse.

@sjclaeys 181369 wrote:

Sorry to hear that and sorry for having an Arlington government that is more interested in putting in shiny bike lanes than doing the hard stuff like having the police enforce the law.

Nothing makes a bike lane shine quite like automotive paint swinging through it (or parking on it). And Arlington does like to keep its bike lanes shiny.

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@dasgeh 181158 wrote:

The crosswalk across the GWMP is certainly an issue, but I’m more worried about the crosswalk on the VA side (though not in VA) of the Memorial Bridge, upstream side. I believe that ALL Memorial Bridge traffic, which is going to include a significant portion of the 14th St Bridge traffic during the closure, will have to use that crosswalk.

Hmm… At first glance, I thought the north sidewalk would be the one closed during 14th St Bridge construction, because NPS says that “the westbound sidewalk will close first from fall 2018 until fall 2019.” But when one reads the details of the detours, it sounds like the south, or eastbound, sidewalk is actually the one that will be closed. Is there a better source of info for Memorial Bridge construction?

With the south sidewalk also closed on Memorial Bridge, the inaccessibility of the 14th St Bridge becomes a much bigger problem. The crosswalk just north of Memorial Circle is even worse than the one across GWMP, due to the merging, awful sightlines, and lack of flashing lights. A trip from Crystal City to the Fish Market now involves an awkward dance around Memorial Circle traversing both of those awful crosswalks, and it nearly doubles in distance.

Surely NPS would be happy to provide a temporary crosswalk between the two eagle statues (along with police enforcement)?

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Typical 14th Street Bridge traffic is almost certainly an overestimate for the increase in use of the GWMP crosswalk. Some 14th St Bridge traffic comes from the north, no? These folks are likely to decrease their current crosswalk usage during the construction, partially offsetting the increase in use by people coming from the south. For instance, anyone who currently commutes from the 110 Trail to the 14th St Bridge (e.g. Courthouse to Navy Yard) uses that crosswalk now but will stop doing so during construction.

That said, there will certainly be a lot of new people starting to cross there. I support and applaud your initiative to use the construction as a justification to focus more attention on the problems with this dangerous crosswalk.

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@lordofthemark 180743 wrote:

Do I need to look back to check for passing bikes before signalling a left?

It’s a good idea not only on the trail but also on a street. I don’t trust that an extended left arm will dissuade drivers from attempting to pass on my left.

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Some additional info at
https://weta.org/press/facts-arlington-national-cemetery
https://www.arlnow.com/2018/08/20/arlington-national-cemetery-expansion-plans-moving-ahead/#disqus_thread

The present pace is 25 burials/day, and each burial consumes an average of about 60 square feet. At that rate, the expansion acreage will be full in six years.

Why keep kicking this can down the road?

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@scoot 180331 wrote:

bike lane on Lynn that is also too narrow to be useful for any purpose other than slow filtering

I should correct myself. Many people have indeed found another use for that bike lane: car parking/idling.

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@accordioneur 180315 wrote:

The cannonball does have a bike lane, but is not without its share of excitement, particularly around the curve at Oak St.

Do you actually use the bike lane on Clarendon Cannonball? I would not feel safe riding so close to parked cars at downhill speeds, especially given the potential for being trapped by a close pass if ceding the car lane.

Unless filtering through a traffic jam, I typically take a car lane the entire way from Courthouse Rd to Lynn St. (Since Key Bridge is my usual destination, I then encounter another bike lane on Lynn that is also too narrow to be useful for any purpose other than slow filtering.)

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@lordofthemark 180208 wrote:

as usual, a car passed me on the crest of the hill on 31st Street just east of Abingdon in Fairlington, IE just before the steep (for me anyway) descent.

Pass these drivers at the speedbumps on the downhill. Bonus points if you yell at them that they should stay off the roads if they can’t keep up with the speed limit.

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Returning to the trail there seems pointless, since it’s closed again a few blocks west. 21st is a pleasant enough route from Scott to Veitch.

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Bob, sorry to hear about your collision. I guess this is evidence that such an incident can unexpectedly befall even the most experienced and conscientious of riders! On the other hand I am certainly glad to hear that you have escaped relatively unscathed and seem to be in good spirit. I hope that you are able to resume riding as soon as possible.

I am curious: do you happen to remember what type of vehicle the southbound Helpy Helperton was driving?

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As an aside: could DDOT legally create and enforce a height limit for parking alongside such a PBL? I don’t believe I’ve ever seen “compact cars only” signs on public street parking, but it would reduce the design danger and is thus worth considering.

Those last three vehicles you rode past were basically 6-ft high opaque walls. If that parking were restricted to shorter vehicles only, you and the driver would presumably have been able to see each other much sooner.

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