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@dasgeh 195054 wrote:

But my read on that detour was that it would be scary dangerous headed eastbound, because the intersection of 16th & Sycamore is pretty blind. Am I wrong there?

@bentbike33 195057 wrote:

Actually, if you roll from Columbia/16th into the bike lane on Sycamore/Roosevelt (just like the cars do), you can see southbound traffic just fine.

@consularrider 195064 wrote:

I agree the 16th and Roosevelt eastbound sightlines are horrible, but more manageable on a bike than in a car (especially a stick shift).

I haven’t been this way in awhile, but perhaps this is a seasonal thing? From Streetview it looks like much of the reduction in viewing distance is due to vegetation hanging off the trees in the corner lot. Presumably one can see through those trees much better now that the leaves have fallen.

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@secstate 195040 wrote:

Sorry to harp on this, but these sorts of issues of basic transparency are really common in data journalism.

Very true. And even when the underlying data are in fact accessible, data journalists can often contaminate their communication with ignorance of (or willful blindness to) basic statistics.

Here’s another example. The original study involved only three cyclists (two men and one woman), and was not designed to investigate gender as a variable at all. In the summary report and local news coverage, the principal investigator was portrayed as surprised by the fact that the woman was close-passed more often than either man; he noted it as an interesting outcome but was reluctant to assert any gender conclusion for obvious reasons. But somehow it gets distributed as clickbait with the headline “drivers behave more dangerously around women cyclists”.

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For this reason, I’ve typically found that streets with a lot of unpredictable activity feel quite safe for cycling. The chaos actually helps, as long as you are not too shy to take the lane when necessary. Some other examples: M Street in Georgetown, 14th St in Columbia Heights.

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@dasgeh 194248 wrote:

@scoot 194243 wrote:

Unfortunately a southside trail along 50 in that segment could have even worse crossing hazards, unless it is somehow grade-separated. Drivers barely slow down at all to take the ramp from 50 east to 27 east, so that would be an awful crossing. Also, in spite of the lack of merge area, drivers are able to navigate the ramp from 27 west to 50 east at high speed because their view of eastbound traffic is unobstructed well ahead of the entrance point.

A trail already makes this crossing (see above). The sightlines are good, but it would be safer with a street light to illuminate people crossing.

Yes, although that trail along 27 itself illustrates the problem quite well. Aggressive drivers at excessive speeds worrying entirely about traffic they are merging into and paying no heed to trail users. I wouldn’t trust any driver to stop at that crosswalk, and I certainly wouldn’t advise a child to ride that route. The other two crossings before Long Branch have different issues but they are also dicey. In the first crossing (ramp from 27 east to 50 east), drivers will veer into the ramp without signaling. At the other crossing (after the underpass), drivers appear very suddenly coming off the high-speed arterial. Plus the underpass itself is too narrow, with no separation from drivers accelerating toward the freeway portion of 27. Overall I consider Fillmore and Pershing on-street to be a safer and more comfortable alternative.

Short of HAWK lights or raised crossings (speedbumps), I don’t see any other way to make these crossings safe for the 8yo or 80yo demographic. Street lights would be helpful but insufficient.

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@Relwal Noj 194238 wrote:

I took the survey and commented that I would like to see either side of the Route 50 Trail extended to the Washington Blvd (Route 27) trail as part of this work.

I didn’t think of that in my responses for this segment, but I agree that the gap further east in the 50 southside trail is a big hole in the network for bicycling. From Penrose there is no way to access the 50 trail at Henry Gate Ft Myer without crossing north of 50 and then back again. And the northside trail has too many dangerous ramp and intersection crossings to serve as a viable alternative anyway. In fact when heading that direction, I ride Fillmore north all the way to Pershing instead.

Unfortunately a southside trail along 50 in that segment could have even worse crossing hazards, unless it is somehow grade-separated. Drivers barely slow down at all to take the ramp from 50 east to 27 east, so that would be an awful crossing. Also, in spite of the lack of merge area, drivers are able to navigate the ramp from 27 west to 50 east at high speed because their view of eastbound traffic is unobstructed well ahead of the entrance point.

One useful alternative I would push for: extend the 50 southside trail along the Ft Myer fence from its current terminus down to the 2nd Street bridge. This would require a bit of land either from the Army or from VDOT, but it would provide direct access from the existing trail into South Arlington without any high-speed ramp crossings.

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VDOT wrote:

Other concepts being studied may also include turn restrictions, Innovative Intersections (potential examples include Quadrant Roadway and Restricted Crossing U-Turn), and pedestrian, bicycle and transit enhancements.

My first take on The Quadrant Roadway and Restricted Crossing U-Turn concepts: they look like exurban fantasies that would be highly inappropriate for a road like this one. I have no idea how they would try to turn any intersection along this stretch into a QR; there’s no empty real estate available for a connector roadway. And the RCUT looks like an utter disaster for peds/bikes trying to cross the road.

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@bentbike33 194179 wrote:

GWMP = 40 mph :rolleyes:

Some drivers interpret mph as miles per half-hour …

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@lordofthemark 194169 wrote:

What would we do without internet search engines?

https://www.callahan-law.com/blog/2018/08/do-more-fatal-bike-crashes-happen-on-rural-or-urban-roads.shtml

“The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has published helpful data on fatal bicycle accidents that occur across the country. According to the NHTSA, data from 2010 to 2015 shows that a majority of bicyclist fatalities occurred on urban roads, as opposed to rural roadways. During this period, 69.6 percent of bicyclist fatalities were in an urban environment, while 30.4 percent were in rural areas.”

I don’t have the data at hand, but the urban cyclist fatalities surely do not contain the same fraction of “motorist overtaking bicyclist, non-intersection” as the rural ones do.

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Perhaps human-powered riders are less likely to notice juiced bikes when passing them than when being passed by them? Ditto for e-bikes where the battery is used for assistance, not as the whole power source?

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I’m even more cautious of people exiting fast-food drive-thrus. They’re often more attentive to their newly acquired treats than they are to anything beyond their windshields.

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Me: riding northbound on N Irving St, approaching the intersection with 5th St N a few minutes before 10am today
You 1: driver who has trailed me northbound for about three blocks, now trying to pass on my left
You 2: bicyclist eastbound on 5th St N, only looking left, making the right turn onto Irving without stopping, now suddenly facing a driver head-on at close range
Both of you: slamming on your brakes, narrowly avoiding a collision.

Observation 1: That speed hump might have prevented a serious injury today.
Observation 2: Drivers, please don’t pass at intersections.
Observation 3: Drivers, perhaps Irving St isn’t your best route if you’re in a hurry.
Observation 4: Everyone, please look both ways when turning to the right.

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@Steve O 194090 wrote:

This is on page 18 of the same document:

How far to the right?
Bicyclists should not hug the curb or road edge since this position makes bicyclists less visible to motorists, promotes unsafe motorist passing, and exposes bicyclists to various hazards. While bicyclist are required to stay “as far right as safely practicable,” it is clearly not practicable to share travel lanes less than 14 feed wide with autos. Bicyclists should position themselves to maximize visibility and vantage and to discourage motorists from turning right into them. Bicyclists may use the shoulders or take the lane.

Nice find.

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@dasgeh 194076 wrote:

Yep, there. Chief Farr claims the lane is 12 feet wide, and reasons that a bike is 3′, an average car 6′, so there’s room for a car to pass with a 3′ buffer if a bike is as far right as possible. He claims that it is better for the bike to be right so that a car will pass on the right side of the double yellow, because there is a blind hill. I disagree.

It has yet to be brought up… I’ve been mulling possibilities.

An average car may be six feet, but trucks, SUVs, and buses are wider. Riding to the right encourages dangerous passes by larger vehicles. And it also encourages dangerous passes even by smaller vehicles that will certainly not be driven right on the yellow line due to fears of a head-on collision. Not to mention the obvious dangers of the curb and grate.

The rule of thumb that I recall learning for deciding whether a lane should be taken or whether it can be safely shared side-by-side is 14 feet. ShareVARoads.org’s guidelines, endorsed by VDOT, stipulate that a cyclist should take the lane whenever the lane is “of ordinary width (10-12 feet)” (see “Take the Lane”, page 10). I’m not aware of any relevant court ruling though.

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@dasgeh 194065 wrote:

ACPD still harasses cyclists with rules that are unclear (recently a woman was stopped for not hugging the curb on Marshall Drive, where there’s a grate on the curb and a blind hill) and when asked, the police chief defended the officer), so these aren’t meaningless issues.

Are you referring to Marshall Drive eastbound from Fort Myer downhill towards 110 (where there is a grate at the bottom of the dip before a short rise)? That lane is far too narrow (11 feet maybe?) to share with a motor vehicle, and any cyclist should claim the whole lane. I hope we have weighed in with ACPD?

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@dasgeh 194065 wrote:

@scoot 194021 wrote:

I do however think that the setting should be a factor, with different limits for streets vs. trails vs. sidewalks. Bike lanes should be considered as part of the street, with the same speed limit as required for automobiles. Certainly for un-“protected” lanes, such as those that are immediately adjacent to vehicles, it would be absurd to set a different speed limit. However, I could be convinced that PBLs belong in the trail class with a universal 15-20MPH limit; many PBLs are unsafe at those speeds anyway due to turning conflicts, visibility obscurations, and proximity to pedestrians. I also think it’s reasonable to set a lower speed limit for sidewalks than for PBLs/trails.

The problem with this approach is that there are too many gray areas in Arlington today. E.g.
– is the Custis in Rosslyn a sidewalk or a trail? What about the westside Rte 50 beside Fairfax Drive near the Red Lion Hotel? Or the northside Rte 50 trail on the bridge over the W&OD/FMR trails? How would anyone know?
– are buffered bike lanes PBLs (e.g. Quincy near the Central Library) or “street” bike lanes? What about where there’s a PBL that have a mixing zone (northbound Quincy at Wilson; southbound Veitch at Wilson)? Or when it’s supposed to be protected but the protection gets moved (southbound Quincy near the car dealership at Glebe)?

ACPD still harasses cyclists with rules that are unclear (recently a woman was stopped for not hugging the curb on Marshall Drive, where there’s a grate on the curb and a blind hill) and when asked, the police chief defended the officer), so these aren’t meaningless issues.

Good points. My use of “should” in my first sentence was too strong… I should change it to “could”

My main arguments on this topic are:

1) I strongly oppose instituting different speed limits for different vehicle classes using the same facility. My understanding is that the draft ordinance would set a lower speed limit for scooters and e-bikes riding on streets than that which is posted for automobiles. (The lower speed limits would not apply to conventional human-powered bicycles.) There certainly do exist safety considerations relevant for riders of small-wheeled scooters maneuvering at street speeds, but these types of vehicles should never be subject to a more restrictive legal speed limit than automobiles when using the same roadway. Scooters and e-bikes have nowhere near the same capability of inflicting damage on other street users as do automobiles.

but

2) Assuming all mobility devices are treated equally, I could support different speed limits for different types of facilities. If it is possible to implement these in a transparent and comprehensible fashion. Obviously that’s a really big if (as you have duly noted with various examples), and I completely ignored those details. But it is reckless to ride any device at 25MPH on a crowded sidewalk, and I have no problem with an ordinance that would prohibit this. The (unenforceable?) 15MPH limit on area trails is itself a recognition of the fact that bicyclists need to slow down when sharing facilities with pedestrians.

As for PBLs, I could go either way, as my original post indicated. Most PBL designs in use in this region are unsafe for riding above 15MPH, so PBL users should somehow be encouraged to ride more slowly there than they might in other places. But I’m not sold on speed limit regulation specific to certain bike lanes as a useful approach for that; the downsides probably outweigh any upside.

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