[zsionakides]

@Judd 197779 wrote:

Yes. Similar design. I believe the Mount Vernon Bridge issue doesn’t have a weight restriction and only one sidewalk is closed. My understanding was that there was some ambiguity between the jurisdictions about who owns it which I believe has been sorted out.

I’d assume that the rebuild is part of an approved capital budget passed by Arlington but I haven’t yet started diving that deep as part of advocacy efforts.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

If a biking project is to work, Alexandria will have to be involved in putting bike lanes or a cycle track on W. Glebe. It won’t do much if just Arlington puts in a bike facility.

[zsionakides]

This seems like a bait and switch then. Promise a replacement tunnel to get cyclists and recreational users on board with the purple line and then cut it later in the process.

[zsionakides]

@reji 197042 wrote:

All new bike infra makes me happy. But in the interim, I’ll remain on high alert so I can keep dodging those nasty cement trucks.

The cement truck issue is due to a poor design on that side of the intersection which doesn’t make clear who has right of way. The fact that the cement factory has a signal light confuses drivers as it’s not obvious they don’t have right of way when it’s green. Changing their current green light to a flashing red when 4MR has a green would properly signal that they only have typical right of way for a vehicle leaving a driveway.

[zsionakides]

@Judd 196968 wrote:

I think Arlington is pretty great to ride in. I feel much safer riding in Arlington than I do in DC. Compared to other places I’ve lived riding in Arlington (and even DC) is waaaay better than most cities I’ve lived or visited. It could be much better.

I grew up biking in an a smaller city (about 100k population) that got bronze on this list, which apparently just requires existing. I felt safer riding there, as the traffic volumes on roads are much lower and drivers aren’t in such a rush and so aggressive.

I agree the trails in Arlington and DC are far better than a lot of areas, but the roads themselves are a mix of bad and really bad. DC is definitely ahead of Arlington in protected facilities such as 15th St, K/Water, and Pennsylvania Ave. Arlington has nothing of that quality nor seems to have much in the pipeline except in long term plans.

[zsionakides]

Looking at the silver list, it’s mostly a bunch of mediocre cities to ride in, which fits Arlington well. The only place in the DMV to get gold was DC, which is probably right as DC is on a much better building path than Arlington despite setbacks.

[zsionakides]

The best things I’ve found for rear and side visibility are the Nox Gear vests or spoke lights. Rear blinkers aren’t bad, but I pick up the vests a quarter mile away.

Front blinking lights in strobe mode are the worst IMO and can cause medical episodes for some people. Bright lights in front can be dangerous on trails as oncoming riders have to take their eyes off the trail. A couple times when I’ve accidentally left my headlamp in high mode transitioning to a trail, I’ve been told about it quickly, and not always in polite manner.

[zsionakides]

@n18 195574 wrote:

Coming Winter 2021: W&OD Bridge over Wiehle AVE in Reston. Should be completed in 2 years from now per PDF docs. It would be 18 feet wide:

https://www.fairfaxcounty.gov/transportation/projects/wiehle-wod-trail

Hopefully they can keep the trail open during construction. A detour along Sunset Hills is not going to be fun.

[zsionakides]

@chris_s 194528 wrote:

The 50 / 27 Interchange is going to require something truly drastic to fix its safety problems. Like, this level of drastic:

[ATTACH=CONFIG]20526[/ATTACH]

It would be inconvenient, but routing a path down to 2nd St and then back around the eastern side of 27 and 50 to connect at the 50 trail by Pershing would be a lot less dangerous and only require crossings at the 2nd St/27 ramp. 2nd St isn’t that busy even at rush hour and involves much slower traffic. It would also be much cheaper than trying to make anything fully separated directly at the 27/50 interchange.

[zsionakides]

This is great that they are starting to plan widening of the W&OD. A couple things I noticed were:
– The trail alternates between widening and the dual use trail. That would be problematic for runners/walkers as you would have to criss-cross the trail back and forth which would increase conflict points. It should be one way or the other, not both.
– There’s no widening under Wilson Blvd, which is already something of a choke point. Ideally a real crossing could be put in place for the 4MR crossing of Wilson to feed off some of the capacity when busy.

[zsionakides]

@Dewey 194330 wrote:

Arlington County Board vote to pass the Micromobility Ordinance. ebikes that meet Virginia state definition of a power assisted electric bicycle (up to 1,000w, 25mph) are permitted to ride on County multi use trails, 20mph trail speed limit, but also a new 6mph speed limit applies to ebikes riding on County sidewalks, and no sidewalk riding where a PBL is in place https://newsroom.arlingtonva.us/release/county-board-votes-to-regulate-e-scooters/

It says all these devices require a speedometer, which is not too cheap an add-on. Also I would be curious about using a speedometer with an electric skateboard. I guess you would have to carry it while riding or use a wearable.

Either way, that probably opens a fair bit of liability if you are at fault in an accident and donÂ’t have one or canÂ’t prove you were under the speed limit.

[zsionakides]

@dasgeh 194229 wrote:

These are at least valid criticisms of the study (and no, sjclaeys, I had not seen any post from you pointing this out before – I took the characterization from NovaParks). Though I don’t see how they are completely irrelevant, they seem to indicate behavior within constraints.

A study where students are riding around on campus at 8mph on ebikes capped at 15mph has no relevance on policy for MUPs where typical riders are going ~12-15mph on pedal bikes and ebikes can go 28mph.

Those on-campus shared use paths the study used are filled with students and are more akin to riding on the sidewalk than an MUP, which is why you see the riding speeds in the 7-8mph range. If you wanted to use that study to infer that ebike riders on sidewalks ride at the same speed as non-powered bikes, that would be reasonable, as the study demonstrates that ebikes slow down a lot in busy, congested corridors as do non-powered riders.

There’s a couple other references in the Nova Parks white paper that show ebikes ride 3-4 kph faster than non-powered bikes on paths in Germany and Sweden, and this is with a cap of 25kph (~15mph) and 250W on the ebikes. With 28mph ebikes being allowed on the MUPs locally, I’d imagine the real speed differential to be much higher than 3-4kph.

[zsionakides]

@Henry 194174 wrote:

FMR Trail through Benjamin Banneker Park will close for construction the week of Nov. 18, 2019 and remain closed through 3rd Quarter 2020.

View the detour for pedestrian and bicycle traffic.

Learn more about the project.

Henry

Is there a reason the trail can’t be kept open through the construction. I understand the need for a detour while it’s being resurfaced and widened or adjacent work is being done, but that doesn’t take a year.

[zsionakides]

@dasgeh 194152 wrote:

Ah, the ol’ “your study must be wrong because my anecdotal observations lead me to a different conclusion”….

That study is absolutely worthless for considerations about the W&OD or any other policy around Arlington/DC. That study was done around the University of Tennessee with e-bikes that have a top speed of 15mph – the iZip Trekking Enlightened. Also the “roads” and “shared use paths” in the study are university roads and paths heavily traveled by students, leading to really low speeds in general.

The average speeds from the study were as follows:

Vehicle type Average speed (kph) 99th percentile speed (kph)
On road
Bicycle 10.5 29.0
E-bike 13.3 32.0

Shared use
Bicycle 12.6 26.0
E-bike 11.0 25.4

Keep in mind that these are in kilometers per hours, so in mph we are talking about average speeds less than 9mph, which is entirely irrelevant to anything in this discussion or any other ebike discussion in this area.

[zsionakides]

@dasgeh 194130 wrote:

It is also contrary to what NoVa Parks found when they did a study — they found ebikes were on average slower than pedal bikes.

That study on ebike speeds almost certainly was cherry-picked and has no basis in reality on the trails in the area. I routinely get passed by multiple ebikes daily, regardless of what I’m riding, yet can count on one hand the number of ebikes I’ve ever passed. For comparison, I pass several pedal bikes daily, and don’t get passed much by pedal bikes unless I’m trailering my kids around.

With ebikes, regardless if they are riding safely, almost all of them are riding fast or really fast. The only exceptions I’ve seen are the occasional cargo bike and the Bromptoms, as they have a small motor.

[zsionakides]

@dasgeh 193563 wrote:

I was surprised to see you connect to the TR bridge rather than continue onto the main street. That’s going to make the TR Bridge suck more.

One of the unexpected side effects I’m noticing of the new Rock Creek connection at the Kennedy Center is a huge uptick in runners using the bridge (5-10X). Yesterday I even saw a couple tourists on the bridge, which I almost never see. My thought is with direct access to the Rock Creek trail, it creates a loop route with the other bridges, whereas before the TR bridge path would dump you out in the middle of VA Ave. While passing a runner/pedestrian (either way) isn’t as bad as another bicycle, every passing on that bridge requires extreme caution. Increasing bridge traffic on the TR needs serious consideration for safety improvements, as any bad incident is likely going to be fatal with the low railings.

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