Boston: 68 miles of bike lanes with more to come

Boston has 68 miles of bike lanes and plans to keep adding to that — even as a neighbor to the south takes away a main lane in response to community complaints.

The city has carved 60 miles of bike lanes out of its streets, most 4 or 5 feet wide and delineated with white lines, taken mainly by reducing the vehicle travel lanes, the Boston Transportation Department said. That’s on about 800 miles of city-owned roads, which doesn’t count streets owned by the state.

The city also announced an additional eight miles of “separated” bike lanes — not right on the road — this week.

A map of the bike lanes shows them snaking around various parts of the city, many around downtown, the Back Bay, Allston/Brighton and Jamaica Plain. A proposed lane in West Roxbury is causing some residents and business owners to worry about shrinking streets.

The push for more bike lanes in Boston follows several fatalities in recent years, including one last February that killed a woman from Cambridge while she was riding in the Fenway area.

But Providence, Rhode Island, just dumped more than $100,000 into a bike lane that didn’t pan out. City spokesman Victor Morente confirmed to the Herald that the city installed two-way bike lanes, which cut out lanes of car traffic, causing anger among the people who live nearby, The Providence Journal reported. Morente told the Herald that Mayor Jorge Elorza still plans on continuing his plan to add about 60 miles of bike lanes in the city.

Providence City Councilor David Salvatore said the bike lanes had made the roads dangerous.

“The roads were so narrow that I personally was almost involved in a head-on collision,” he told the ProJo.

from Boston Herald https://ift.tt/2WE5Zxh