Neighborhood Greenways

Last week at a press event celebrating the installation of 103 miles of buffered and protected bike lanes, Mayor Rahm Emanuel promised to build 50 miles of new bike lanes, including PBLs, over the next four years. The Active Transportation Alliance's new "Bikeways for All" campaign, launched on Monday, urges the mayor to double that goal.

The Chicago Department of Transportation recently held a public meeting about their clever proposal to install a contra-flow bike lane on Glenwood, between Ridge and Carmen, in Edgewater. More quietly, CDOT and the 49th Ward have been moving forward with an equally promising plan for a neighborhood greenway on Glenwood and and Greenview in Rogers Park.

Earlier this week, I reported that the proposal for a north-south neighborhood greenway in Rogers Park was left off the 49th Ward participatory budgeting ballot, but that bike-priority route is still expected to become a reality. Similarly, 22nd Ward PB voters didn’t elect to fund a proposal for an east-west greenway in the Little Village neighborhood, but that doesn’t mean the idea is dead in the water.

I was nonplussed when I checked out the results of Saturday’s 49th Ward participatory budgeting election this morning. The most exciting proposal, a bike-priority neighborhood greenway, which was discussed at a community meeting in mid-April, wasn’t one of the winning projects, since it wasn’t even included on the ballot.

The city is gearing up to add 175 more Divvy bike-share stations this year, bringing the total to 475. On Thursday, 49th Ward Alderman Joe Moore hosted a community meeting at Eugene Field elementary to discuss potential Divvy station locations within Rogers Park. The meeting also covered the proposed north-south neighborhood greenway that’s a ballot item in the ward’s upcoming participatory budgeting election. Joining Moore to discuss these projects were Chicago Department of Transportation deputy commissioner Sean Wiedel and bikeways planner David Smith.

Chicago aldermen traditionally use their $1.3 million in discretionary “menu” money for basic street, sidewalk and lighting improvements. However, this year a handful of wards are holding participatory budgeting elections. These often result in money being set aside for innovative transportation projects, and walking and biking infrastructure is a relative bargain. 49th Ward Alderman Joe Moore, who five years ago became the first U.S. elected official to pioneer the participatory budgeting process, is once again holding a PB election, and a few walking, biking, and transit projects may be on the ballot.

It's "New Bikeways Week" here on Streetsblog, and John and I will be writing up the many new neighborhood greenways, protected bike lanes, buffered bike lanes, and refreshed bike lanes installed this summer and fall. First up: the Berteau neighborhood greenway.

The Mayor’s Pedestrian Advisory Council met last Wednesday, the day after an SUV driver struck and killed an 83-year-old man in Rogers Park, then fled the scene. At the meeting, Chicago Department of Transportation Commissioner Gabe Klein, co-chair of MPAC, along with Peter Skosey, vice president of the Metropolitan Planning Council, described the crash as “gruesome.” However, citywide the situation may be improving: There have been 16 pedestrian fatalities in Chicago through July of this year, down from 20 during the same time last year, Klein said.