The Chainlink

Kinzie. It's what's next.

Hopefully you've heard by now that CDOT will begin construction this week on the city's first protected bike lane: Kinzie Street from Milwaukee Avenue/Desplaines Street to Wells Street. 

 

Full story on Steven Can Plan. 

 

I want to know what you think about this.

  • What do you feel will need special attention?
  • Is this the right or wrong location for such a facility? Why?
  • Are you going to thank/congratulate Rahm, Gabe, and the CDOT Bicycle Program?
  • Will you use it?

 

Cycle track and protected bike lane naysayers, this isn't the post for you. But if you've ridden in protected bike lanes before, then I welcome your constructive comments and criticism based on your actual experiences. 

Big intersection

The new beginning. Looking southeast at the intersection of Kinzie/Milwaukee/Desplaines. 

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Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Carter O'Brien on July 22, 2011 at 11:32am

Very fair point - I definitely didn't mean to imply no public/user input should happen, just that in Chicago there are better and worse ways to go about that (a CDOT-facilitated meeting framed intelligently and with proper community outreach and notice would likely be far more productive than one Alderman X announces 48 hours ahead of time).


h333 said:

I've attended as many "public hearings" as anyone here and I know how completely useless they can be.

 

Howver, I'm not sure how this discussion got reduced to "a public input session" -- my (and presumably Steven's) frustration is a little broader than that-- it ought to be at least possible to clue us in on what's planned, and what's being factored into teh decisions on where protected lanes should go.  The confusion over the Stoney Island lane is one example-- the back and forth over whether it was cancelled was ridiculous.
Why are we groping around in the dark?


Carter O'Brien said:

CDOT seems to have a substantial # of bike ringers, so I'm optimistic - Dr. Doom's assessment that a public input session would just be derailed by naysayers is sadly grounded in the reality I've experienced.  People seem to be very motivated to show up at meetings where they want to bitch about things, especially things involving change.

h333 said:

I think Steven means that there does not seem to be any input from the bike community-- and being that Steven is well-connected to planners and the folks in the bike program, one can infer that the decision-making is so top-down that not even the bike program is directly involved.


I share his dismay that the stakeholders are not only not part of the process, but that we are relegated to hoping an industrious reporter covers the story, or that the topic is on the agenda at a monthly MBAC meeting so we can get little shreds of information.

 

Dr. Doom said:

I think you should ponder the fact that if there were public input here protected lanes wouldn't be built, because the public drives cars, thinks bicycles are stupid, and doesn't want the roads clogged up with bollards.

Steven Vance said:

I think commenters on this discussion should be more worried about where CDOT plans the next 24.5 miles. At the June MBAC, Bicycle Program Coordinator Ben Gomberg said that the first 25 miles of protected bike lanes has "already been assessed" and "will be done right away."

 

Without. Public. Input.

 

The next 75 miles will apparently be decided by the new "Streets for Cycling Plan," or I've also heard it described as the Bike 2020 Plan. Mark de la Vergne of Sam Schwartz Engineering will be leading the creation of this plan. It will "obviously" include public meetings and involvement. 

I wrote about this on Steven Can Plan.

Permalink Reply by ad on July 22, 2011 at 11:38am

Wow, I hope this is just a temporary solution.  I was wondering why the Kinzie plates seemed to bounce a bit more than any of the plates installed on the Cortland or Wells bridge.   Probably still safer than just an exposed metal grate, but it feels a bit sketchier riding on them than it needs to feel. 

Another weird thing is that the plates seem like they were measured incorrectly.  There is around a foot gap between the start of the bridge grate and the first plate when heading east.  Not sure that small of a gap will impact anything in the end, but it seems weird to leave it like that. 

 

My fear (hopefully unfounded) is that they didn't permanently bolt them down in case the City decides to scrap the whole project at some future date.  My hope has always been that even if the protected cycle track "experiment" ultimately fails, any safety-based improvements to the bridge would remain behind.    

vxla said:

^ and they're held in place by coat hangers....amazing.
Permalink Reply by Dr. Doom on July 22, 2011 at 11:46am
I take Steven's broader point, but it's just hard for me to be too put out by a lack of democracy in the process given that if we're being honest, if the project were really being run democratically it would be put on the shelf.
Permalink Reply by h' Zerocats on July 22, 2011 at 11:54am

Agreed-- I guess we're all really just barking at the moon.


We have a new benevolent dictator, who thus far has shown no sign of being any more enamored of the concept of "transparency" than the old benevolent dictator, and I have no doubt pretty much everyone in  city government is treading very lightly right now and will be for the foreseeable future.

 

The likely reality is that the decision making is in fact top-down to the extreme, and that we'll continue to find out about new protected lanes by someone noticing construction on their way to work in the morning.

 


Dr. Doom said:

I take Steven's broader point, but it's just hard for me to be too put out by a lack of democracy in the process given that if we're being honest, if the project were really being run democratically it would be put on the shelf.
Permalink Reply by Carter O'Brien on July 22, 2011 at 12:51pm

Maybe Rahm will bring some of those DC politics to the office & have locations surreptitiously leaked ahead of time.

 

h333 said:

Agreed-- I guess we're all really just barking at the moon.


We have a new benevolent dictator, who thus far has shown no sign of being any more enamored of the concept of "transparency" than the old benevolent dictator, and I have no doubt pretty much everyone in  city government is treading very lightly right now and will be for the foreseeable future.

 

The likely reality is that the decision making is in fact top-down to the extreme, and that we'll continue to find out about new protected lanes by someone noticing construction on their way to work in the morning.

 


Dr. Doom said:

I take Steven's broader point, but it's just hard for me to be too put out by a lack of democracy in the process given that if we're being honest, if the project were really being run democratically it would be put on the shelf.
Permalink Reply by Gort 12-mile Pinklegneep on July 22, 2011 at 3:38pm
A member of the administration, on condition of anonymity, commented that fart fart fart, booger booger fart.

Carter O'Brien said:

Maybe Rahm will bring some of those DC politics to the office & have locations surreptitiously leaked ahead of time.

Permalink Reply by Mike Zumwalt on July 22, 2011 at 5:02pm
It's better than the grate but those things get slick as ice in the rain. The concrete filled in bridges are the only ones I actually like.

Cameron Puetz said:
The plates were in place this morning.

vxla said:
Whatever happened to those plates that were supposed to cover the metal grates on the Kinzie street bridge?
Permalink Reply by jennifer james on July 22, 2011 at 5:42pm
I'm interested in how they will engineer new lanes as much as where. With so many ways to organize the traffic barriers  I am hoping they use something new- not bollards- to see how that works. (see the pedestrian walks on Broadway in  N.Y.( on Streeetsblog) all through the loop anyone?) I'm thankful for the new lane and hope it's just the start.
Permalink Reply by Far'arned Retrogrumpalunkus #63 on July 25, 2011 at 9:50am

The ribbon-cutting ceremony for the Kinzie Track is TODAY at 11:00AM at the Southeast corner of Kinzie Street and Jefferson Avenue.

 

Be there or be square.

Permalink Reply by Michelle S on July 25, 2011 at 12:25pm

That was definitely wrong of the cabbie and a PIA for you.

 

However, in all fairness to the cab driver, he was probably unfamiliar with the new cycle track and trying to follow the law/ordinance that requires cab drivers to pull over as close the "the curb" as possible to discharge passengers. The cycle track's new curb is the outside line next to the parked cars or buffer zone, closest to moving traffic. But given that it's a flat stripe of paint, this is hard for people to accept as a "curb".

 

I have a non-bicycling friend who drove the Kinzie stretch recently for the first time and sought me out to ask me about how it worked. She was astounded to hear that the parked cars that she described as being parked "in the middle of the street" were in fact parked in the right place. To her, they were in the middle of the street. White paint only goes so far, and it will take time for everyone to get used to new configurations. 

Cameron Puetz said:

In a new twist on Friday I had a cab drive around the bollards to let a fare out.

Steven Vance said:
USPS vans blocking Kinzie protected bike lane

Yeah, thanks, USPS.
Permalink Reply by Michelle S on July 25, 2011 at 12:36pm

Very short Trib article about the Kinzie cycle track just posted here. The headline is “City’s First Protected Bike Lane In Use.” That’s “breaking news”??

 

It has already received 65 comments in less than an hour. As always, do not read them.

 

Perhaps this part is the breaking news - I thought the Stony Island thing was a no-go:

 

CDOT earlier said it also plans to install a cycle track on Stony Island Avenue on the South Side between 69th and 77th streets. CDOT received a $3.2 million federal grant to build and test the track.

Permalink Reply by Michelle S on July 25, 2011 at 1:03pm

OK, sorry about the multiple posts. Catching up on news over lunch. I wasn't able to go to the 11:00 Kinzie track ribbon-cutting due to work commitments, but those of you who did probably already heard this announcement from CDOT that the next stretch of protected lane is on Jackson from Damen to Halsted.

 

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