What's this doing in the bike lane?
Share your pics, videos, streets, stories of what you find in the bike lane of the non-bike variety that has an impact on your ride and/or your safety. I've decided to keep it a little more open ended - cars, snow, buses, garbage, cabs, etc. If they shouldn't be in the bike lane, go ahead and add it to this thread. Please be safe if you are taking pics or video! :-)
My hope is that we can collectively build some evidence of what we see when riding in the city with the overall hope of better enforcement of "bikes only" and improving maintenance.
Update: More Hashtags to Capture Vehicles in the Bike Lane
With popular hashtags:
#BikeLaneShaming
#LaneSpreading (Chicago Bike Selling)
#ClearTheWay (ActiveTrans), there are many options to capture violations.
We think you should use ALL of them AND post your photos on The Chainlink. ;-)
Views: 83835
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by HumanPoweredTransportation on
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It would be fun sometime to just go collect all the paraphernalia that is parked out in the street right around 3pm and set up a hidden cam of the fun that ensues.
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Permalink Reply by April on
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On 12/19 I noticed a car wash company , "Splash Hand Car Wash" (5108 N Milwaukee Ave, Chicago, IL 60630) was using the bike lane on Milwaukee avenue as a lane for idling cars waiting their turn to be washed. I had to leave the bike lane in oder to pass the 6 cars that were lined up blocking the lane. Photos attached.
The driver of the front car gave me the finger when he saw I was taking a photo. I smiled and said "Happy holidays!" I have noticed this behavior in the past and I fear it may be a regular practice for this company. Considering it's against the law to park or drive in the bike line, it can't be legal to use the bike as a queue!
I reported it to 311 and emailed to cleartheway@activetrans.org (but the email bounced).
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I would report this to the police and email the transportation engineer and the planning department, and the members of council for this ward about the negative impact the drivers using this business are having on people biking. Perhaps a (partly) protected bike lane for this block would be warranted.
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Permalink Reply by Kevin O on
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Yes, I have seen this regularly at other car washes, too, unfortunately. I have witnessed this at the Clybourn Express car was on Clybourn just north of Fullerton, which is striped as a buffer protected bike lane. I have also seen this at the Automatic Car Wash on Damen just south of Bryn Mawr. This is not a striped bike lane, but it is recognized as a signed bike lane in the City of Chicago bike map. This section of Damen is also regularly used by many of the local competitive cyclists as they ride back into the city from training rides in the north suburbs.
Other than enforcement, I don’t know if there is really an effective solution to this; and even enforcement is not likely to even happen at all and would require constant attention. It looks like for all three of these car washes it would be possible to eliminate some parking and create “No Parking” zones just upstream of the entrances to the car wash. I don’t know if that’s even something the City can do (or a precedent that they want to set) or if the other local businesses would push back against the City for removing street parking spaces.
I agree that it might help to report this to the Ward/alderman and go from there.
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If this is the repeated result of this style of business, then perhaps the city should not allow as many of these businesses or be very specific to where they are allowed.
Since the City of Chicago is not able to remove parking meter spaces from the supply, but if this area is non-metered parking and the City was to allow it to be used for 'standing only' the City would need to CHARGE the business for the space its customers are using, even if just 8a-6pm or whatever.
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Permalink Reply by Anne Alt on
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- Yes, this is an issue with LOTS of car washes. Seems like a tailored solution is needed in lane usage approaching this type of business, as well as enforcement. I like your idea.
The current system isn't working, as so many of us have observed.
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My commute takes me down Elston to Milwaukee to Rover North, and I pass at least 4 car washes, all of which present this same issue. There are 2 car washes between Lawrence and Irving Park on Elston that are particularly bad; I've counted up to 10 cars in the queue/bike lane, and drivers on this stretch are pretty aggressive, unfortunately, making the move in to the traffic lane dicey at times.
It really is a planning problem that the city has chosen to ignore. I've thought about the parking removal as a solution, as well, but agree that may not be doable. Not sure what possibilities there are from a practical standpoint.
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Permalink Reply by Bob Kastigar on
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This is right across the street from the 16th District Police Station!
A policeman could just WALK across the street and start writing parking tickets. This would send some people away.
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Permalink Reply by Jeremy Bloyd-Peshkin on
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Not - strictly speaking - the bike lane, but the H&R Block on Milwaukee just west of Ashland has decided to jump on the "ghost bikes as advertising" bandwagon by painting an old broken bike a faded, pale green and chaining it to a streetlamp by their storefront.
There aren't too many things that make me really, genuinely angry. This is one of them.
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