Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Sarah on January 4, 2009 at 5:32pm

california is my favorite route that way. lots of neighborhoods and slower traffic than other southbound streets. more than enough room to ride on and good condition pavement. marquette is a good choice, too, but it would be west to kedzie from there, not east. kedzie from there is busy, but there is a shoulder to ride on.

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by jen on January 4, 2009 at 5:34pm

thanks.... i edited myself.

Pilsen, near Racine and 18th.

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by jen on January 4, 2009 at 5:36pm

Sarah- have you biked this frequently? If so, have you had bad experiences or felt unsafe? A friend of mine used to commute north of here on California and stopped biking due to her experiences.... just asking. thnx.

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Sarah on January 4, 2009 at 5:54pm

not recently, but usually about once per week throughout the spring/summer. i'm coming from much further north and would usually take halsted to archer to california. california was always my first choice for getting far southwest. i never had any experiences that made me feel unsafe other than the occasional car passing too closely for comfort--but that's everywhere. i chose this route because it was fast and has some interesting architecture/things to see (bungalows, blvds, courthouse, and churches). Also, there is a lot of pedestrian traffic throughout which might explain the slower moving traffic.

jen said:

Sarah- have you biked this frequently? If so, have you had bad experiences or felt unsafe? A friend of mine used to commute north of here on California and stopped biking due to her experiences.... just asking. thnx.

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Vondo on January 5, 2009 at 9:07am

How interesting your comment about steering clear of Englewood and such. My friend and I were talking last night about how helpful Google Maps is to get around town on bikes or in combination with the CTA. We both agreed that it would be extra helpful if there were some method of outlining on those maps the relative safety of some of those unfamiliar neighborhoods so as to be able to steer clear or feel more confident to ride through. (We've had a couple of incidents of rock and bottle throwing and such on some rides) I guess there would not be an easy way of doing that, but it wold definitely be a helpful tool to improve the cycling experience in our little town I think.

h3 said:

OK, I would definitely start out by heading south on Loomis.
Take the Lyman/Haynes connection to continue south to Racine.
I believe the construction on Racine through the stockyards is complete?
You can then take 47th west to California. Agree with California to Marquette from there, but you can experiment with Rockwell or other secondary streets as an alternative to California.
Should have asked whether you ride mountainn or road, as there are lots of tracks to cross through the Stockyards.
There's also Loomis/Lyman/Haynes to 35th, which does connect all the way west to California (becomes very secondary for the last few blocks, and basically ends at California just south of the Stevenson).

In terms of safety, you should be fine in the Stockyards, Back of the Yards, etc.-- best to steer clear of Englewood (i.e. stay north of Garfield or so until west of Western.)

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Vondo on January 5, 2009 at 4:30pm

I hear you about taking this thread off topic. I don't have experience with the tools you mention, but I think this is a topic that definitely needs an eyeballing.

h3 said:

Vando said:

How interesting your comment about steering clear of Englewood and such. My friend and I were talking last night about how helpful Google Maps is to get around town on bikes or in combination with the CTA. We both agreed that it would be extra helpful if there were some method of outlining on those maps the relative safety of some of those unfamiliar neighborhoods so as to be able to steer clear or feel more confident to ride through. (We've had a couple of incidents of rock and bottle throwing and such on some rides) I guess there would not be an easy way of doing that, but it wold definitely be a helpful tool to improve the cycling experience in our little town I think.

h3 said:

OK, I would definitely start out by heading south on Loomis.
Take the Lyman/Haynes connection to continue south to Racine.
I believe the construction on Racine through the stockyards is complete?
You can then take 47th west to California. Agree with California to Marquette from there, but you can experiment with Rockwell or other secondary streets as an alternative to California.
Should have asked whether you ride mountainn or road, as there are lots of tracks to cross through the Stockyards.
There's also Loomis/Lyman/Haynes to 35th, which does connect all the way west to California (becomes very secondary for the last few blocks, and basically ends at California just south of the Stevenson).

In terms of safety, you should be fine in the Stockyards, Back of the Yards, etc.-- best to steer clear of Englewood (i.e. stay north of Garfield or so until west of Western.)

Vando, I don't want to steer this thread too far off path before jen comes back to see her results, but I've been dreaming of a resource that shows where various sorts of incidents have taken place (I would never brand a whole neighborhood "bad", that wouldn't be fair to a lot of good people); currently the closest thing we've got is The Right Ride although it didn't really take off (I tried to share my vision with the creator to give it some useful tweaks but I wasn't able to get him to share my vision.).
It could also show resources like bike shops or other safe havens.
I don't suppose you have any experience with drupal? The Chicago Stolen Bike Registry would make a good basic template from which to build on (see maps view).

• ▶ Reply