Fort Green-->Clinton Hill-->Bedford Stuyvesant

Samuel Ting                                                                                                                                        10/20/2013

SUS 7100B

Bike Blog Post:

Sam’s bike route: Fort Green through Clinton Hill to Bedford Stuyvesant and back

We started on the shared lane from corner of Lafayette Avenue and South Elliott place and rode along Lafayette Street where some cars may not consider bicycles when navigating a left turn.

After making a left turn on Vanderbilt Ave, I noticed shared lane signs that may have be placed too high for motorists to easily see.

After making a right turn on Willoughby St, shared lane signs were at every block along this street with an extremely faded bike lane that continued from Washington Ave until Hall St.

 A distinct protected bike path along Willoughby started from Hall Street for a few blocks until Classon Avenue where it became a bike lane with a faded outer boundary from Kent Avenue until Marcy Ave.

There were clearer bike lanes from Marcy to Bushwick Ave but a tiny pothole was noticed in the lane between Tompkins and Throop Avenues. This tiny hole will eventually become a safety issue in time. Here is a clear example of an alternative use for these lanes.

 We made a series of right turns, as per the NYC Bike Map, after Bushwick Ave that could certainly have used the addition of continuous bike lanes as it wrapped around towards Dekalb Ave. The turn into Myrtle Ave was greeted with a narrow and busy two-way street with a shared lane that is more like an “either or” lane, which may pose undue risks for some novice riders.

After making a right turn on Evergreen Avenue, we encountered an oncoming bike lane, which was the only available option outside of riding in the street.

 No apparent bike lanes from Evergreen until reaching DeKalb Avenue & Malcolm X Blvd where protected bike paths started again.

The protected bike path of DeKalb was the usual scene of commercial and residential parking on the pathway, which could be solved by additional traffic enforcement presence.

Our ride was interrupted again after Marcy by a 1 block long, green colored “protected” bike path fed into a chaotic left turn with many cars vying for pole position and causing an intersection jam. 

Further along Dekalb we observed clear evidence of the dangers of biking even in a protected bike path as seen in picture.

Riding a few blocks further we saw a row of police cars and a dumpster blocking half of the bike lane.  How can the police enforce rules that they violate themselves?

The rest of the ride from Washington Ave to Adelphi Street was fairly smooth with clearly defined protected bike paths.

The bike lanes on the return trip along Dekalb Avenue seemed to be more problematic but were more clear and defined than along Willoughby Avenue route. Some regions of protected bike paths were colored green while others were marked by white painted lines and symbols. If this was a finance- based decision, a possible compromise may be to mark the protected paths the same way as the bike lanes with painted lines and symbols but in green. The percentage of observed riders without helmets, including ourselves, were about 70% and about 19% of cyclists rode against traffic. Overall, the neighborhoods we observed had average shared and bike lanes and protected bike paths but the visible signage boosted its grade to a little above average (3.3). However, bike safety is not determined by grades but by the awareness of the rider as well as the use of helmets even though we were guilty of not wearing helmets during our tour.