News, Links, Events, and Other Views - Nov 28, 2017

Check out recent news and upcoming events from San Diego and beyond.  Have an article to share for our next News & Views post? Please email us - talk@bikesd.org. Enjoy!

San Diego

California

  • Abuse of the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) delayed bike lane projects for years in San Francisco and was employed by Uptown Planners Chair Leo Wilson against City of San Diego bike lanes. But California regulators have overhauled CEQA and "hope the new rules will spur more bike lanes and housing near transit":Under the current interpretation of the law, developers have to measure their project’s effects on car congestion — something that often stymies the installation of bike lanes because the removal of car lanes could tie up vehicles.The new effort would force projects to estimate the number of miles cars will travel on nearby roads. Since bike lanes won’t increase vehicle trips, and could reduce them, regulators hope the new rules could ease their development. The new proposal also would apply to residential construction in an effort to make it easier for developers to build pedestrian or bicycle friendly projects if they can show their projects will limit car travel.
  • Los Angeles drivers are killing pedestrians and bicyclists, while overturning road diet projects designed to save pedestrian lives.

Elsewhere

  • Safe Mobility is a Human Right – "All people deserve to safely walk, bike, take transit, and drive through their communities regardless of their age, race, ability, or background".  Here are eight steps communities can take to become more walk and bike friendly
  • Ten rules for cities about automated vehicles (AVs) - Urbanist Jeff Speck, author of Walkable City, pens an excellent article about the potential impacts of AVs on cities.  He concludes with a great shout out to the most efficient transport on the planet - bicycles. A fantastic read.

Upcoming Events

  • BikeSD Member Meetup in North Park - Your quarterly chance to connect with other BikeSD members, chat with board members, or learn more about the organization if you're not already familiar.  Event will be at North Park Beer Company (3038 University Ave, San Diego, CA 92104) on Tuesday, December 5, with doors opening at 6 PM, a short program at 7, and concluding at 9.  This will be an opportunity to thank former Executive Director Sam Ollinger for her great work with the organization and meet Interim ED John Anderson.  Please RSVP here and spread the word!
  • BikeSD Member Meetup in Pacific Beach - In 2018 we want to do a better job of connecting with the bike community across our fair city.  We'll start with our quarterly Member Meetup being held in Pacific Beach.  Mark your calendars for March Tuesday, March 6, from 7 - 9 PM and stay tuned for details.
  • The Border to Bayshore Bikeway project will connect Tijuana to San Diego Bay.  Next community meeting will be Wednesday, December 6, 2017 from 6-8 PM at Imperial Beach Library (810 Imperial Beach Boulevard, Imperial Beach, CA 91932). RSVP via Facebook here or get more project information on the SANDAG project website.

by BikeSD Staff

Will Councilmember Ward Prevent Additional Delays and New Holes to the Uptown Bikeway Project?

UPDATE: After subsequent conversations with SANDAG, Councilmember Chris Ward has committed his support to the original construction phasing.   This will allow the entire protected bikeways on 4th and 5th Ave to be completed as planned.  Construction of this segment is planned to start in 2018.    BikeSD would like to thank Councilmember Ward for the continued support of Uptown Bikeways.

Recently we learned that Councilmember Chris Ward had made a request to delay the protected bicycle lane on Fifth Ave between University and Washington from the 1st construction phase to the 3rd construction phase in the Uptown Bikeway project. This would delay the implementation by 3 years. BikeSD Executive Director Sam Ollinger and Board President Jeff Kucharski met with Councilmember Ward and his staff earlier this week to discuss this issue. BikeSD asked for Councilmember Ward to reconsider his request. Below is the follow-up email to his office summarizing our meeting and discussion.  

Dear Councilmember Ward and Ms. Bailey,

Thank you for taking the time to meet with representatives of BikeSD. As we discussed we wanted to follow up with you over email on a few items:

  1. Since the Uptown Bikeway is part of the Early Action Projects that the SANDAG committed to completing within 10 years when they voted to adopt the 2050 Regional Transportation Plan back in 2011, it is important that no additional delays or gaps be created in the network. The project has had both unprecedented community outreach and feedback (>100 stakeholder meetings). It received environmental clearance in July 2016. Any further delays or gaps in the network will only delay the project's construction and establish a terrible precedent for future bikeway projects in the region.

  2. Fourth
    Fourth and Fifth Avenue Proposed Alignments. Image source: SANDAG

    Here is a map showing the construction phasing of the Uptown Bikeway project. As we mentioned in person, delaying the Fifth Avenue segment between Washington Avenue and University Avenue is both unacceptable and unnecessary since it will create a break in the protected bikeway network. The Fourth and Fifth Avenue segments are protected bikeways as you will see here. The planned 3rd phase along Bachmann Place is different style  facility than the Fourth & Fifth protected bike lanes.  As the planned bikeway will rely on sharrows northbound from Washington to Lewis, no purpose will be served by delaying a single section of Fifth ave protected bike lane. Based on SANDAG program budget, the Third phase construction would not begin until 2021, 3 years after the Fourth & Fifth segments' construction began.

  3. Councilmember Ward, as an urban planner, you know the critical importance of mobility and urban development as key tools to attaining the goals the City Council committed to when it adopted the Climate Action Plan. SANDAG's own projections show increased population growth in District 3 and the time to ensure the implementation of a contiguous and safe bikeway network in District 3 is now.
  4. Finally we do want to express our thanks about the good news in the new bike lanes that will be striped along India, Redwood, and Jackson Drive. If you have additional information about the dates when they will be ready - we would love to write about it on the BikeSD blog.

Thank you.  Please feel free to contact us.

Sincerely,

Jeff Kucharski, Board Chair, BikeSD

Sam Ollinger, Executive Director, BikeSD

Please help us fight the good fight and sign up to volunteer for the upcoming Bikes and Beer ride on April 8th! We need ride leaders and help at registration. Thank you!

by BikeSD Staff

Join Your Community Planning Group to Make San Diego a Better Place to Ride

Once a month volunteer residents in over 50 community planning areas meet to advise the City of San Diego on land use decisions. Community planning groups (CPGs) provide guidance on a wide range of issues, from the large, multi-year community plan updates to individual residential and commercial developments. To learn more about what community groups do and how to get involved, consider attending attending our next member meetup on March 6 at Iron Pig Alehouse in Pacific Beach. Circulate San Diego will be joining BikeSD to discuss how residents can (and should) get involved in local planning groups to help create a world-class city for biking.

How to Join Your Community Group

Any effort to improve bicycling in San Diego is basically a land use decision; therefore, these groups play an important role in making San Diego a world class bicycling city. As an organization, BikeSD, encourages bicycle riders everywhere to join their community groups. While a CPG role is strictly advisory, these groups remain influential. We have highlighted a few recent examples to show how these groups have helped or inhibited our effort to improve bicycle infrastructure in San Diego.

  • In March 2015, Uptown Planners held a special meeting to address the Uptown bikeway. Despite the passionate pleas of bicyclists, the Uptown Planners supported 4 motions that weakened or opposed the planned bikeway. Less than ten weeks later, the SANDAG transportation committee officially created a hole in the planned network by abandoning any improvements in western Hillcrest.  
  • In the “Complete the Boulevard” study, the need for dedicated bicycle infrastructure were widely ignored. While city staff did study these options, they were excluded after Kensington-Talmadge and City Heights CPGs made it clear that they would only support sharrows (or no bike infrastructure) on El Cajon Boulevard.
  • The ridiculous creation of a hole in the Uptown Bikeway caused advocates to mobilize and join the Uptown CPG (including BikeSD endorsed candidates). The personnel change provided immediate sanity as the board passed a series of motions supporting a continuous east-west corridor. In a passionate defense of 4th and 5th Ave. segments of the planned Uptown Bikeway, former District 3 Councilmember, Todd Gloria, cited these changes in the local CPGs as positive sign of support for the project.
  • City staff has cited the Uptown CPG’s motion to close the “Gap” when presenting the proposed “Hillcrest Gap” solution.
  • The planned transformation of downtown San Diego’s streets, Downtown Mobility plan, was supported by the Downtown CPG. The San Diego City Council unanimously supported the plan in June of 2016.  

Every community in San Diego should be a great place to safely ride a bike. Community planning groups play a large role in whether that happens. Whether it is advocating for secure bike parking at a new development or supporting a road diet, we need support (even minority support) on CPGs. If your community has either an upcoming community plan update (Clairemont, Old Town/Midway, Kearny Mesa) or is home to one of SANDAG’s early action bicycle projects, your CPGs will play a very important role in our transportation future.  

Each planning group has slightly unique eligibility rules for elections. All CPGs hold elections in March. If you choose not to join a CPG, please consider voting (and bring friends) for bicycle friendly candidates!!

by BikeSD Staff

Is San Diego Ready for California's Climate Protection Act?

Bike Lane with Bus

State planning officials have been working to change the way traffic impacts are analyzed, from level of service (LOS), a car centric measurement, to vehicle miles traveled (VMT), a multi-modal measurement, pursuant to the recently passed Senate Bill 743.  

But is our San Diego region traffic planning world and local jurisdictions really ready to implement the change? It appears the answer is “no” for the most part, but they should be. With the adoption of SB 743, known as the “Sustainable Communities and Climate Protection Act,” the legislative intent is clear… “to encourage land use and transportation planning decisions and investments that reduce vehicle miles traveled and contribute to the reductions in greenhouse gas emissions...” The connection between vehicles miles traveled and the reduction of greenhouse gases is important to California where the main source of greenhouse gas emissions is from vehicles  

In order to achieve our climate action goals, we must drive less, which means we need to carefully locate development so that driving is not the primary mode of transportation. New development needs to be located near transit, bicycle, and pedestrian facilities. There is no better way to consider location than tracking how far people must travel to and from said location, in other words, tracking VMT.  

Here is why it is important for jurisdictions—rural and urban—to adopt the new VMT standards:

  1. First and foremost, because it will be the law of the land.
  2. Second, to start highlighting—with meaningful data—the locational concerns of proposed projects.
  3. Third, to extract multi-modal mitigation (actual physical improvements) from project developers.

This last one is important. With VMT measured impacts we can start to build actual multi-modal mitigation projects—improved bike lanes, sidewalks, and connections to transit—as a result of new development impacts. Currently, impacts to LOS only require development projects to fix or improve roads to mitigate for traffic conflicts. This shift is a very real opportunity to fund multi-modal improvements by those who are doing the developing. Mitigation where it matters! To build better sidewalks, connections to transit, and bicycle facilities. This is especially important for the City of San Diego which has just completed several Community Plan Updates and is embarking on several more. These documents are laying out future development and how those future impacts are being mitigated for . . . do we want to think in terms of mitigation for cars and delays on the roads (e.g. wider roads) or for land uses that reduce the need for those same cars on the roads?

While the state planning officials have not yet published final VMT implementation guidance, the expectation is that these guidelines are forthcoming in January of 2017. There have already been two Draft guidance documents released by OPR. The state is close. The cities of Oakland, San Francisco, and Pasadena have had the foresight and determination to adopt VMT metrics. We look forward to our local jurisdictions approaching this new requirement with the same vigor and eagerness. Let’s get going San Diego!   

by BikeSD Staff

CEQA Exemption for Uptown Bikeway

SANDAG LogoOn Friday June 22nd, SANDAG approved the CEQA (California Environmental Quality Act) exemption for the Uptown Bikeway. As expected representatives on Hillcrest Business Association and California Restaurant Association attempted to revise the design on 4th and 5th avenue between Robinson Ave and Washington St. Below are Bike San Diego Board President's  comments at the meeting. SANDAG board member comments will be highlighted in a future post.

Hello. I am Jeff Kucharski, Board President of Bike San Diego. We represent San Diego residents who simply want to bike safely in our neighborhoods. Thank you for the opportunity to speak on this important item.

The staff report is clear. The project is qualifies for CEQA exemption. Thank you to staff for a great explanation on CEQA exemption rationale.     

Despite the fact that parking impacts are immaterial to this CEQA exemption , we are going to hear a lot about parking today. As the staff reports details, there are underutilized parking garages in the contested area of 4th & 5th Ave.

In fact, a single off-street garage in the contested area has average of 151 open spaces on weekdays and 283 opens spaces on weekend. These numbers from a single garage dwarf the 23 spaces parking enthusiasts are lobbying to save. The enormous community benefit of a complete bikeway outweighs this negligible loss of parking. For our membership, the benefit of riding safely in their own neighborhood is invaluable.

Finally, I ask the board to refrain from recommending additional delays. The public outreach for this project has been extensive. I doubt any other project has SANDAG reviewed this thoroughly. While SANDAG staff are friendly, I have seen them too often over the past 4 years. I often think of how my life has progressed since this project began.

But rather than highlight my life progression as a reference point, I will use my Councilmember, Todd Gloria’s career. While this project was announced, Todd Gloria has been my city council member, council president, interim mayor and likely state assembly member before this project’s construction begins.  

So please no more delays!! There is no solution to the parking enthusiast’s inflexible and extreme demands. In 2015, they objected to university ave, 2016 they objected to 4th and 5th avenues. And 2017, their objections are TBD.   

Thank you for your time. Please approve the CEQA exemption without changes to design or timelines.

 

by BikeSD Staff