Comments on: Austin’s first sharrows to be installed tomorrow

By: M1EK

M1EK — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 14:32:15 +0000

John, you’re absolutely wrong – most of the roads around here, even the major roads, get zero dollars and zero cents of funding from the gas tax (they are paid for by local funds – mostly sales and property taxes) – and even major highways like 183, 360, Mopac, etc. have gotten some local funding – so it’s cyclists who have been paying for ‘your’ roads, not the other way around.

By: John

John — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 01:35:05 +0000

If you are doing less than 10 mph under the posted speed limit, stay off my road. I say “my” road because if you are riding your bike everywhere, you are not paying the gas tax that pays for the road.

By: David Moore

David Moore — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 01:27:56 +0000

I’m going to install a sharrow on the town lake hike/bike trail with a picture of a Four-Wheel drive truck on it.
This is a bad idea.

By: M1EK

M1EK — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 15:35:39 +0000

by ‘downstream’ I mean the bike lane on the side going away from the intersection, in case that’s not clear.

By: M1EK

M1EK — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 15:33:48 +0000

The bike box treatment underway at Speedway/38th is making me nervous – the first steps appear to have been to extend the bike lanes on the “downstream” side of 38th all the way back to the intersection. This seems dumb to me; intuitively one of the primary benefits of the bike box was going to be to allow cyclists to proceed through the intersection first, ahead of the motorists/buses, to the point where the bike lane picked back up (past the left turn lane, i.e.).

Now, there’s kind of no point – barring right-turning vehicles who don’t behave, there’s no real reason for the bike box at all – the bike lane doesn’t even have the gap.

By: aaron

aaron — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 08:08:54 +0000

(oops, I’m not the same Aaron as above, btw)

By: aaron

aaron — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 08:06:36 +0000

Tim: As an Austinite who recently moved to Portland to study transportation planning, my eyes have gotten real big seeing what a bike culture similar not long ago to Austin’s has achieved in less than a decade. Studies here have shown that cheap and highly visible improvements (eg. sharrows) on what had previously been viewed as “major car routes” have made motorists significantly more aware of bikes in general, creating a generally safer riding environment. The resulting increase in two-wheeled traffic has given planners just enough ammo to push successfully for the re-synchronizing of traffic lights on a few of these “major car routes” (similar to Guadalupe and Lavaca) to a “green wave” for bikes rather than cars! Over time, people are finding it more of a hassle to maneuver their car through the city than to breeze through it on a bike, and that was a fantasy here too in the not-so-distant past…

By: elliott

elliott — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 18:55:07 +0000

Mike,
I think the recent wet weather delayed the install, but I’m not sure.

By: M1EK

M1EK — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 18:33:51 +0000

But on the other hand, there did appear to be some bike-box preparatory work going on at 38th/Speedway on Friday.

By: M1EK

M1EK — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 18:33:30 +0000

I drove down Guadalupe over the weekend, too, hoping to see some big honkin’ sharrows and was similarly disappointed.