10 Year Old Cyclist Hit by Van in Point Loma and another in El Cerrito
A reader wrote in about a collision that happened yesterday morning at Catalina and Wilcox in Point Loma.
A 10 year old cyclist was hit at Catalina and Wilcox. According to our reader,
the cyclist was hit when the van turned left across traffic hitting cyclist coming in opposite direction. Cyclist was hurt but was told she would be ok. That is all I know. Be careful on Catalina at all times!
According to our source, the cyclist that was hit was an aspiring youth cyclist who was just 10 years old. The young cyclist was taken to the hospital. The cyclist's father was also riding with his daughter when the collision happened. He declined help offered by fellow cyclists. I can only imagine that the father must have been terribly shaken by the incident.
The other source reporting this collision states that the "cyclist suffered from fractured leg and collar bone, which police said were not life-threatening."
Our source stated that the Chevy van responsible for the collision was a government issued van driven by a Navy enlisted man. From the looks of van in the above photo, it is a miracle that the young girl is even alive.
A second cyclist was hit near SDSU campus yesterday when a Hyundai driver struck the bicyclist as he tried to pass her,
The 23-year-old woman sustained non-life-threatening facial fractures
If you have any additional information about either of these two collisions, please do leave a comment or email admin@bikesd.org
We send the both cyclists and their families our thoughts and wishes for a speedy recovery.
Rose Creek Bridge: A Work in Progress
Editor's Note: The following article was written by Robert Leone of the Knickerbikers, San Diego’s Bicycle Touring Club and board member at the San Diego County Bicycle Coalition.
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One of San Diego's problems with bicycling infrastructure is the long gap of time between the conception of a project and its execution. A typical case is the Rose Creek Bikeway and Pedestrian Bridge. The San Diego Union-Tribune article notes this bridge has been studied, planned for, held up, in progress, on the table, and so on, for about 20 years. If you're able to view multiple web pages at once, you might want to click on this link to an "artists [sic] rendering of the Rose Creek pedestrian bridge in Mission Bay Park."
Make no mistake -- the groundbreaking ceremony is a ceremony. It featured politicians in suits, wielding light gardening spades spray-painted gold, with an artistically arranged earth mover as a backdrop. That earth mover itself was a clean, nearly dust-free showpiece, with the construction equipment yellow equivalent of a pricey Joe Bell bicycle paint job. There were signs. There was press. There was a lot of dirt. And there was Mission Bay Park, tantalizingly out of reach across the mouth of Rose Creek, an urban waterway and flood control channel that is a primary drainage for University City. Annoyingly, there was no actual construction. Within an hour or so of the photographic opportunity for elected officials, the shiny, scratch-free tractor was being chained to a flatbed and whisked away. Would actual construction happen? Would non-motorized travelers through San Diego's paved jungles get their long-planned path from the eastern end of Pacific Beach Drive into Mission Bay Park?
If you take a look above, you'll see the Rose Creek Bridge as of the 28th of July, 2011. In three calendar months, piles have been driven and supporting girders welded into place. Wooden forms are under construction for the cement pour for the roadbed. And it'll be wide, too. We can look forward to a facility for non-motorized travel that can accommodate joggers, dog-walkers, families on bikes, skateboarders, rollerbladers, hand-cyclists, and others who'd like to enjoy the many amenities of Mission Bay Park without braving the narrow sidewalk, curb steps, substandard width, steep slopes, sharp turns and rough pavement of the Rose Creek Bike Path between Mission Bay Drive and Grand Avenue, the freeway-frustrated motorized traffic on Grand Avenue itself, and the long door zone that is Olney Street. If you have that artist's rendering from the first paragraph open, you can compare it to the actual bridge in the picture. There's a lot of work left to be done, but it really is a work in progress.
By the way, below I'm including another, gratuitous picture from the 28th of July, showing Rose Creek Bridge construction. Enjoy!
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Previously on BikeSD.org: Announcement of the Mission Bay Bridge Groundbreaking News Conference
Tomorrow at 10:30 AM - Mission Bay Bridge Groundbreaking News Conference
Tomorrow at 10:30 AM at 2211 Pacific Beach Drive, District Two's Kevin Faulconer will be joined by the city's Bicycle Coordinator, Jim Lundquist to announce the groundbreaking of a long-awaited bridge that will complete the 10-mile Rose Creek Bike Path around Mission Bay. Kevin is expected to be joined by numerous walkers, joggers and bikers. Both Faulconer and Lundquist will be riding to the news conference by bicycle.
In the press release I received a copy of, Faulconer was quoted as saying, that the bike path and bridge "will provide a safer route over the creek by keeping pedestrians off Grand Avenue. I’m certain it will become a wonderful addition to San Diego’s beach communities."
As is typical for San Diego projects when it comes to modes of transportation not involving the automobile, the $6.8 million project – paid for with state grants and local transportation dollars has been in the planning stages for more than a decade. Construction is expected to be complete in early 2012.
If you do make it to the news conference, do take some photos and send it in or submit it to our group on flickr.
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Details: Tomorrow at 10:30 AM – Mission Bay Bridge Groundbreaking News Conference
Location: 2211 Pacific Beach Drive
Work Underway Along Santa Fe Street
I received this via email:
The project schedule and work hours have been changed due to a large boulder that crews encountered during the boring process in mid-November. New work hours will be Monday to Friday from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. And Sunday to Thursday from 6 p.m. To 6 a.m.
The product team anticipates a new project completion date of February 2010 due to delays in AT&T's schedule for relocating its equipment
As stated in previous correspondence, the antiquated sewer line running adjacent to Rose Canyon Creek will be replaced by a new pipeline along the west side of Santa Fe Stret from Damon to the bridge at approximately 5181 Santa Fe Street. The replacement pipeline will ensure a cleaner creek bed in the future and eliminate the potential for environmental damage from line ruptures.
City plans to ease traffic on Rosecrans by studying the problem
Despite some minimal progress toward fixing roads in San Diego, traffic gridlock and ill-maintained (and the never maintained) roads remain a constant source of irritation for the city's cyclists.
Rosecrans Street is one of the busiest streets in the city with an average daily traffic of up to 100,000 vehicles. The city of San Diego, with help of a $300,000 grant from CALTRANS, has finally decided to ease the traffic problems on Rosecrans by studying the problem. The study could take years and any changes as a result of that study - that much longer.
However the good news is that the "goal of the study is to identify short-,mid- and long-term projects that will improve pedestrian access, bicycle facilities and accessibility, transit operations and facilities, and traffic flow in the corridor."
To date, the study has found that the lack of infrastructure, including a lack of bike lanes, has caused many to ride on the sidewalk. Additionally, based on weekday counts, the following intersections were found to have the highest amount of bicycle traffic:
- Rosecrans / Pacific Highway
- Rosecrans / Kurtz
- Rosecrans / Laning
- Rosecrans / Moore
- Rosecrans / Sports Arena
- Rosecrans / Nimitz
The study has also found that just striping a bike lane may not get usage by bicyclists as the speed limit on Rosecrans is too high for the more vulnerable riders such as children to be comfortable and feel safe while riding. Speed limit reductions and other traffic calming measures that can be implemented on Rosecrans Street are under consideration by the city.
The city is welcoming comments from the public. You are invited to submit comments to the city or contact the Project Manager, Oscar Valdivieso at ovaldivieso@sandiego.gov