San Diego City Council Adopts City's First Bicycle Advisory Committee
Earlier this week, on Tuesday, San Diego's City Council unanimously approved the creation of the city's first Bicycle Advisory Committee. This was a goal that was originally proposed in the 2002 city adopted bike plan, the city's second plan to accommodate bicycling.
Getting this committee established was one of our goals for our second year of existence (we launched as an organization in 2012). The composition of the committee calls for each Councilmember adopting one appointee and the two appointees made by the Mayor. Districts 4, 6, and 7 do not have a representative yet, so if you live in these neighborhoods now would be a nice time to get to know your elected representatives at City Council.
The current members of this new advisory committee include the following:
- Petr Krysl, involved with bicycling planning in UCSD where he is also a professor, representing District 1
- Nicole Burgess, who has been asking for improvements on Nimitz for as long as this website has been in existence, representing District 2
- Michael Brennan, the founder of San Diego Streets for People and a board member and a voice of reason at the Uptown Parking District representing District 3
- Kathleen Keehan, former executive director of the San Diego County Bicycle Coalition from 1999 to 2011, representing District 5
- Randy Van Vleck, Active Transportation Manager at the City Heights Community Development Corporation, representing District 9
- Andrew Hanshaw, current executive director of the San Diego County Bicycle Coalition and founder of Bike the Bay, representing District 3
- Kyle Heiskala, who led a successful student fee referendum at UCSD for bus and light rail access representing District 3
- and myself, Samantha Ollinger, representing District 8.
If you're not sure what all the District numbers mean, here is a link to a neat map that visually shows the entire city and its council districts.
At the Council session on Tuesday, the item to approve the committee was scheduled to be on the consent agenda (essentially voted on without any discussion), however frequent Council Chambers visitor and occasional mayoral candidate, Steven Greenwald, asked for the item to taken out of consent and open for discussion. He was the only member of the public who spoke about the item and he spoke in support of it. He voiced support for "designated bike lanes" and asked that the city look to Vancouver for inspiration. He also talked up bike trains, which Nicole Burgess has been leading in Ocean Beach, and Veronica and Sandra have been leading in Mid-City. Greenwald also mentioned that not all drivers were "sensitive to the fact that bicycles have a place in transportation".
All councilmembers provided positive comments.
Marti Emerald (District 9) stated that perhaps even she could one day be on a bicycle, but that she was "petrified" to ride in traffic today.
Mark Kersey (District 5) thanked Kathy Keehan for her willingness to serve.
Sherri Lightner (District 1) thanked Petr Krysl for his willingness to serve.
Lorie Zapf (District 6 and soon to be District 2) thanked the entire group of committee members and recalled her experience of riding with Burgess and spoke about the needed changes to accommodate the upcoming bike share program as well and changes at Nimitz Boulevard and where the I-8 meets the dog park.
David Alvarez (District 8) spoke about the Climate Action Plan and commended the current District 2 staff that ride to their jobs at City Hall.
Ed Harris (interim Councilmember in District 2) seemed a bit surprised that the issue of bicycling had made a dent at City Hall and made generally positive comments as well.
Scott Sherman (District 7) spoke about the positive effects of seeing more people on bicycles.
Todd Gloria (District 3) stated that this was simply a formalization of the work that all of us had done to date. He also mentioned that the work done in the city to date were "modest" but wanted to see work sped up. Gloria also mentioned that the bike share program was scheduled to launch on October 30th this year. Gloria emphasized that this committee would be working with city staff to advise them on the work that needed to be done.
Emerald made a motion to approve the creation of the Bicycle Advisory Committee and newly re-elected Councilmember of District 2 (to be seated in November) Lorie Zapf seconded the motion.
$312 million updated Bike Plan passes with unanimous support from City Council
Last Monday, the update to the 2002 Bicycle Master Plan passed with unanimous support from the City Council. This plan to build an additional 595 miles of bicycle facilities nearly doubles the city's existing 510 miles* of facilities and further demonstrated our council's growing commitment to bicycling.
During public comment, two of our proposed requests were included in the motion made by Council Member (and current mayoral candidate) David Alvarez and amended by Council Member Sherri Lightner. Our request to create a Bicycle Advisory Committee to ensure the implementation of the plan was also supported by the San Diego County Bicycle Coalition (SDCBC). Our request to remove the Coastal Rail Trail alignments from Rose and Roselle Canyons was not supported by the SDCBC but was supported by the community that this alignment affected: the Friends of Rose Canyon, the University Community Planning Group and Council Member Lightner whose district includes University City. Council Member Lightner spoke to not only preserving the city's limited remaining open space but to also saving the city the huge financial and environmental expenses of building in Rose and Roselle Canyons - an amendment that was accepted by Alvarez and the rest of the council.
Melissa Garcia, Senior Planner at the City of San Diego, presented the item for council consideration by stating that the goal of the plan was to "create a city where bicycling is a choice." The goal to promote "environmental quality, public health and recreation and mobility benefits" were also mentioned. The purpose of the plan, Garcia stated, was to "maximize spending choices for implementation."
The original Bicycle Master Plan was adopted by the City Council over a decade ago in 2002. The update to the 2002 Bicycle Master Plan was prepared by Alta Planning + Design for the City of San Diego and begins with this promising statement in its introduction:
"...the updated plan provides direction for expanding the existing bikeway network, connecting gaps, addressing constrained areas, improving intersections, providing for greater local and regional connectivity, and encouraging more residents to bicycle more often."
Since 2002, most of the facilities built have been incredible and award-winning (such as the bike path around Lake Murray and Miramar Reservoir), but not effective in meeting the needs of everyday San Diegans by connecting neighborhoods to ensure daily riding in a way that is safe and comfortable. In the two years since the plan was updated, the plan went through respectable community feedback and input. Is the plan the best that it can be for current and future riders? The plan is incredibly promising and it should give everyone cause to celebrate. But a good plan alone will not transform our city. The important lesson from the last Monday's vote is that the political will is unanimous and the way forward is to ensure that this plan actually gets implemented with the efforts of a Bicycle Advisory Committee.
What will this committee do and who will it be composed of? That depends on what the City Attorney proposes to the City Council, but we'd like to have council staff, city staff, advocates and community members (including high school and college students) be active representatives. This committee will ensure that facilities get built and that the group doesn't become yet another layer of bureaucracy inhibiting the implementation of the bicycle plan. We'd like to see all facilities implemented with complete transparency.
In this year alone, our council members have demonstrated incredible leadership. Interim Mayor Todd Gloria was the first to lead on the issue. Gloria has been very receptive to feedback, ideas, and has demonstrated a willingness to lead in a way that has not been seen before in San Diego. Council member and Land Use and Housing Chair Lorie Zapf's Council Resolution has provided us with much needed leverage to ensure accountability from the city staff in implementing bicycle infrastructure in the city. We have also learned how to listen to communities (such as the Friends of Rose Canyon) that seek us out and explain their concerns. Our success in transforming this city into a world-class city for bicycling depends on meeting the needs of our current ridership and being open and receptive to the feedback we receive from potential riders.
The next steps are not only to create the Bicycle Advisory Committee, but also to ensure that the plan is implemented. How will that happen? That will be the work for BikeSD's second year. Thank you for joining us on the ride.
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City Council Unanimously Passes Resolution Prioritizing Bicycle Infrastructure Improvements in the City of San Diego to Enhance Public Safety
By now you may have heard the news from last Tueday about the unanimous City Council vote on the Resolution prioritizing bicycle infrastructure improvements to enhance public safety that got some excellent coverage on Fox 5. The Fox 5 coverage included an accurate visual depiction of how our riders have to play a dangerous game of frogger in order to navigate the various freeway ramps that litter our city.
First, a thank you. We want to thank Councilmember Lorie Zapf for rising up and pushing the issue. We reached out to her after David Ortiz died in her District last year. We encourage you to contact Councilmember Zapf and the other Councilmembers (Alvarez, Gloria, Kersey, Lightner, Sherman), who voted on this resolution to thank them as well. Councilmembers Kevin Faulconer and Marti Emerald were not present last Tuesday.
After our first meeting with Councilmember Zapf's staff, we presented the case on why the I-805 and I-5 ramps on Balboa Avenue (and Clairemont Mesa Boulevard) needed to be redesigned. Councilmember Zapf, as chair of the Land Use & Housing Subcommittee agreed to prepare a resolution addressing our concerns. The original draft (.doc) that was sent to the City Attorney for review contained this paragraph which was then removed prior to being voted upon at the Land Use & Housing subcommittee and then later at the full City Council meeting.
WHEREAS, our San Diego community has experienced too many instances of bicycle related collisions in the public right-of-way. In high risk conflict areas for cyclists, such as the heavily traveled I-805 and I-5 freeway interchanges, the City should utilize all methods for increased safety such as shared lane markings known as “sharrows” on narrow roadways without bike lanes, innovative pavement markings such as bright color bike lanes for better visibility by motorists, and to maintain pavement surfaces to acceptable conditions, AND
Without this specificity included, we felt that the resolution didn't really have anything tying the resolution to actual change or project implementation. Our main concern that we raised in January was the deadly design of the freeway on/off ramps along Balboa Avenue and Clairemont Mesa Boulevard - language that was struck out by the City Attorney's office. The resolution that was voted upon last Tuesday did have some good language which indicated that Councilmember Zapf and her staff was paying attention to what we write about here especially as part of our "Foto Friday" series, but the resolution by and large missed the point we were trying to raise about the freeway ramps.
However, we do realize that we are fortunate to have a very supportive and encouraging City Council championing our mission to create a livable San Diego while supporting our goals to implement world-class bicycle infrastructure in order to make our vision a reality. While elected officials elsewhere make asinine statements about bicycling and then backpedal when cornered, we're lucky to have elected representatives who apparently were just waiting to be asked to support our mission.
While the resolution was being discussed, Councilmember Alvarez pointed out out that a Capital Improvement Programs with up to $40 million in funding could be applied to some bicycle projects around the city. He asked that Ed Clancy, the City's new Programs Manager for Bicycle Initiatives to get some projects implemented quickly. Clancy stated that he'd been meeting with us and other transportation and built environment advocacy groups on this issue in order to do just that. Councilmember Alvarez also restated his desire to see some national experts come down to San Diego and see through some actual projects built. The archived transcript and video of last Tuesday's Council session is available at the City of San Diego's website for your perusal.
Council President Todd Gloria ended the discussion item by stating the following offering some perspective (edited from the transcript for readability):
The last time you came, we asked for you to keep coming back. This is how you will make forward progress. I want to thank you Ms. Zapf for her leadership on this issue. The fact that city council is discussing this is change. When I first got on the Council over four years ago, there weren't too many members on the council talking about biking. Ms. Zapf I appreciate your interest in this issue. With regard to the concerns about whether or not we are making forward progress, I think I may see a bit of perspective. I recognize the frustration.
This isn't about a nice weekend jaunt for most of you. This is your means of commuting and your means of commuting is not safe. I understand exactly where the comments are coming from. That said, in my first term, there were no sharrows in the city of San Diego. We got over that hoop and now there are hundreds across the city. We had no bike corrals almost a year ago and now we have four. They're all in my district. You need a couple in yours. They are worth getting. We have a bike sharing program that's on deck and we'll start, I believe, this summer. The mayor has championed Ciclovia or CicloSDias as he likes to call it. And I believe that's on deck for later this year. Additionally, probably most importantly, is that we are having the conversation and moving forward with a number of regional bike projects. Two, particularly in my district. One of the uptown area and the other in the north park city area. And as Ms. Zapf mentioned, that's going to be difficult stuff but I'm there with you. I'm willing to consider road diets. I'm willing to eliminate parking to make space for bikes. We're willing to do that difficult work but you can't just be on twitter, you can't just be on facebook and you can't just yell at people who are supportive of you. You need to be at those community meetings advocating for bikes. Because I promise you the other side will be there as well.
So let's keep the focus on where we're at. A lot has happened. It may not feel that way especially when your livelihood and safety is at stake. You have a mayor who is outspokenly in favor of biking and I appreciate that the mayor's leadership on this has been remarkable.
You have a Council who through this vote just will signal its support and to Mr. Alvarez's point the question is less about what more funds we can put in for bike infrastructure but the funds that are going to road repairs and making sure whatever roads are capable of handling a bike lane actually receive a bike lane when it is paved. And that's something that I think is incumbent upon Mr. Clancy and his role to look at those lists and figure out where that's done. It's not additional money, it's just a can of paint down the street to provide that safety. It can be just that simple.
I think this is the council, all of you already know is passionate about infrastructure, biking is part of our neighborhood infrastructure. We're making progress, you've seen it with sharrows and bike corrals. You're gonna see it with bike sharing and CicloSDia, with these mobility projects in my council district and elsewhere. By the way the two in my district have a price tag of roughly $2 million just for design. So getting to Ms.Zapf point, that's not even building anything but that's money that's there. It's budgeted and it is in there and it will be there when the time comes. With this resolution today, I hope we're not just designing this stuff but we're going to build it. When the City Council for the City of San Diego weighs in what I expect will be unanimously a signal will be sent both to the mayor's office and SANDAG that there better be money for these bike projects. Once the community finishes its dialog, determine what streets it wants to paint these Class I bike lanes on and let's just get the job done. Everyone wants to see this happen and that's what this vote is about today.
Randy Van Vleck of the City Heights Community Development Corporation asked Brian Genovese of the City's new Multi-Modal Division what this resolution symbolized and he responded,
The resolution is symbolic in the sense that it commits the City to emphasize the need for bicycle infrastructure. The gesture is important because it creates awareness and a commitment by council to back the Mayor’s agenda. TEO is already taking steps at implementation through re-striping efforts in conjunction with the overlay program (low hanging fruit).
