Why has the green bike lane on Montezuma Road been scrubbed away?

Since earlier this month, we’ve been receiving lots of emails that the green painted section of a portion of the bike lane on Montezuma Road has been scrubbed out.

Many of our readers were not in favor of the green painted section because they didn’t address the key issue that has resulted in fatalities and injuries along Montezuma Road – the high speed differential between vehicles and bicycles. Those who were in favor of the green painted bike lanes fell into the “it’s better than nothing” camp of thinking.

Putting vehicles traveling at or above 55 miles an hour alongside slower vehicles traveling at under 20 miles an hour with no road treatments to account for something human beings do all the time – make mistakes – creates dangerous and deadly conditions. We weren’t thrilled about the green paint because it didn’t address the key issue we were trying draw attention to – motor vehicles traveling at high speeds on Montezuma Road alongside slower moving bicyclists.

According to our new friend, Brian Genovese at the Multi-Modal division, Genovese stated that some cyclists were observed changing lanes to enter the diagonal section without looking behind to see if there was oncoming traffic.

We’re still pushing for some substantial treatments along Montezuma – treatments that provide a measure of physical barrier between people moving at different speeds.

We’ve been working with Councilmember Emerald’s office on this issue and we’ll keep you updated as this moves along. And we hope that the new treatments that Genovese and his staff is working on addresses this key point.

Update: Head over to KPBS and read more about this issue.