Cities set out to make cyclers safer

Matthew Daneman | USA TODAY

ROCHESTER, N.Y. — Riding a bike on Monroe Avenue — one of this city's main and busy traffic arteries — is about to get a little safer thanks to a few stripes of paint.

The city is in the midst of installing a trio of bike boxes — painted-off sections that give bicyclists a place to wait at the front of the line and ahead of stopped motor vehicle traffic.

Rochester will join a growing number of cities looking to provide safer travels for cyclists, including Indianapolis, Seattle, Portland, Ore., and Madison, Wis.

Bike boxes are more commonplace in Europe. Portland, Ore., was one of the first to pioneer them in the USA, said David Vega-Barachowitz, director of the Designing Cities Initiative at the National Association of City Transportation Officials.

For motor vehicle drivers, bike boxes mean stopping a few feet farther back from an intersection than before. For bicyclists, they serve as a launch pad for turning left or going straight once the light changes, so riders are more visible and aren't, for example, trying to turn left while waiting to the right of traffic at the curb.

Seattle started putting in bike lanes in 2008. Its first bike box came in 2010, and last year, the city opened its first protected bike lane, which has a physical barrier setting it apart from motor vehicle traffic. It opened its second section of protected bike lane on Saturday.

"We have a robust off-street trail system that is very recreational in nature," said Seattle Traffic Engineer Dongho Chang. "But a lot of the community members were wanting to use the bicycle for their daily routine to commute as well."

Indianapolis installed its first bike box last year. "Indianapolis is competing with a lot of other cities for that young creative class," said city Bicycle and Pedestrian Coordinator Jamison Hutchins. "And young people are not as interested in moving out to other suburbs. They're interested in an urban downtown, walkable, bikeable community. You look at other cities where young people are moving — Chicago, Portland — it's not necessarily a coincidence they have pretty robust bike networks and bike programs."

Rochester City Engineer Jim McIntosh said the city expects to have 40 miles of bike lanes on city streets by the end of 2013.

"It's really about creating a city that has all of the things modern urbanites are looking for," he said. "A lot of young people want to ride bikes to work. That's one less car causing slow downs at intersections or taking a parking space in a garage, For an urban area, there are some real advantages to trying to get that mode shift."

Not everyone or every community is automatically a fan of the greater accommodations for cyclists.

"There's always people who are not going to like the bike boxes," said DeSarra, 74, of Brighton, N.Y. "Some motorists think we're trying to squeeze the car off the road. Car is still king. It's a long time before cars are pushed off the roads by bicyclists."

Daneman also reports for the Rochester (N.Y.) Democrat and Chronicle

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