One alternative to building new roads — which California transportation experts have found only make congestion worse — are bicycle roads, separated from automobile traffic via permanent barriers and controlled by traffic signals.

Using gas tax and transportation sales tax dollars, Southern California cities are exploding with the newest transportation connection: protected bike lanes, also called cycle tracks. The city of Pasadena is about two years away from buildings its first protected bike lane.

Reduce pollution

The idea is simple: Get people comfortable enough to leave the car in the garage and ride a bicycle or scooter on short trips. Because most car trips are less than 1 mile, the distance is doable without a car. The goal? Replace fossil-fueled trips and clean the air, while reducing the amount of greenhouse gases that cause global climate change and what many scientists say already are contributing to hotter summers, fiercer wildfires and extended droughts.

Usually, cycle tracks are placed in what were once traffic lanes, sometimes called a “road diet.” Cities entertaining the cycle-centric solution often experience pushback from car-loving Southern Californians who will not or cannot ride a bicycle or hate the idea of driving more slowly.

Do they replace cars?

While clashes have occurred in many cities, the protected bike lanes continue to be installed along busy roads, spurred by state law that says reductions of statewide greenhouse gas emissions must be at least 40 percent below 1990 emission levels by 2030. Because transportation produces one-third of the air pollution in the United States and about 27 percent of greenhouse gases, vehicles are prime targets for achieving emission reduction and climate-change goals.

But just because they build it doesn’t mean people will come, cities have found.

“To go where cars dominated all the roads and go multi-modal? That is a big paradigm shift,” said Carl Blum, who helped usher in the San Gabriel Valley’s first protected bike lane in residential Temple City five years ago this month, when the city unveiled cycle tracks on both sides of a 2-mile stretch of busy Rosemead Boulevard from Callita Street to Lower Azusa Road.

The former city councilman said it was his vision to promote other forms of safe transportation, especially for low-income people who don’t own cars. Rosemead Boulevard’s cycle tracks were done by narrowing vehicle lanes — not taking lanes.

Blum says he sees “a bike rider or two” whenever he drives Rosemead Boulevard. City Manager Bryan Cook hesitated when asked if he considered the $17 million protected bike lane and streetlight upgrade project a success.

“Overall, there has been some criticism, but I think there has been success. We provided for a broader network of users, from those on a leisure ride to those getting to work or to our stores,” Cook said.

Despite being named one of the 10 best bike lanes in America by GearJunkie.com in December 2014, along with projects in Seattle and Portland, the Temple City lanes have few riders today, according to anecdotal reports. The city does not measure ridership.

Efren Moreno, a co-founder of Bike SGV, now Active SGV, and a former Alhambra councilman, said the Rosemead Boulevard lanes would be more used if the city of Rosemead to the south and the county of Los Angeles to the north had extended the project. Instead, they are an island that don’t connect to schools, workplaces or colleges, something needed to make bike transit as success, he said.

Cities moving ahead

The city of Long Beach has seven protected bike lanes. It is finishing the striping on a new one along East Broadway that took away a car lane in each direction, said Eric Widstrand, city traffic engineer.

“Yes. we did a road diet. From two lanes in each direction we went down to one lane in each direction, but added left-turn lanes so cars aren’t backing up,” he said.

Bicycle riders are protected from cars by rows of parked vehicles or by a concrete median, curb or rubber barriers, he said. The other protected bike lanes are located at Third and Broadway; Artesia Boulevard; Orange Avenue; Bellflower Boulevard, Studebaker Road near El Dorado Park and along Long Beach Boulevard over the 710 Freeway, he said.

“We found that one of the things to encourage people to ride more is to be separated from fast-moving cars,” he said. “We are definitely trying to grow the program.”

Santa Ana in Orange County is moving full steam ahead on protected bike lanes. In late December, it opened its first, a 1-mile track on both sides of Bristol Street where the rider is protected by medians and planters on one side and the curb on the other.

Santa Ana’s goal is primarily safety, said Cory Wilkerson, active transportation coordinator. About 50% of the residents don’t have access to a car. Many ride their bikes on the sidewalks, causing collisions with cars pulling in and out of driveways, he said.

“We are just trying to make it safe for the people who are riding,” Wilkerson said. “When you are riding a bicycle you are a vulnerable road user. You don’t have a ton of metal to protect you. So your comfort level riding on the street plays a big part whether you choose to ride or not or where you ride,” he said.

Los Angeles opened a two-way bike track on Spring Street on Monday.

First one for Pasadena

The city of Pasadena will hold a second community meeting Thursday on designs for a $6.9 million, two-way protected bike lane along Union Street between Arroyo Parkway and Hill Street. This will be the first protected bike lane in the city.

Because Union is a five-lane, one-way street with three through-lanes and left- and right-turn lanes, removing one through lane for bicyles is doable, said Joaquin Siques, principal traffic engineer. Also, Union operates at less than its capacity of traffic volume.

The bike lanes would be on the south side of the street and protected by raised curbs, medians and traffic signals for the bike riders and the vehicles, he said.

Members of Keep Pasadena Moving, which helped kill plans for a road diet and bike lane on Orange Grove Boulevard in Pasadena last October, are asking questions about the Union Street project but have not opposed it, group founder Frank Duerr, said.

The group has met with businesses, such as Vroman’s Bookstore and several restaurant owners in the Playhouse District who are concerned the cycle track may discourage customers from patronizing their establishments, he said. The group is also concerned about losing parking on Union Street.

“They’ve gone ahead with this plan without having to mitigate parking in this area,” Keep Pasadena Moving member Jim Houston said, adding, “There is never an option to do a no build.”

The city has received $5.6 million from SB1 gas tax dollars and $745,000 from the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority, Siques said. A smaller amount comes from developer fees.

On Thursday, the city will present tweaks to its project design from accumulated from last year’s public meeting. If finalized, it could go out to bid next year, with completion of the project in December 2021, Siques said.

Proponents, such as Wes Reutimann, senior program manager for Active SGV and a Pasadena resident, said this project is key to helping people move about the city’s downtown to catch a movie or dinner without driving a car.

“This is the most important bike project in the city’s recent history,” he said.

The Union Street project meeting is from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. Thursday at Pasadena City Hall, 100 N. Garfield Ave., Training Room S018 (basement level). For more information, contact Rich Dilluvio, senior transportation Planner: 626-744-7254 or by email: rdilluvio@cityofpasadena.net.