I see that there’s a West St. option, just not one with a cycle track. I would have like to have seen a west side of West St. cycle track as an option.
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The West Street both side 1-way option makes the most sense as it provides the best north-south connectivity (new path under Wade Avenue bridge over Capital even provides bike access to the Five Points neighborhood).
Does anyone know if BRT is still pursuing a West St option? All the focus has been on Western/New Bern so far but I’ll be interested to see if any thought has been put into the Capital route.
The cycletrack options don’t make sense here with all the driveways along the West/Harrington St corridors.
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Dunno. Is BRT supposed to get to Union Station? I honestly can’t keep track.
Some of the options putting 2-way cycletrack on just one side and keeping the on-street parking on the other cited that as a benefit that could be transitioned to dedicated BRT lane in the future…
My memory - which could be wrong - is that West St. is not actually as wide though out its course as it is on paper. I believe there are a few spots on it that become too narrow to accommodate the road diet needed for a two-way cycle track.
Hard to tell if there was a consensus at the open house. We put green stickers on our 1st choice and bronze stickers on our 2nd choice. City is also collecting feedback through the survey.
Options 1A and 1B (two way cycle tracks on either side of Harrington) are far more expensive than any of the other options due to the required updates to traffic signals and RR crossings. The two way cycle tracks are also a bit confusing to exit. I rode the pop up track earlier last year and found that exiting the track - especially if doing so to your left - put you in an exposed, no-man’s land.
I think the hurdle to doing one-way lanes on both sides of one street is the perceived impact on parking. Essentially taking all parking from one street.
My preferred option is 3A, which puts a northbound lane on the east side of West St. and a southbound lane on the west side of Harrington. This configuration distributes the parking impact to two streets and allows cyclists to reduce exposure to cars when making a north/south (or south/north) direction change. To go from north bound to south bound you’d simply make two right hand turns and would not have to cross any oncoming lanes of traffic.
I admit that I’m not familiar with the reconfigured exit from Capital to Peace - Google maps hasn’t updated this intersection. But from what I heard last night that location is a point of concern.
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At this intersection, there’s no stop sign on the Capital ramp. The stop signs are on Harrington (I presume because the city or NCDOT doesn’t want traffic potentially backing up from this intersection back onto Capital which has higher volumes of traffic). So if you put the bike lane on northbound Harrington, there’s a potential conflict point between the protected bike lane and traffic that doesn’t have to stop for you (and due to this, I presume many drivers won’t be looking out for you anyways).
Also the good thing about doing northbound on West and southbound on Harrington is if you come up West and want to loop back down Harrington, you wouldn’t need to cross Peace Street to do that safely (as Brian mentioned).
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BRT will go to RUSBUS supporting @John’s cycle track on West St.
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The City of Raleigh is planning an initial kick-off meeting for the Phase II discussion of the Blount / Person corridor and we’re encouraging folks to attend to advocate for a protected facility to be installed along this corridor. In Fall 2019, initial bike lanes were placed down as a Phase I for this project, along with more consistent lane markings throughout the corridor. Actually having a space for people that bike on this facility is a step in the right direction, but paint is not protection, and the city must commit to providing a protected and connected bike network if we wish to make progress on our city’s climate and equity goals in place for our home.
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The Transportation Committee meeting today was really interesting. COR had representatives from electric scooter/micro-mobile companies come in and speak such as Lime and SPIN (Ford Motor Co. subsidiary).
Also bless the lady that commented on more protected bike lanes.
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Thanks to a motion yesterday by Jonathan Melton, CC will discuss protected bike lanes/network at a work session in April.
Motion is around the 3’08" mark of the meeting: Raleigh City Council Afternoon Session - March 3, 2020 - YouTube
Mayor would also like to be able to announce our first protected bike lanes in April.
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I just bought my “Greenways are the best ways” t-shirt. If you’re looking for a way to support Oaks and Spokes, these t’s look real nice. I can review it once it shows up. I mean, look how beautiful these people look in them! 
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How do we feel about this? I’m mixed right now cause I would have merged over to the left way before getting to this box.
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I don’t get it. What’s the direction and who’s it for?
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Isn’t it a left turning lane for bikers? It does seem really strange and confusing, but I guess for people who use this route often and know it’s there, it would give them a little safe island to wait for traffic in neighboring lanes to pass, instead of merging into traffic to make a left turn.
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Maybe it’s a visual guide, so people realize the green paint is a bike lane…
Obviously, it’s a bike left turn across two lanes of fast moving car traffic. They should add “Good luck!”
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Wow, yeah I agree. Kyla and I have been biking a lot since we moved downtown, and we’ve always gotten in the left turn lane way further back. This seems like a strange traffic pattern, but then again I have only really been riding these roads post-COVID so I’ve really only experienced light traffic. Maybe if they don’t put the bikers right out in the middle of intersection (where they’re forced to proceed with their turn after the light changes, to clear the way for eastbound traffic) they’d be stuck indefinitely waiting for a safe break in the steam of cars?
This makes zero sense.
That is a spot for a “box” left turn
aka a “two-stage” left turn.
To use it, you are supposed to stay right, stop in this box, point your bike 90 degrees to the left, and then wait for the light to change. It allows you to turn left without having to do any merging.
It’s in a place where there should be no through traffic, so it makes sense to me.
I have done my time cycling in heavy traffic on busy 45mph arterials. Signaling, merging, and using the left turn lanes with cars is an entirely legal option (and hardcore Vehicular Cyclists will tell you that if you aren’t comfortable with this then you have no business on a bike, but they’re full of crap.) But when traffic is heavy, doing a box left is way, way better. Even if there is no painted box, there is almost always enough space between the crosswalk and the traffic lane for it to work. Stop in front of the near (leftmost) corner of the rightmost through lane.
I first learned about this while living in Japan. There, bicyclists are allowed to (and almost always do) use the sidewalk, but mopeds are pretty common there too, so this is how you’ll often see moped riders executing a right turn (since they drive on the opposite side of the street).
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Thanks for the explanation. That actually makes sense. But the way it’s shown in the pic above, it looks like the box is painted right in the middle of the cross street, not off to the side.
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How much is car traffic down in DTR. Is it only a quarter of normal?
Must making biking such a breeze.