The City of Manassas is soliciting ideas for how to improve Grant Avenue at a public meeting on Wednesday 29 June 2016 at 7PM in the Georgetown South Community Center, 9444 Taney Rd, Manassas, VA. Active Prince William encourages residents to attend the meeting and provide input on ways to help make Grant Avenue a safer place to bike and walk.
GrantAve Streetview at railroad underpass
The public meeting on Wednesday is the beginning of the planning process for the Grant Ave corridor from Lee Ave to Wellington Rd. The Manassas spokeswoman who announced the project stated that the intent is to consider potential improvements to the existing public right-of-way without acquiring additional private property. The City mentioned potential pedestrian improvements as an option, but there was no mention of bicycling improvements. This is an opportunity to suggest that Grant Ave should be a safer place to ride bikes and walk.
Grant Ave Road Profile Proposal – courtesy of @FixRoute28 (on Twitter)
In its current state, this section of Grant Ave is unfriendly to bicyclists. Active Prince William’s Bicycle Comfort Level Map (http://ow.ly/c24d100cBbG) shows this stretch as “Low Comfort” due to multiple lanes of traffic, high traffic volumes, and no accommodations for bicycles along the route.
Grant Avenue StreetView at Taney Rd
See additional details from the announcement here.
According to the latest (2015) VDOT traffic counts [ http://www.virginiadot.org/info/resources/Traffic_2015/AADT_155_Manassas_2015.pdf ], this segment of Grant Ave (Business 234) carries only 15,000 vehicles/day. This traffic volume would allow the common four-lane to three-lane road diet (resulting in only one travel lane in each direction plus a central two-way left-turn lane), which would free up about 10 to 12 feet of roadway space for two conventional bike lanes (one in each direction). Such a road diet would reduce speeding (because the absence of passing lanes slows everyone to the speed of the slowest driver), further improving pedestrian and bicyclist comfort and safety.
Where mid-block left turns are not needed (and as the adjacent land use changes over time with more urban-like redevelopment), a raised median with landscaping and street trees could replace the two-way left turn lane.
That is what I plan to advocate at the June 29th meeting.
Mark Scheufler (@FixRoute28 on Twitter) has similar ideas to yours, but he will not be able to attend the meeting. The proposed road profile graphic added to this post was provided by him.
Unless there is a compelling rationale (e.g., connection to a major trail on one side of the road) or mitigating circumstances (e.g., one side of the road has no motor vehicle crossflows because it’s adjacent to a body of water, a railroad, or a freeway), two-way separated bike lanes on one side of a two-way road are seriously ill advised. Separated bike lanes carrying only same-direction bicycle traffic are problematic enough; adding contraflow-bicycling to that mix greatly increases inherent conflicts and delays at intersections, where about 80% of urban car-bike crashes occur.
By the way, I’m registered to attend the Separated Bike-Lane Design Guide Workshop at the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments this Wednesday, June 29, 9:30 am-2:30 pm (more info at [ http://www.tpbne.ws/more-news/separated-bike-lane-design-guide-workshop-coming-up-june-29/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+tpb_news+%28TPB+News%29&utm_content=FeedBurner ]. This workshop is free, open to interested members of the public, and still has some openings. To register, use the RSVP link on the page I referenced above.