Nueces Bike Boulevard

Here's one for all your politically minded folks with flexible (or no) job schedules and nothing else to do in an hour or so:

RALLY for Austin bicycling at City Hall!

It begins with a ride from Caffe Medici on the Drag, i.e. Guadalupe St. Meet there at 10am, and depart at 10:15am SHARP. The ride will go down the beloved (if not “boulevard”) street of Nueces. We expect the ride to arrive at City Hall with time to spare.

The Nueces/Downtown Bicycle Boulevard briefing item is on the City Council agenda on Thursday, June 24th, at 10:30am or later.

Item # 104: http://www.ci.austin.tx.us/council_meetings/public_meeting_agenda.cfm?me...

It is scheduled to be the second of three items between 10:30am-12noon. The best estimate is that it will start just after 11am. Keep in touch via Twitter: http://twitter.com/lobvaustin

Since this is planned to be only a briefing and not a council vote, there will be no public input (at the microphone) at this meeting. However, we still need to show our support for bicycling in Austin at the City Council Chambers. We can give public input with our presence. By showing the dedication and numbers of bicyclists at City Hall, we will remind City Council that more and better bicycling facilities must continue to come to Austin. Bring your bike pin, bike shirt, and/or other bike paraphernalia, and let’s fill the room.

AFTER the City Council briefing, we’ll head over to Halcyon Coffee Bar Lounge a few blocks away at 4th & Lavaca Sts. Halcyon is offering a special happy hour for us. Just make sure you pick up a League of Bicycling Voters sticker to identify yourself for your happy hour discounts. (Look for Vince.) No, you don’t have to drink (alcohol), but it will be an opportunity to plot, plan, share, and socialize with your fellow interested cyclists.

I would have liked to have been there, but I’m currently in Copenhagen at the Velo-City Global 2010 (bicycle conference). Indeed, here there are many bike boulevards and cycletracks, and indeed, people on bikes, as well. So too in Austin, with dedication from all of us, we will create the Austin of our dreams, the Austin of our future: an Austin full of bikes and public people.

Thanks for organizing this Tom, even though you're suffering for the cause (ha right!) over in Copenhagen. ;) Have fun y'all!

Update: Got the following from the Bicycle Program folks:

The City Council has requested that the Downtown Bicycle Boulevard Briefing be moved from this week to the June 24, 2010 City Council meeting at 10:30 AM at City Hall.

Please contact Annick Beaudet (512) 974-6505 with any questions. More info here: http://www.ci.austin.tx.us/publicworks/bicycle.htm .

Guess we're back on for the 24th. Keep emailing and calling, folks! City Council NEEDS our input.

Yesterday the City of Austin folks informed us that the City Council meeting briefing (as in closed to public input) on the Nueces Downtown Bicycle Boulevard, which was originally scheduled for June 10th and then re-scheduled for June 24th, has now been re-re-scheduled for the 10th of June once again. The briefing happens at 10:30am, and here are the details from their "Public Input" website, a somewhat ironic name since there's not going to be any public input at the briefing whatsoever:

UPDATE 6-7-2010

DATE CHANGE FOR COUNCIL BRIEFING

The Austin City Council will receive a briefing on the final staff recommendation for the Downtown Bicycle Boulevard on June 10, 2010 at 10:30 a.m.

Over the last 6 months City staff and Austin residents have engaged in a public process to enhance and preserve bicycle mobility in the Northwest District of the Downtown. Through that process the City of Austin Neighborhood Connectivity Division produced and released a staff recommendation for a Downtown Bicycle Boulevard in April 2010.

Information and visuals related to the staff recommendation can be found below. The staff recommendation has been recommended unanimously by the following City of Austin Commissions:

Downtown Commission
Design Commission
Planning Commission
Urban Transportation Commission
Other various schools, organizations, and neighborhood associations.

For more information regarding the project or the City Council briefing to be held on June 10, please contact Annick Beaudet by phone at 512-974-6505 or by e-mail at annick.beaudet@ci.austin.tx.us

Annick Beaudet listed her contact information above, but there are a couple other people worth emailing about the bike boulevard if you want to make your opinion known at this eleventh hour. Here are the resources for contacting the mayor and the rest of city council:

Via email (sends to everyone below): http://www.ci.austin.tx.us/council/groupemail.htm

Via telephone:

Mayor Lee Leffingwell- (512) 974-2250

Place 1 Councilmember Chris Riley- (512) 974-2260

Place 2 Councilmember Mike Martinez- (512) 974-2264

Place 3 Councilmember Randi Shade- (512) 974-2255

Place 4 Councilmember Laura Morrison- (512) 974-2258

Place 5 Councilmember Bill Spelman- (512) 974-2256

Place 6 Councilmember Sheryl Cole- (512) 974-2266

Our input on this project is of utmost importance. The paradoxically named Austinites for Downtown Mobility movement (Automotive gridlock != "mobility") has been doing their part to persuade the city to neuter their plans and remove many of the improvements that would have increased cyclist safety through the corridor and actually turn the street into a world-class bicycle facility. Lets not let their short-sightedness and financial muscle keep us from making this facility something that we ALL can be proud of. Elliott over at A2W has been much more eloquent on the subject, and the comment section of his writeup is full of goodness from all sorts of folk. Read it and be informed, then write your city council members, the bicycle program staff, and anyone else in city government that you can think of. Lets have some more public input before the current neutered proposal is signed into law!

The City of Austin Bike/Ped staff just sent out notice that their city council briefing on the Nueces Downtown Bicycle Boulevard is going to be delayed one month, to June 10th. Here's the email I received:

Good Afternoon:

This is an update on the City of Austin Downtown Bicycle Boulevard Project. Please note that the City Council Briefing on the Downtown Bicycle Boulevard Staff Recommendation will be on June 10th, 2010, and NOT MAY 13, 2010 as originally planned. Also, please note that the City Council does not allow speakers on Briefings.

The last Boards and Commissions briefing will be May 11th, 2010, at the Urban Transportation Commission (UTC), 6 pm at City Hall. It is likely that the UTC will take action on the item at this meeting; they will allow speakers on this item at this meeting.

To date the Downtown Commission, Planning Commission, Design Commission, and the Downtown Austin Alliance Mobility and Streetscapes Subcommittee have unanimously supported the Downtown Bicycle Boulevard Staff Recommendation.

The Downtown Bicycle Boulevard staff recommendation, 3-D rendering of the recommendation and other information can be found here:

http://www.ci.austin.tx.us/publicworks/bicycle-public-input.htm

Sincerely,

Annick C. Beaudet, AICP
Program Consultant - Planning
Neighborhood Connectivity Division
Department of Public Works
City of Austin
505 Barton Springs Road, Suite 900
Austin, Texas 78704
office 512-974-6505
cell 512-784-3085

Thanks for the heads-up Annick. Sounds like the City boards and committees are liking the CoA staff's recommendation, so if all goes like it's been going we'll probably see minor redevelopments and markings on two streets, rather than the originally intended solid modifications to one. There's one more meeting happening on May 11th if you want to show up and make your voice heard. Otherwise you can email city council or the Bicycle Program staff themselves if you want to let them know your opinion on the bike boulevard. The time for public input is nearly over so don't fuck around.

The friendly, fearless, fighters for bicyclists' rights of the LOBV recently sent out notification of a meeting this evening that can affect the Bike Boulevard process. Here are the details:

Date: Tuesday, April 27, 2010
Time: 6:00pm - 8:00pm
Location: City Hall – Council Chambers
Street: 301 W. 2nd Street, Austin, TX

The Planning Commission will hear an update and take possible action on the bike boulevard. Show up and speak out and let commissioners know that you support the original vision for a bike boulevard on Nueces.

Details at http://www.lobv.org/nueces

Please try to curtail any anger and vitriol over this process if you choose to address the commissioners. 6pm at City Hall is the spot. Leave any contraband outside, as they may search you and your bags upon entry.

A reader sent this in yesterday:

Sorry for a lack of some of the regular event postings, or any sort of responsiveness via email whatsoever. This weekend I discovered that due to a 10 minute time difference with my server's clock and the email configuration, the server decided to stop forwarding all my mail since about March 28th. Thanks MEGATRON! I'm digging through the backlog right now and should be on track shortly. Sorry for that Harry, Matt, Ben, FF folks, and everyone else that sent me an event which went unpublished because my server can be a right bastard at times.

NEVERMIND! Turns out the information Noni based this ride on was incorrect, and they aren't presenting at city hall but instead are just releasing their recommendations online at 3pm. No ride, but go ride your bikes around anyway! Hell, what a perfect time to go roll around Nueces and imagine what we could have had...

I just heard that Noni is organizing a Nueces Bike Report Ride to get cyclists over to city hall for the 5pm Nueces Bike Boulevard recommendation. Here's what he has to say about it:

Around 5pm, the city’s Public Works Department is scheduled to announce its recommendation on the proposed Nueces Street Bike Boulevard Project. We will meet at 4:20 on PflugerBridge and ride to City Hall. We will listen and comment in a respectful manner if given a chance.

4:20 on the bridge sounds like a great place to be if you can swing it. Please do keep your commentary from sounding too insane y'all. I know we're nuts but they'll probably have press and business owners there, no need to give them ammo.

I've been hearing and reading a lot of disheartening things about the until recently titled "Nueces Bike Boulevard". Now the city has dropped the word "Nueces" from ALL formal communication and references to the project, instead calling it the "Downtown Bicycle Boulevard". You can keep up-to-date on the latest developments at the CoA's Bicycle Public Input webpage. According to Annick they're going to be releasing an official city recommendation today (keep an eye at the aforementioned link), but from what she told us at the last Bicycle Advisory Council meetings gone are the traffic calming devices or diverters originally being looked at, instead they're going to be installing green-colored bike lanes and some sharrows, and calling it a "Boulevard".

UGH. Fuck making everybody happy. I'm sure there were plenty of bummed out locals and businesses when the city tore up the beautiful and scenic East Avenue to install that big ugly I-35 split through downtown Austin, but the City did what they thought was right at the time and went ahead with their plans. Why not flex some municipal muscle again and give us a multi-use facility that isn't completely neutered?

I guess I should bite my tongue and just wait for the city's recommendation to see if my concerns are valid or not, but from the sound of the Chronicle blog we're pretty fucked. Ah well, welcome to "progress" as it actually occurs within a city who's strings are pulled by business interests and private citizens with political connections.

In a last ditch token effort which in reality means absolutely jack shit in the City's eyes the Bicycle Advisory Council passed the following resolution in a lively and heated meeting:

The Bicycle Advisory Council supports a full and expedient implementation of a bike boulevard on Nueces Street with significant traffic calming, with the specific devices and locations to be discussed at future BAC meetings. The BAC also supports roadway improvements, including traffic calming, on Rio Grande Street to provide safer access to Pease Elementary, Austin Community College and other schools and destinations for cyclists and pedestrians.

At least WE got to pat ourselves on the back, though the hollow thud that emanates from such actions is rather disheartening. Should be interesting to see the official recommendation. At the BAC meeting I DID suggest we change the name of the boulevard to the "Nueces BUSINESS Boulevard" to greater reflect the major stake-holders and players responsible for what we're ending up with, but that was met with dirty looks from the official folks. Wonder what they're even going to call this thing.

I want to make it clear after all this ranting that I DO love our City Bike Program staff and all they've accomplished over the past few years, but I HATE the debacle that the NUECES Bike Boulevard project has devolved to. They're good people doing a hard job and serving masters who just don't get it.

Between these fumbles and pretty near everyone in the entire world getting hit by cars while the cops do nothing, shit's looking pretty dismal here in Austin. Now that Live Music as we knew it is completely fucked, maybe we should change our slogan to "Welcome to Austin, the most unfriendly "Bike Friendly" cities in the world."

Want the news from last night? Well that's too bad, because I've got a meeting in 5 minutes. In the meantime, here's what the news that gets paid had to say about things:

KUT: http://kut.org/items/show/19957

Fox: http://www.myfoxaustin.com/dpp/news/local/22410-Council-Still-Discussing...

KVUE: http://www.kvue.com/news/local/Nueces-Bicycle-Boulevard-85282702.html

KXAN: http://www.kxan.com/dpp/traffic/Bike-boulevar--would-not-hurt-traffic

Aaaaaaaand here's the place to go for links to the traffic impact analysis.

Last night was wild. If you weren't there you missed some great shit.

Hey folks, I know there are a couple other regular rides that happen today, but if you're on a bike tonight for leisure and you aren't riding to the big Nueces Bike Boulevard Meeting, well fuck you. Any other night I wouldn't give a damn but TONIGHT you've got much bigger things on your plate. The meeting is at 6pm at Pease Elementary, which is within a short distance of the place the other rides meet. Come on down and be a part of the process. Show the city, the media, and the business owners how much this means not only to us, but to the future of Austin.

Oh yeah, the ride! A lot of us are meeting up at 5pm on the Lamar Pedestrian Bridge, so we can cruise up there together and get to the meeting as a crew. It'll be a good time, so get there early if possible. We leave AT 5:30, so if you're late just go straight to Pease.

Rob D'Amico of the League of Bicycling Voters just sent out a press release regarding tonight's final Nueces Bike Boulevard Meeting, and about the plan in general:

Bicyclists rally to “Build It Right!” for the Nueces Bike Boulevard

City holds final design workshop tonight, releases traffic data

The League of Bicycling Voters (LOBV) is calling on the City of Austin to "Build it Right" when designing the Nueces Bike Boulevard. To help reinforce that message, hundreds of bicyclists will attend the city's final design workshop for the Nueces Bike Boulevard tonight at 6 p.m. at Pease Elementary School at 11th and Rio Grande. The city will present results of its detailed traffic study at that time.

"The final traffic studies are in and confirm that Nueces has the ideal bicycle counts to have a successful bike boulevard, and now we just need to ensure that the best facility is designed to attract new riders," said Rob D'Amico, LOBV president. "Nueces is going to be an important pieces of an overall network of bike corridors and facilities, so we're excited to see it establishing a good foundation for the future projects."

LOBV has drafted a detailed traffic calming plan for Nueces, which uses traffic circles, pinch points, medians and speed cushions, and partial diverters to slow traffic and make bicycling safer and more accessible to new, inexperienced riders. Combined with signage, stenciled streets, public art and other identifiers, the bike boulevard will be promoted as a key corridor for commuters, students and families. "This project is all about creating a safe place for new riders, for families with kids, and everyday commuters to get downtown, to ACC Rio Grande, to major events and to the University," D'Amico said.

LOBV has more than 1,200 signatures on a petition supporting its plan, and the organization intends to rally bicyclists to lobby for its plan when the Nueces Bike Boulevard ultimately goes to City Council for approval.

For more information on LOBV's plan, see http://www.lobv.org

LOBV is a nonprofit advocacy organization promoting better transportation policy decisions, justice for bicyclists and more resources to increase the number of bicyclists in the Austin area.

Thanks for keeping everyone apprised of the situation, Rob. I'm feeling a bit under the weather today but come hell or high water I'll see y'all tonight, 6pm at Pease Elementary School. I may be sitting in the back with one of those sick kid masks on, but I'll be there.