Tag: M-St

disconnected bike network

Dan AllisonLeave a comment

A recent article on CapRadio: Sacramento’s bike network received a failing grade. City officials disagree was also reference on Streetsblog California.

The People for Bikes analysis on Sacramento is at https://cityratings.peopleforbikes.org/cities/sacramento-ca. Note that only cities are rated, not counties, so there is no rating for unincorporated Sacramento County. Sacramento’s score was 36, Rancho Cordova’s 29, Folsom 37, Elk Grove 23, West Sacramento 25, and Citrus Heights not scored.

The lead photo on CapRadio is a concrete-separated bikeway on Broadway. But it is only one block long, and is the only one in the city.

A quote from Jennifer Donlon Wyant is revealing of exactly the problem with Sacramento bike facilities:

“M Street from Sac State to Midtown through East Sacramento is known to be an all-ages and abilities bikeway connecting schools and health care and retail, and that is shown as a high-stress facility,” she noted. “When known low-stress facilities like this are showing up as high stress, that concerns me.” 

Yes, parts of M Street are great, and should be recognized with a neighborhood or greenway status. Though it is an overly wide street along much of its length, traffic is slow and light, and it meets the definition of a low-stress bikeway.

However, what happens at either end? Approaching Alhambra, M Street ends, with no bike lanes on Alhambra, and no wayfinding for how to shift to a low-stress route to continue westward. At the east end is Elvas Avenue, one of the most hazardous bike routes in the city. Bicyclists exiting onto Elvas Avenue from 62nd Street must cross four lanes of high-speed, high volume motor vehicle traffic to reach the safety of the Hornet Tunnel and SacState. Most bicyclists cross early and ride against traffic. It is slightly less hazardous to go westbound to M Street. There is no wayfinding for how to best deal with this situation.

The city has been aware of the Elvas problem for years. Nothing has been done. This blog has written about it many times: tag:Elvas-Ave.

All of the parking-protected, separated bikeways in the city are discontinuous:

  • 10th Street northbound: starts at W Street with an awkward transition from east side to west side; ends at I Street
  • 9th Street southbound: starts at I Street; ends at Q Street; design is very inconsistent with bike lane-only blocks
  • P Street westbound: starts at 21st Street; ends of 9th Street
  • Q Street eastbound: starts at 9th Street; ends at 21st Street
  • J Street eastbound: starts at 19th Street; ends at 28th Street
  • 19th Street southbound: starts at H Street; ends at W Street with an awkward transition from east side to west side; at Broadway the route transitions to Freeport Blvd with no bike facilities
  • 21st Street northbound: starts at W Street with an awkward transition from east side bike lane to west side separated bikeway; ends at H Street with a semi-protected bike signal

For few of these routes do the separated bikeways take you to a final destination. There are transitions to regular bike lanes, or no bike lanes at all, at the ends of each segment. That is not a connected network. It is disconnected!

Almost every advocate in the city is supportive of Jennifer Donlon Wyant and all she has accomplished to make the city more bikeable, more walkable, more livable. However, the city policy, by staff at a higher level, and city council, to spend almost none of its general fund on transportation safety, and to rely only on state and federal grants. means that the city will continue to rank low on any assessment of bicycle friendly.

Sacramento needs a connected network, and we are far from that.

Google map of Elvas Ave from 62nd St to Hornet Tunnel
Google map of Elvas Ave from 62nd St to Hornet Tunnel

Folsom Blvd alternative

Dan AllisonLeave a comment

The city has proposed a Folsom Blvd Safety Project.  See previous post on that project. I would like to present an alternative to the bicycle facilities aspect of this project, improvement of the M Street corridor. M Street, and related streets including Elvas Ave, provide an alternative route. This route is already used by hundreds of bicyclists per day, students at Sacramento State, other commuters, and recreational bicyclists accessing the American River Parkway. Folsom, on the other hand, sees very little bicycle use. This is because it feels dangerous for most bicyclists, and because it is not the most direct route for many destinations.

The lack of bicyclists does not indicate that the street does not deserve bicycle facilities. Folsom has no bicycle facilities in the section to be revised, does not feel safe for bicyclists, and is not safe for bicyclists. The classic saying is that you can’t judge the need for a bridge by the number of people swimming the river. Bicyclists deserve safety on every street.

However, since bicycle facilities are a primary feature of the project, so it is worth asking: ‘Is this the best investment of limited funds?’ I’d suggest that upgrades to the M Street corridor might be a better investment.

Neither route actually offers safe access to and through Sacramento State. M Street is a low volume, mostly low speed street, from Alhambra Blvd to Elvas Blvd, However, the section along Elvas to the Hornet Tunnel that goes under the railroad tracks, is hazardous and intimidating for bicyclists. Folsom Blvd, with this project, would provide basic bicyclist facilities from Alhambra to 65th Street. However, access to and through Sacramento State beyond 65th Street is poor. The ‘safer’ crossing of Folsom at 69th Street and Elvas Avenue is awkward, was designed for walkers and not bicyclists, and not really safe. I have observed a number of drivers blowing the red light at this crossing. After crossing Folsom, a bicyclist can jog west to Elvas Avenue, and ride that to Hornet Tunnel, though the street is very deteriorated, of widely variable width, and the entrance to the tunnel is awkward.

The map below shows both routes, M Street from Alhambra Blvd to Elvas Avenue, in orange, and Folsom Blvd from Alhambra Blvd to 65th Street. Both are of equal length. Folsom Blvd has bike lanes from Alhambra to 47th Street, and discontinuously from 49th Street to 57th Street, with nothing to the east. M Street does not have bike lanes, but is is a low volume, low speed roadway along which most bicyclists feel comfortable riding. It is a ‘low stress bikeway’. Some of the route is marked with bike sharrows. Though improvements could certainly be made to M Street, it is functional as is, as a bicycle route.

Folsom Blvd has a posted speed limit of 35 mph, and much higher speeds are routinely observed. The fatal crash was in fact due in part to egregious speed violation by a driver. The proposed project would reduce speeds somewhat due to prudent drivers, but will probably encourage passing in the center turn lane. The project would leave the posted speed limit unchanged. M Street has a posted speed limit of 25 mph throughout, and speeds above 30 mph are rare. Would bicyclists rather ride on a non-bicyclist facilities roadway with 30 mph traffic, or on a buffered and un-buffered bike lane with 50 mph traffic?

Both of these routes are unacceptable because they don’t create a safe corridor all the way to Sacramento State. However, I feel that an investment in improving the M Street corridor section along Elvas would be a better investment than bicycle facilities along Folsom Blvd which end at 65th Street.

I wrote about improving the section of the M Street corridor between 62nd Street and Hornet Tunnel earlier this year: Elvas Ave and Hornet Tunnel. I don’t have a cost estimate for this project.

I am not saying the the Folsom Blvd Safety Project is a bad idea, just raising the question of where funds can be best invested to improve safety and comfort for bicyclists.

M Street to Hornet Tunnel

Dan Allison2 Comments

I have long been planning to write about the extremely poor bicyclist facilities from M Street to Hornet Tunnel, which is a major access point for Sac State.

M Street is a major east-west bicycle route, with some but not all of it marked as a bicycle route. If the city used the bicycle boulevard designation, it would be designated a bicycle boulevard. M Street forms an uncontrolled T-intersection with 62nd Street, which leads a short way left to a signalized T-intersection with Elvas Ave.

Hornet Tunnel is a major access point to Sac State campus, probably second only to the Guy West bridge access on the north side.

The map below shows M Street, 62nd Street, Elvas Ave, and Hornet Tunnel, as it exists.

The route from M Street to Hornet Tunnel is heavily used by bicyclists, both students and people passing through to the American River Parkway paths. It would be much more heavily used if it were safe, but it is not.

Eastbound to campus, one must cross over four lanes somewhere between 62nd Street and the median along Elvas Ave, and then ride on the wrong side of the street to reach Hornet Tunnel. Westbound, it is not bad, only having to merge over the northbound lanes to a dedicated left turn lane to 62nd Street. The signal here is surprisingly responsive to bicyclists, so the wait is usually short.

At the 62nd Street & Elvas Ave intersection, Elvas is 62 feet wide, 70 feet with sidewalks. There are shoulder stripes setting off unofficial parking, one southbound lane, one center turn lane, and two northbound lanes. At 64th Ave, Elvas is 68 feet wide, 76 feet with sideewalks. At Hornet Tunnel, Elvas is 63 feet wide, 77 feet with sidewalks, with two northbound lanes and three southbound lanes, two of which are dedicated right turn lanes to 65th Street. Elvas was formerly wider at Hornet Tunnel, but some sidewalk was added there to ease crowding at the tunnel entrance/exit. Given the city-preferred, though unnecessarily wide 11 foot travel lanes, there is room for six lanes of traffic here! That means there is ample room for bicycle facilities. But there are none present.

Some bicyclists take the striped shoulders to be bike lanes, but they are not. The city’s 2018 Bikeway Master Plan shows this section of Elvas between 65th Street and Hornet Tunnel as a Class 2 (on-street) bike lane, but this is false. It is not indicated as such with either pavement markings or signage. Though the shoulder stripe southbound has the dashed marking often used to indicate a bike lane approaching an intersection, this is a fake. It is NOT a bike lane. People park along this stretch, so even if it were a bike lane, it would not be safe nor meet minimal standards for a bike lane.

Solutions

What street redesign and reallocation would make is safer for bicyclists?

First, for northbound bicyclists, there should be a separated bikeway on the right side of the street. Along this section, there are four driveways and a stretch of street-oriented perpendicular parking (where vehicles enter directly into parking spaces from the street). There is a section of 270 feet with no existing buildings. Though there could be parking protected bikeway along here, I don’t think the parking is even needed. Instead, this is probably a good location for a curb separated bikeway, with hard curb to prevent encroachment on bicyclists. The curb would be cut only for driveways which are currently in use. The existing parking along this stretch is used mostly by students to avoid paying on-campus parking fees. All the businesses have onsite parking. The one business that might reasonably need short-term parking on Elvas is The Mill coffee shop. Separated bikeways work best with long stretches without driveways, but one here is workable.

Southbound is more complicated. If there were a bike lane or separated bikeway on the southbound side of Elvas, bicyclists would still need to cross to Hornet Tunnel, at a location where there is currently no way to do so. I see three options:

  1. First, have bicyclists ride south to the existing 65th Street & Elvas Ave intersection, and use the crosswalk on the north side to cross over and then go north to the tunnel. This is very awkward, out of the way, and encourages bicyclists to use a crosswalk, which is not illegal but poor practice.
  2. Second is to create a two-way separated bikeway (often called a cycletrack) on the east side of Elvas, from 62nd Street to the tunnel. A separate bicyclist signal phase would need to be created for northbound bicyclists to cross to 62nd Street, and southbound bicyclists to cross to the east side of Elvas Ave. An advantage to this solution is that parking on the west side of Elvas does not need to be changed, though it can be reasonably argued that there should be at least a regular bike lane here for bicyclists who are not going to the tunnel, but continuing south on Elvas or south on 65th Street.
  3. Third, have bicyclists continue southbound on Elvas, but create a clear zone for crossing to the tunnel by signalization. Northbound motor vehicles would be held by the existing signal at the intersection of 65th Street and Elvas Ave, while southbound motor vehicles would be held at a stop line just north of the tunnel by new signal heads. Bicyclists would cross to the tunnel during the red phase. There would need to be queuing area for southbound bicyclists, since they would exceed the stacking capacity of the bike lane during busy times. This option probably slows motor vehicle throughput more than the other options.

No matter which solution, the sidewalks along Elvas Ave should be repaired and widened, and street trees should be planted. And of course the street needs to be repaved.

Below is a Streetsmix diagram showing one possible configuration (looking north) with a two-way separated bikeway (cycletrack) on the east side, along with wider sidewalks and trees in a planing strip, and a southbound regular bike lane. And yes, all this fits in the existing over-wide Elvas Ave right-of-way!

the magic water fountain on M Street

Dan AllisonLeave a comment

water fountain in the M Street mini-park
water fountain in the M Street mini-park

In my previous post, I complained about the non-functional water fountains at SacRT light rail stations, but in doing so, I remembered that I’d never posted about the water fountain on M Street in Sacramento. Herewith is my paean to the M Street water fountain.

In a tiny triangle park at M Street and 48th Street in East Sacramento is a wonderful thing, a public drinking fountain. Not only is there a drinking fountain, but also a decorative fountain, and benches, and flowers, and shrubs, and a patch of grass. I stop here on every trip, whether I’m thirsty or not, just to celebrate this little corner. Sometimes I’ll stop and lie on the grass, or sit on the bench and enjoy the fountain. Other times, it is just a quick drink and on with my trip. I’ve seen mothers here letting their kids play, and retired folks just passing the time. There is always a bowl beside the fountain for dogs to have a drink as well.

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