Longfellow Bridge Bike Lane Saved, And Sidewalks Too!

By on January 5, 2010 in Advocacy, Bicycling Infrastructure, Commuting

In a victory for bicyclists and pedestrians, MassDOT today agreed to change its plans to remove a portion of the bike lane on the Longfellow Bridge in order to install sidewalks where none currently exist. Instead, MassDOT opted to build the sidewalks and keep the bike lane by implementing an alternative proposal submitted by MassBike, LivableStreets Alliance, WalkBoston, and the Institute for Human Centered Design.

Longfellowbridge_Boston

MassDOT also agreed to perform further analysis of the traffic patterns on the bridge in order to determine whether the lane configuration currently planned for the long-term reconstruction of the bridge is necessary, or if alternative proposals to provide even more space for bicycles and pedestrians are feasible (such as this one submitted by MassBike pdf). Finally, MassDOT agreed to continue the discussion with the advocates about the future configuration of the Longfellow Bridge.

Thanks MassDOT, and thanks to all the advocates for a great joint effort! Special thanks to State Representatives Marty Walz and Will Brownsberger, whose leadership on these issues is making a real difference.

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8 Responses to Longfellow Bridge Bike Lane Saved, And Sidewalks Too!

  1. matt January 5, 2010 at 3:53 pm #

    this is huge!!! thank you!! i’ll get a membership pronto!

  2. janice January 5, 2010 at 6:00 pm #

    thanks massbike! i used to bike this bridge everyday and it was a nightmare … speeding cars, glass/debris in the ‘breakdown lane,’ etc. now if we could only do something about the entrance from the charles/mgh side …

  3. Shane January 6, 2010 at 9:49 am #

    Matt: Thanks! It is from the support of people like you that we are able to do these things.

    Janice: If you read the second proposal that MassBike submitted (this was prior to teaming up with everyone else) you will see that item 4 deals with the approaches, we are not done fighting! We will continue to push to fix all the aspects of the bridge, stay tuned for more details.

  4. Ken Cheeseman January 6, 2010 at 11:22 pm #

    Bravo! Thanks Mass Bike and Livable Streets et al

    This will be appreciated for years to come by so many cyclists and pedestrians.

  5. European May 26, 2010 at 9:56 pm #

    congratulations. I live in the Netherlands and we have a lot of bike-facilities and is getting better. There are suspended bike lanes across highways. There are more bridges for bikers than for cars (and we do have lot of those).

    http://www.fietsberaad.nl/index.cfm?lang=nl&section=voorbeeldenbank&mode=openModal&repository=Tweestrooksrotonde%20met%20tweerichtingsfietspad

    The site is in dutch, but the pictures say enough.

Trackbacks/Pingbacks

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