Road Advocacy What We’re Excited About in 2022
As a new year begins, what do we have to look forward to? A lot, it turns out! 2022 promises to be an exciting one, with several projects long in the making finally breaking ground.
While there is still much to push for, we wanted to take a moment to talk about the past wins that the bike community of Marin will soon benefit from.
Corte Madera Creek Bridge – Larkspur
Easily the biggest (and biggest budget) active transportation project in the pipeline, this new 15’-wide bike/pedestrian bridge over Corte Madera Creek will replace the current narrow, uncomfortable 4’ sidewalk. Instead of having to dismount every time another rider comes in the opposite direction, riders and pedestrians will all be able to easily travel between Larkspur Ferry and Redwood Highway.
The project represents another step toward the completion of the North/South Greenway, leaving only 0.4 miles to connect to the Wornum Drive Pathway and the San Francisco Bay Trail along Redwood Highway and San Clemente Drive.
Construction is well underway with completion anticipated in late spring/early summer (the project was delayed by 5 months due to the large number of unmapped utilities found underground). MCBC will be helping coordinate an event coinciding with the opening ceremonies. Stay tuned!
3rd Street Rehabilitation/2nd Street Protected Bike Lane – San Rafael
This highly-anticipated project will provide a two-way separated bike connection between Shaver Street in the Gerstle Park neighborhood and West End Avenue (leading to the Greenfield Avenue bike route). Riders traveling between these two points must either take the lane on a high-speed road, ride on a narrow sidewalk, or travel out of the way to 4th Street.
While construction is not planned to complete until 2023, we’re eager for this project to get underway.
TAM/SMART Bikeshare
In partnership with SMART, the Transportation Authority of Marin is launching Marin County’s first bikeshare system! The system will feature docks, installed on wide sidewalks or in former car parking spaces, that will allow you to check out or park a bike. Excitingly, the bikes will be electric, and the system will be operated by the same company currently running the e-bikeshare in Richmond, which launched last year.
The bikeshare docks will be concentrated near SMART stations, facilitating first/last mile trips around town. While the locations haven’t been finalized yet in every city, you should expect to see them in Larkspur, San Rafael, Terra Linda, Hamilton, and Downtown Novato. Marin will have 150 bikes, with another 150 located around stations in Sonoma County.
The pricing will match that of the bikes found in Richmond. Users will either be able to pay as they go ($2 to unlock, plus $0.10/minute) or subscribe for a monthly fee, which includes 30 minutes of ride time per day, plus $0.10/minute after that.
An exact launch date has not been set yet, but expect to be able to ride it this summer.
Blithedale Avenue Bike Lanes
Those who have been following closely know that MCBC has been working hard on improving biking on E. Blithedale Avenue. Thanks in part to our advocacy and members like you, the City of Mill Valley will be installing flexpost-delineated bike lanes on E. Blithedale between the Mill Valley-Sausalito Pathway and US-101 in the eastbound direction and between US-101 and Ashford Avenue going westbound. This should be complete in June of this year.
Further west on E. Blithedale, the improvements will not be so marked, but there is still room to make things a little more bikeable. While we did not succeed in getting the city to question whether on-street parking is the best use of our narrow streets, there is still the possibility of getting a bike lane installed between Park School and Millwood Street. We are working on this now, and will need your help supporting the plan this spring.
Francisco Blvd E Gap Closure
Anyone who has ridden the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge knows that the bikeway connections on the Marin side leave something to be desired. Well, this year we’ll break ground on closing one of the remaining gaps.
This project, once completed, will give riders a full separate path from the bridge landing to the top of the hill at Andersen Blvd/Sir Francis Drake Blvd. We still have a long way to go on the remaining gap to connect to Larkspur Ferry. Despite updating the cost estimate early in 2021, the County has made no progress on this crucial and currently very dangerous connection.
There are a few other small projects happening around the County that we will round up in a future post. Here’s to a 2022 full of great progress toward a more bikeable Marin!
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