The hot topic at Columbus's Hilltop Area Commission meeting last night was the possible installation of bike lanes and the removal of a parking lane on West Broad in the Hilltop neighborhood. As discussed in the Columbus Dispatch on Monday, the suggestion was supported by a majority of residents but widely disliked by business owners.
The commission voted to recommend that no bike lanes be added and that street parking be retained on both sides of West Broad.
Many residents were supportive of the proposal to add bike lanes to add bike lanes along W. Broad east of Hague Avenue between Harris and Clarendon Avenues, and to remove car parking along the south side of Broad in that area. But area business owners have negative impressions of anything that is going to remove parking, assuming that will also mean a loss of customers.
Most local League of American Bicyclists Cycling Instructors were against the issue as well, supporting the premises of vehicular cycling over facilitated cycling. The League cycling education credo states that "Cyclists fare best when they act and are treated as drivers of vehicles." Vehicular cycling advocates hold that separation of cycling facilities from normal traffic facilities work against that credo by treating cyclists as other than normal vehicles.
But local facilitated cycling advocates, including many at Consider Biking, were in favor of the bike lanes, offering up the evidence that numbers of cyclists increase with the installation of bike lanes and other facilities, which leads to safer conditions for cyclists due to sheer numbers. The idea here is that drivers get more accustomed to seeing cyclists with more cyclists on the road, and adjust their driving accordingly. Vehicular cyclists respond that bike lanes incorrectly make drivers think that cyclists must operate only in those lanes, and work against the "are treated as drivers of vehicles" portion of their philosophy.
The city's Bicentennial Bikeways plan calls for the installation of 500 bikeways of various types (including paths, bike lanes, and sharrows).
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