The city of Bellingham council members have approved the proposal for the addition of new bike lanes running through the Columbia Neighborhood. In addition to the bike lanes some other improvements are to be assessed for the street as well according to city representative, Jack Weiss.
Weiss said that the entire project will be designed over the summer and will include putting bulb-outs in intersections, making pull out areas for buses and putting in a few more cross walks throughout the street. Weiss is a proponent for the bike lanes and said that he wouldn’t be surprised if the entire project will end up costing more than $250,000. Weiss said, in the fall the council will have its budget negotiation meeting and Public Works, the company responsible for the entire project, will have the design plans and tell the council for sure how much money it will cost. From there the council will decide on how much they want to spend.
“We’re not going backwards on it [the bike-lanes],” said Weiss. The question is just about how much they want to spend. “I frequently travel on that street myself along with many other bicyclists that use that road and quite frankly it’s very dangerous in a few different areas,” he said.
Weiss said that he helped in the passage of creating an urban village in the Fountain District. In it, the negotiation was that Meridian Street would focus on cars and pedestrians while Northwest Avenue would be used as a bicycle corridor for South to North travel. “If I hadn’t moved on that the bike lanes probably wouldn’t have been built for maybe another 12 to 15 years,” he said.
According to the Columbia Neighborhood Association President Mark Keller the lanes will extend from the corner of Broadway and Elm Street through Northwest Avenue and will come to an end once it reaches Interstate 5.
Northwest Avenue is a lengthy road consisting of a mix between both residential houses and commercial businesses. The addition of bike lanes means that the available on-street parking will be gone on one side of the street. As far as Keller knows, the side hasn’t been determined yet. “There are minimum widths for the road and so the road just isn’t wide enough to accommodate bike lanes and parking on both sides of the street. They will keep parking on one side of the street,” said Keller.
Generally bike lanes are required to be about 5 feet in width so the bicyclist can be at a comfortable distance from traffic. Northwest Avenue is unable to accommodate on-street parking on both sides while adding in bike lanes because the road itself doesn’t meet the minimum width requirements.
“Very little of it [on-street parking] is used, so impacts to businesses would be minimal if any at all,” said Keller.
Rianna Earl, cashier at Yeager’s Sporting Goods store on Northwest Avenue, feels just a bit conflicted about the bike lanes. “From a personal standpoint, I don’t have a car; from a Yeager’s standpoint, I think it’s a bad idea because a lot of our elderly customers park there,” she said. Earl said that even their regular customers don’t realize that there is a parking lot in the back of the store where the employees park. She thinks that people will be confused about the parking in front of the store if it is affected.
“They have ample parking,” said Keller.
Deirdra Brummer, employee at Classic Health Apparel, located on Northwest Avenue, thinks the bike lane is a great idea. “I take the bus or bike, so I like it,” she said. She doesn’t think the business will be affected at all because there is a large parking lot close by that potential customers can use. “I don’t care. I think it’s a good idea,” she said about the parking concerns.
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