Worried about sick bastards tossing down tacks to pop your bike tires or cops parking in middle of the bike lane? In a way, you're lucky. Because at last night's Manhattan Community Board 7 meeting, the board was slammed for not doing enough to meet the neighborhood's demand for bike lanes. Up there they don't even HAVE enough bike lanes to complain about.
While the UWS recently made the streets safer with 60 blocks of protected bike lanes on Columbus Avenue, residents say that one mile of protected lanes is not enough, Streetsblog reports. Mary Kelly, whose husband was killed riding his bike said ”He’s been dead for six years and I’ve been showing up at these meetings … You just want to sit and waste our time.”
The Board plans to vote on a proposal to extend the Columbus Avenue lane from 59th to 110th Streets and add a protected lane of similar length on Amsterdam Avenue. But for the next month, residents will have to sit on their hands: The committee won't be voting until it hears the DOT's proposal November 13.
CB7—not the DOT—was the main target of residents' griping at the meeting. Even Board member Mel Wymore admitted that "This committee has not been proactive to date about bike lanes." Nevertheless, board member Ian Alterman is still feeling "Really neutral about bike lanes." We'll report back when the Board votes on whether to approve the new lanes. Until then, UWS bikers can take solace that they have a fellow biking advocate in Jerry Seinfeld .
