Bike jams are becoming a problem in the District. It seems every time I bike up to the intersection of 15th and Massachusetts Avenue around rush hour there are at least a half dozen cyclists. I have to force myself to wait in line, not push to the front, not jump the light.
These are annoyances I am pleased to endure. Washington, D.C., is becoming a great place to navigate on two wheels, and I find myself ditching my car for the bike saddle more and more. I have joined thousands of people pedaling around on two wheels.
Frankly, I have been rather stunned to see how many people are cycling our downtown streets. On any day, you can see riders astride their own rides or the red bikes from the Capital Bikeshare racks. I thought the rent-a-bikes were goofy and the program was doomed to failure. How wrong I was. The system is a raging success.
Councilman Tommy Wells has just proposed adding $2 million to the capital budget to fund 40 more stations, added to the 25 already planned.
What’s happening is that D.C. is becoming one of the most bike-friendly cities in the nation. In the last decade it has added 47 miles of striped lanes; built a dedicated biking thoroughfare on 15th Street, from V Street south to Pennsylvania Avenue; established bike lanes down the middle of America’s Main Street, from 15th Street to the foot of Capitol Hill.
We are not quite in the league of hip biking towns such as Portland, Ore., and Seattle, but we’re getting there, thanks to Mayors Tony Williams, Adrian Fenty and now Vince Gray. During the last mayoral race, bike lanes became code words for Fenty’s favoring downtown and white communities, but Gray has signaled his support by showing up at the dedication of a Bikeshare rack at the Wilson Building.
Heck, eight council members are planning to take part in next Friday’s Bike to Work day!
Dig down into the bureaucracy and you will discover that Jim Sebastian joined the Bicycle and Pedestrian division of the transportation department exactly 10 years ago. He has slowly but steadfastly executed the bike plans set forth by the mayors.
Gray reduced the bike and pedestrian budget by about 30 percent. “We can still do a lot of work for pedestrians and bicyclists,” Sebastian says. Like making sure people can walk and bike across new bridges over the Anacostia River.
As for stereotypes that black people don’t bike, Sebastian says: “We’ve had a lot of success.” The city has invested millions in the Anacostia River Trail, Marvin Gaye Park, and Oxon Run. “People east of the river are bicycling, definitely.”
A “bicycle beltway” that’s been a dream of advocates for years is close to completion. It will link the National Mall north to the Metropolitan Branch Trail to Silver Spring and the Capital Crescent Trail to Bethesda and back to Georgetown along the Potomac.
Sebastian and his colleagues are struggling to close the circuit’s few gaps, but that’s another good problem to have.
Harry Jaffe’s column appears on Tuesday and Friday. He can be contacted at [email protected].
