Laura Glesby file photo
Safe-streets advocates at September City Hall hearing.
Make way for safe-streets upgrades to Blatchley, Bassett, Kimberly, Winthrop and Wintergreen, thanks to a newly announced $400,000 federal boost for New Haven’s plan to overhaul the city’s bike, pedestrian, and public transit infrastructure.
That new grant was announced in a Wednesday morning email press release sent out by U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal’s office.
That press release noted that Connecticut has been awarded $2.408 million through the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Safe Streets and Roads for All (SS4A) grant program.
Of that total, $400,000 will be heading to New Haven “to build upon the existing safety action plan to pursue quick-build projects,” according to the press release.
What exactly does that mean?
City spokesperson Lenny Speiller confirmed for the Independent in a follow up email that these newly awarded federal funds will be used in line with the city’s recently adopted Safe Routes for All plan.
“The city anticipates using this funding on several high-priority quick-build projects that are outlined in our Safe Routes for All plan, which include projects along the corridors of Blatchley Avenue, Bassett Street, Kimberly Avenue, Winthrop/Sherman Avenue, and Wintergreen Avenue,” Speiller wrote. “The final list of projects will be based on available funding after these projects are fully scoped out.”
The Board of Alders formally adopted the city’s Safe Routes for All plan last fall. Some of the plan’s recommendations including expanding and upgrading 90 miles of bike lanes, and making many of those lanes “protected” from cars; aligning car and pedestrian traffic lights so that pedestrians won’t have to press buttons and wait for four-way red lights before crossing the street; implementing traffic-calming interventions at dangerous intersections; adding sheltered bus stops; converting some one-way streets to two-way; and committing to a “Vision Zero” goal of eliminating pedestrian deaths.
Click here, here, here, here, and here to read previous Independent articles about the SRFA plan, and click here, here, and here to read the plan in full.
From New Haven's Safe Routes for All plan.
It's nice the city is building all of these bike lanes to downtown, but then once you get to downtown, you are completely out of luck.
New Haven's approach is the exact opposite of what most other cities around the world are doing. They start with the bike lanes and pedestrian safety improvements downtown (where there's by far the highest density of people biking and walking), and then work their way outwards.
It's unfortunate, since we'll never meet the mayor's climate or health goals if this policy isn't reversed.
It's nice that something is planned in the future for State Street, plus a couple more blocks of South Frontage Road, but it seems like those projects may take years. Meanwhile, the unprotected lane on Elm Street needs to be improved, and this could be done very quickly. Park Street (where the Edgewood Avenue cycletrack will end) would be a great street for a protected bike lane in two directions, and that also would cost relatively little.