Streetsblog Chicago
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Streetsblog Chicago is the region's sustainable transportation news and advocacy website. Tweets: @greenfieldjohn (unsigned) @stevevance
Chicago, IL
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Great news! Due to incredible support from readers like you, we’ve surpassed our 2023-24 fundraising goal. Once again, the generosity of walk/bike/transit boosters is fueling our reporting and advocacy.
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When you say, "It's irresponsible for people to go out walking or jogging during the pandemic, because there's not enough room on sidewalks for social distancing," what you mean is, "It's irresponsible for cities to give so much public space to cars and so little to pedestrians."
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Emails obtained via a Freedom of Information Act request revealed that Metra deputy executive director John Milano referred to the South Shore Line's Mask Optional Car as "the dumb ass car."
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Despite our earlier tweet today about great winter bike ridership in Chicago's Milwaukee Ave. protected bike lane, everything isn't peaches and cream. Come on
@onepeloton
, first the controversial "Peloton Wife" ad, and now this? Photo: Kevin Conway
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"Bike infrastructure is a waste of taxpayer dollars."
The cost to-date of Chicago's Jane Byrne interchange expansion is $600M. That's about 20 times the cost of 6K
@divvybikes
& 600 stations. Divvy has turned a net profit for the city of $2M+ for the last 4 years, $3.7M in 2017.
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Police union president John Catanzara said of the off-duty officer who fatally struck Hershel Weinberger, 9, on his bike, "Any person could be in his shoes." But witnesses say the cop ran a stop sign. Why hasn't he been cited or charged?
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We could make Chicago much safer for families by creating a citywide grid of side streets w/ traffic diverters. Drivers could access destinations on side streets, but not use them as crosstown routes. Yes, motorists would have to tweak their habits a bit, but it would save lives.
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Chicago's not "a car city," it's a multimodal city where almost 1/3 of households don't own cars. We have the potential to have great conditions for transit, walking & biking.
@chicagosmayor
wants to make gas cheaper. What's her plan to offer better alternatives to driving? (1/2)
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Here's the new Jersey Wall protected bike lane on Wacker, installed as a temporary detour between Dearborn and Clark while Dearborn bridge is rehabbed, photographed by a reader.
Wouldn't it be great if we had (safer, parking-proof, quick, cheap) bikeways like this citywide ASAP?
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A common argument: "It's stupid to spend money on building physically protected bike lanes. Nobody uses them during the winter."
That's not the case. This is what Chicago's Milwaukee Avenue looked like this morning in about 25 degrees F. Photo:
@RudyFaust
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Mayor Lightfoot has boasted that Chicago was the only big city that didn't cut transit service during COVID – on paper that is. However, a data analysis found that since early December the Blue Line has only run about 52% of scheduled runs.
@TransitCenter
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"Why do we bother spending money on bike infrastructure? Nobody uses it during the winter."
Yesterday, after a storm dropped several inches of snow on Chicago, causing *very* messy conditions, the
@divvybikes
system saw 1,868 trips. Photo: Clint Midwestwood
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*Me on a first date*
My brain:
Don't say it
Don't say it
Don't say it
Don't say it
Don't say it
Don't say it
Don't say it
Don't say it
"If we converted two lanes of every four-lane Chicago street to bus rapid transit, everyone would get around more safely and efficiently."
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We do. There are trains above you.
-SV
Complete and total post
#Lollapalooza
gridlock on Wabash.Shouldn't
#Chicago
know how to handle this?!
@cbschicago
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Lightfoot is touting $100+ e-helicopter service to ORD instead of making Blue Line service more frequent and reliable. And if we really want express service to the airport, here's away to do it relatively fast and affordably using existing infrastructure.
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Yesterday Lightfoot proudly announced free CTA rides for children on the first day of school, sponsored by a cooking oil company.
Meanwhile San Francisco made an investment that will allow all kids to ride Muni free *all year*. Chicago needs to catch up.
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During tonight's mayoral debate, when asked about improving the CTA Brandon John's response focused on improving reliability and staffing, while Paul Vallas said "Public safety is the overriding issue."
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Anti-protected bike lane folks argued Chicago's many new PBLs would be a mess after snow, and TBH we were worried too. So it's great CDOT has introduced this "Tiny Plower", spotted this morning on Augusta in West Town.
Photo: Kairsten Thies, taken while waiting for a red light.
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Randolph & Dearborn in Chicago. Gotta love the intersection of two protected bike lanes, with a Dutch-inspired intersection treatment. -JG
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.
@ABC7Chicago
reports that the driver who killed NEIC ceramicist Don Heggemann on his bike Monday in a bike lane at 5115 N. Damen and failed a Breathalyzer was recently released without charges.
Our previous coverage of the case:
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Do any other U.S. cities have commuter railroads like the
@southshoreline
from Chicago to South Bend, IN, that are coddling COVID deniers?
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Awful news. The bike-truck crash this morning at Leland/Winthrop reportedly involved the death of a small girl riding in a child seat on the back of her mother's bike. The mother was uninjured. This is the 2nd child crash death on/near Leland in a week.
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Smart: The city of Chicago is banning ride-share pickups and drop-offs in the area bounded by Ohio, State, Roosevelt, and the lake during Saturday's St. Pat's river dyeing and parade along Columbus. That will encourage transit use and decrease congestion.
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We looked at
@WGNTV
's new report on the Augusta Boulevard protected bike lanes, in which random people, like this driver taking her kids out of an illegally parked vehicle, claim the lanes are dangerous.
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Quite a conversation starter: IDOT and CDOT released renderings of N. DLSD with parkland and beaches dramatically expanded through infill. While the highway's excessively car-centric 8-lane footprint is retained, some of the images show bus lanes.
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Here's the drone footage of Thursday's
@bikegridnow
DLSD "die-in" you've been waiting for. 🤯
Streetsblog writeup of the DLSD shutdown.
Chicago, we deserve better than the scraps of safe streets infra that
@chicagosmayor
,
@ChicagoDOT
, and alderpeople give us. We deserve a safer and more equitable way to get around our city. We deserve a Bike Grid and we will keep jamming till that happens.
#bikegridnow
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After Mayor Lightfoot announced unhoused people would no longer be allowed to spend the night at O'Hare, the aviation department confirmed that police now ask 'L' riders for a boarding pass or work badge before allowing them to enter the airport.
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During today's PM on Chicago's Milwaukee Avenue, there appeared to be at least as many, if not more, people on bikes as in cars.
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I wish the city would do something about all these dockless cars strewn in the bike lanes.
-SV
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.
@CTA
proposed doing 'L'-speed bus rapid transit on Western and/or Ashland in the early 2010s, but the project was shelved after a backlash from some drivers and merchants. Could it be revived under the next mayor?
Western Avenue ‘L’ Line. Think about how massively this one often-proposed project could transform Chicago’s transit network by making it no longer just a hub-and-spoke system
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City of Chicago: "Build a citywide expressway system? Sure, we can tear down neighborhoods and do that in about a decade!"
Also COC: "Build a citywide bikeway system? Hold your horses! We need OKs from 50 alders in our weird ward system, and it will take 30+ years and counting."
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Brandon Johnson's transition plan's transportation committee report proposes lowering speed limits to 20 mph on arterial streets and 10 mph on residential streets and other outside-the-box ideas to improve traffic safety and equity,
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This Tribune article about a new study that found (surprise!) Chicagoland congestion is horrible mentions traffic-inducing expressway widening as a possible "solution," but does not contain the words "transit," "public transportation," "CTA," or "Metra."
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John felt the need to point out the irony that the CTA didn’t provide a FOIA response about board members' transit use for months, and then finally did so on the day when he was knocked unconscious in a bike crash and unable to read it.
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Paresh Chhatrala, 42, struck on his bike Saturday night on Madison in the W. Loop by an intoxicated driver who crossed into oncoming traffic, has died. Ald. Burnett, who ordered the removal of planter medians, called the case "a very unfortunate accident."
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This is a nice surprise! Sure, these are just flexi-posts that a reckless motorist could easily drive over without scratching their paint job. But this is more-or-less the first-ever example of a traffic diverter installed in Chicago to make biking safer.
Motorists are now blocked from going west on Dickens from Cannon Drive, or crossing/turning from Lincoln Park West heading eastbound.
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Vlogger
@Nerd4Cities
previously praised Chicago as the best affordable big city. But in a new clip he rightly calls out Chicago for having the worst waterfront highway in North America. DuSable Lake Shore Drive is a nationally-known civic embarrassment.
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Tragic news: Gerardo Marciales, 41, the Divvy rider who was struck by a BMW driver at Balbo/DLSD, has died from his injuries. Police say the motorist "instead of turning left according to the traffic signal, continued north," but he wasn't cited.
#bikeCHI
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Thread: Very sad news. Former CDOT acting commissioner and traffic engineer John LaPlante has passed away as a result of the coronavirus. Throughout his 45+ year career, John was a friend to sustainable transportation. Here's a message from the ministers at his church.
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.
@Chicago_Police
officers often park in bike lanes when there's an easy alternative, such as curbside space, where they could park without endangering people on bikes. It would be great if a CPD memo was issued reminding officers not to do this. Photo:
@kalereceptacle
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Chicago's City Council just designated Milwaukee between Logan and Sacramento as a Pedestrian Street, banning car-centric land uses that degrade conditions for walking like big box stores, and strip malls.
More info on P-Streets:
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Have you noticed there have been relatively few complaints from drivers about the Kennedy lane closures? Increased transit use, including a significant ridership boom on four Metra lines, is partly to thank for that.
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Here's why nobody hangs out and spends money in the area next to the United Center after games and concerts -- it's a wasteful
#ParkingMoat
.
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We need to get away from the notion that there are only certain locations, near parks and schools, and only at certain hours, where drivers need to hit the brakes "for the children." Instead, we should enforce non-deadly speeds at all times, everywhere in the city, for everyone.
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John was injured while on a bike tour in Southern Illinois on Friday [posted by
@stevevance
]
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If 44th Ward's
@AldLawson
wants to give Streetsblog more info about exactly why the city chose to swiftly dismantle a pedestrian safely project
@ThePeoplesCDOT
did at Cornelia/Elaine in Lakeview, we're all ears.
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"Why did the city spend money to build protected bicycle lanes on Clark Street in Edgewater? Nobody rides bikes in Chicago during the wintertime."
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It was bad enough that the city approved a new Amazon warehouse in Bridgeport, adding more truck traffic to the SW Side. But the removal of the Halsted bike lane to enable super-easy left turns by truckers adds insult to injury, endangering cyclists.
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Nice!
@ChicagoDOT
is starting the Milwaukee Avenue protected bike lane project from North/Damen to Western/Armitage, including sidewalk extensions and bus islands Monday.
Background:
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Sweet: "This summer,
@DivvyBikes
will launch a new environmentally-friendly method of rebalancing its bike fleet using two new pedal-assist “Bike Trains.” These bike trains hold 16 bikes when full and will replace two of the... blue vans that move bikes around the city."
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Update on the case of NEIU ceramicist Don Heggemann, 59, killed on his bike on 10/23 at 5115 N. Lincoln by a driver who fled, then failed a Breathalyzer. More than a month later, the motorist has been charged with felony DUI. Details below.
Background:
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Unfortunately, Chicago officials haven't figured out that having nice car-free public spaces isn't just something we should do during a global pandemic.
Every time I visit Fulton Market I get angry all over again. Chicago trashed a pleasant pedestrianized dining block to create 15 FUCKING PARKING SPACES.
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The new bikeway on 1.3 miles of Augusta from Milwaukee to Western demonstrates that curb-protected bike lanes should be the *default* for Chicago bikeway design.
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Police News Affairs essentially confirmed that an officer driving an SUV ran a stop sign in Humboldt Park without lights or siren activated, striking a person on a bike. But it's unclear if the cop will face disciplinary measures.
#bikeCHI
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An officer who had just left the House of Blues in her SUV jumped the sidewalk and slammed Maria Schwab, 56, into a fence. The cop then reversed, and Schwab fell to a lower-level patio and died. Why did it take hours for the driver to be given a DUI test?
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Heartbreaking: A ghost bike has been installed at Leland/Winthrop, where Lily Grace Shambrook, 3, was run over on the back of her mother's bike last June by a Mondelez semi driver, after a ComEd trucker blocked the bike lane. Background on the case:
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100s came to today's Walk + Roll to honor Rafi Cardenas and Lily Shambrook, toddlers killed by drivers this month in Chicago, and demand that officials take bold action to create safer streets. Writeup soon on SBC. In the meantime, here are thoughts on the event from attendees.
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.
@chicagosmayor
, in the event of civil unrest this week, please don't respond with bridge lifts and shutdowns of transit and bike-share again, which are counterproductive to public safety and hurt essential workers and transit-dependent residents the most.
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Chicago bike advocates are distributing 200 free bicycles to migrants to help them get around our city and earn money making deliveries, but so far that's just a drop in the bucket. What can the city of Chicago and CDOT do to help out?
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Lightfoot's budget calls for reducing the fine for parking in bike lanes. Kudos to
@AldReilly
for pointing out that would be the wrong thing to do a time when bike fatalities are on the rise.
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It appears that once again a driver who failed to stop for bike trail traffic at a flashing beacon trail crossing has seriously injured or killed a cyclist. EB driver, 92, critically injured man, 27, biking S. across Devon near Kedzie on Valley Line Trail.
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Whether Lake Shore Drive has 6 lanes for drivers or 10, they're going to get jammed with cars during rush hours. So let's convert 2 of the existing 8 lanes to dedicated bus lanes so that more *people* (rather than vehicles) can be transported efficiently.
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Neighbors often complain that protected bike lanes like the new Dearborn Street lane on Chicago's Near North Side slow down first responders. But the fire department told us they haven't heard of any problems.
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Good news: Chicago is set to legalize high-capacity electric cargo bike delivery, which could help cut down on the number of large, gas-guzzling trucks and vans downtown.
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Video from a reader: An SUV driver drove onto Lakefront Trail at Belmont, did a 3-point turn where the bike and ped paths split, and drove back to the intersection. This seems to happen often at Belmont. Maybe better signage and/or guardrails are needed?
@ChicagoParks
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Chicago mayor Rahm Emanuel just told us that the day after he leaves office on May 20, he will depart on a 1,000-mile bicycle trip around Lake Michigan. No, he won't be camping. "I'm 59, man. I want a shower the next morning."
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CDOT plowed the Dearborn 2-way protected bike lane this morning, and then Friedman Properties had their maintenance folks push all the snow from their sidewalk into the bike lane. Leave the snow on the sidewalk near the curb please! Photo: A Streetsblog reader
#bikeCHI
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Looks like
@ChicagoDOT
did a good job of plowing the Randolph Street protected bike lane, but maintenance folks from the 151 N. Wacker building dumped a mountain of snow in the bikeway.
@cbrepropmgmt
, could you please ask them to clear the bike lane? Thanks. Photo by a reader.
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Sustainable transportation advocates agree: During a time of climate crisis, it's messed up that Chicago and Illinois officials want to use federal infrastructure funds to expand the Ike and other Illinois highways.
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It was pretty hilarious that a person in Lincoln Park, where household incomes are twice the Chicago average, protested Saturday's Dickens Greenway Churros and Chill ride with a sign reading "Bike Lanes Are Elitist."
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We have claimed, for transportation purposes, that the center two lanes and median of Ashland Avenue will be used for a gold-standard BRT line from 95th to Irving Park.
Additionally, we hereby claim the Dearborn Street corridor strictly for use as a pedestrian/bus/bike route.
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Chicagoans: Could we please get more frequent and reliable Blue Line service to O'Hare?
@chicagosmayor
: $100 helicopter rides to the airport coming right up!
Sick of the L and expressway traffic? A California-based company wants to skip the hassle with air taxis to O'Hare.
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Awful: A driver killed Samuel Bell, 41, on an e-bike Thursday afternoon near MKE/Morgan. He was the 8th cyclist killed in Chicago this year, the 2nd bike rider killed on MKE in 2022, and the 2nd cyclist killed on MKE in River West in recent years.
#bikeCHI
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Just awful: A delivery driver fatally struck Joshua Avina, 15, at 62nd and Austin in Clearing. The driver, who failed to exercise due care for a person in the road, was *not* cited. Joshua was the 4th Chicago kid killed by a driver this month.
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Why is Chicago's transportation commissioner shilling for Elon Musk's proposal to build an O'Hare Airport express using nonexistent technology?
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Great news! SBC deputy editor
@stevevance
is serving on Chicago mayor-elect Lori Lightfoot's transition committee, providing input on transportation. Along with SBC's
@Lyndab08
&
@yfreemark
, Steven published a proposed sustainable transportation platform for mayoral candidates.
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Here's what the curb-protected bike lane near Harrison/State in the South Loop looks like right now. This has been going on for years. The longterm solution is for
@ChicagoDOT
to redesign PBLs to make them difficult to park in.
#HateTheGameNotThePlayer
Photos by Alex Mazarakos
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-In 2008 a driver killed Tyler Fabeck on his bike at Logan/Western.
-In 2018 ATA published safety upgrade recommendations for the location. CDOT, IDOT took no action.
-Today a driver killed "School of Rock" actor Kevin Clark on his bike at Logan/Western.
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Three students from Chicago's Back of the Yards College Prep wrote an open letter to
@chicagosmayor
Lori Lightfoot arguing that
@cta
service should be free for CPS students.
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Wild: During an action to force northbound drivers to stop running red lights during the walk signal at Balbo/DLSD, police manually changed the signal to accommodate motorists, making pedestrians wait longer to cross.
@samwightt
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Sevilla, Spain, roughly the population of Boston, built a citywide network of protected bike lanes in 12 years and increased mode share by 452%.
Chicago has built PBLs for 11 years, and this is what our PBL network will look like at the end of 2022. 👎
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Hey, if we're going to have drivers endangering Dearborn bike lane users by forcing them into traffic, at least they're delivering mail and using electric vehicles, right? 🙄
CDOT and Ald. Reilly, how about installing a concrete curb here? Thanks!
Photo: Steven Vance
#bikeCHI
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The
@nbcchicago
piece on Dickens is disappointing. CFB's Rebecca Resman says she told NBC about a driver killing a child ago near the traffic diverter site, but that was left out.
However Ed Fitzpatrick, the lawyer obsessed w/ blocking the greenway, gets lots of airtime. (1/2)
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Tragically, a hit-and-run sedan driver fatally struck CPS teacher Charles “Charlie” Mills, 56, on the 6300 block of S. Pulaski Road in the West Ridge community. Mills was the fifth vulnerable road user killed on Pulaski in Chicago in the last nine months.
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All Chicagoans are this person waiting for a CTA run that appeared on the Bus Tracker but never materialized.
@stevevance
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Finance Committee members will likely vote to roll back Chicago's speed cam ticketing threshold from 6 mph over the limit to 10 mph. Here's why they shouldn't in 4 slides: The lower limit is saving lives, and low-income residents get a 50% off discount on tickets.
@ward32chicago
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We're pleased to announce that
@CourtneyCyclez
has been promoted to assistant editor of SBC. Her new responsibilities include providing input on editorial decisions, reviewing drafts before publication, and weighing in on Streetsblog Network matters.
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If Chicago wants to improve safety and fight climate change by dramatically increasing biking, incrementalism isn't going to cut it. We need to follow the lead of Seville and Paris by rapidly building out a citywide protected lane network. Here's how.
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Here's a food delivery person using a cargo e-bike in the Washington protected bike lane. Assuming the operators don't park in bikeways or block sidewalks during stops, how do you feel about this?
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South Lakefront / downtown state representative Kam Buckner's new bill, backed by 3 North Lakefront reps, urges IDOT and CDOT to take bold action in the North DLSD redesign to improve walk/bike/transit. ATA says the legislation will help make that happen.
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CTA leaders recently complained the system is getting a bad rap. Of course, the most effective way for the agency to change public perceptions that CTA is unreliable, unsafe, and unsanitary is to significantly improve reliability, safety, and sanitation.
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Tomorrow Chicago alderpersons may vote to allow 9 mph speeding in school zones and near parks. Here's their argument, basically.
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A great protected bike lane ruined by a terrible sidewalk cafe setup. At Treehouse, 149 W. Kinzie, the cafe completely blocks the sidewalk, so people have no choice but to walk in the PBL (which wheelchair users may not be able to access.) CDOT fix this please!
Pics:
@NWChiFiets
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A stroke of good fortune! RTA asks CDOT to include bus lanes in the Bally’s Casino viaduct reconstruction. The agency that oversees CTA, Pace, and Metra is using a little muscle to persuade the City to include better bus facilities,
@stevevance
reports.
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.
@chicagosmayor
how exactly are thousands of essential workers going to be able to get home tonight now that
@cta
@Metra
@PaceSuburbanBus
and
@DivvyBikes
are essentially all closed, and how is stranding them and/or causing lots of panicked driving going to promote public safety?
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Youth mentor Sam Bell, 44, was riding an e-bike in a protected lane on Milwaukee when he crossed Huron and was fatally struck by an elderly motorist who failed to yield while making a left. How can we prevent tragedies like this?
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A new bill proposed by Chuy Garcia proposes equal funding for transit and driving. It may be unlikely this year, but a strategy of aiming high could significantly move the funding needle during the current window of opportunity.
@TransitCenter
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Cameras on buses to issue tickets to bus lane blockers?
Yes please!
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