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It's been a trying few days for the Los Angeles Department of Transportation as strong emotions from bicyclists and other complete streets activists rallied to save the elimination of bicycle lanes on Reseda Blvd. to make room for peak hour traffic. A Northridge Neighborhood Council had it as an agenda item earlier this week, prompting a huge turnout by the public to fight the measure.
However, according to LADOT, the whole issue is just one big rumor. "We had no plans to do that," explained the department's spokesperson, Bruce Gilman. "It was all based on rumor, nothing that we had propagated."
Apparently, the motion in front of the neighborhood council was pre-emptive and based on the rumor that the city was considering removing bicycle lanes amidst it's major bicycle planning process. The official statement from LADOT emphasizes there are no current plans as such for the street:
Recently, rumors surfaced regarding elimination of bicycle lanes and street parking along Reseda Boulevard to make way for 'Peak Hour' parking restrictions, allegedly to move more vehicles quickly during high vehicle volume hours. Rest assured, The Department of Transportation, City of Los Angeles (LADOT) has no current plans to remove any portion of the bike lane or to install peak hour lanes on Reseda Boulevard according to Ken Firoozmand, Transportation Engineer, West Valley District Office, LADOT.
You can follow LADOT's General Manager Rita Robinson on Twitter, but so far, she has not updated.
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ummm, something doesn't smell right with their explanation.
more like,
"oh you guys were *watching*? well, we wont do it yet. we'll try burying the notification even further, to see if we can still get away with it."
I'm suspicious. I know information can whip up into hyperbole over blogs, but the LADOT has done very little to foster any sense of trust within the cycling community. I think they probably did have plans for this and when it leaked and opposition jumped all over it, are backing out of claiming they ever had such a notion.
Thankfully there are posts like this, and other sites that publicize stuff that might otherwise have snuck by without people realizing...
Nice to see LADOT running back on their heels. Hopefully this is a bit of a victory for LA cyclists.
LAODT's Bruce Gilman dances backwards saying ""We had no plans to do that, It was all based on rumor, nothing that we had propagated."
Of course, he wasn't at the recent LA Bicycle Advisory Committee when the LADOT's Bikeways Coordinator explained why the bike lanes on the old Bike Plan were labeled "infeasible" on the new Bike Plan Maps. "It's because there has been an internal LADOT discussion going on for the last couple of years and the bike lanes interfere with plans for peak hour lanes."
The LADOT's philosophy is to support the movement of the single occupant vehicle at the expense of alternative modes. When it comes to innovation, this is the Department of NO!
It's NOT just a rumor! Cyclists responded to an earlier document from LADOT clearly states that they intended to implement the peak hour parking restrictions, and put the bike lane project on hold. From the LADOT bikeway engineer Paul Meshkin's August report to the LA Bicycle Advisory Committee - regarding the status of the Reseda lanes: "West Valley District does not concur with the project, cites peak hour lane usage in near future."
See the original LADOT report document here: http://glatwg.files.wordpress.com/2009/08/bike_lane_projects_in_progress1.pdf
Cyclists deserve an apology from the LADOT for their lie... and the immediate implementation of the long-delayed Reseda bike lanes.
Thanks Stephen and Joe, I'll follow up with this!
Ha, I knew the LADOT cover up sounded fishy. Good thing we have some people watching what they are up to like hawks. No pulling a fast one on the cycling community. LADOT credibility moves yet another notch lower.
I suspect that you have lots of other bigger stories to follow-up on, but I (and probably a tiny handful of hardcore cyclists) think it's pretty important that LAist print some sort of retraction or at least a follow up.
You printed LADOT's untruth: "We had no plans to do that ... It was all based on rumor, nothing that we had propagated." Now that the LADOT's own written documents show that they indeed had plans, I think it's important that you tell your readers that the LADOT's Bruce Gilman's statement (that you published) was false.
I think it's important that LAist (and any other reputable news sources) issue a statement when something you've published turns out to be untrue... otherwise the public is left with just the falsehood.
Thanks for at least covering bike issues!