Yesterday, city council approved an ordinance requiring Houston drivers to play nicer with others. That means: No throwing things at them anymore, and no passing “vulnerable road users” without maintaining at least 3 ft. of space (or 6 ft., if you’re driving a commercial truck). And how are you supposed to know which road user is vulnerable? Maybe you can print out and keep in your car this list — not organized, presumably, by order of importance — from the city press release: “walkers or runners; the physically disabled, such as someone in a wheelchair; a stranded motorist or passengers; highway construction, utility or maintenance workers; tow truck operators; cyclists; moped, motor-driven cycle and scooter drivers; or horseback riders.” [City of Houston] Photo of cyclists on Fry Rd.: Flickr user josephkynguyen
Read more about: Bicycles, Ordinances, Pedestrians, Public Safety, Streets
Approved this week and sent on to Gov. Perry was a new draft of that bill proposing bike trails along CenterPoint utility rights of way. CenterPoint didn’t seem too crazy about the first draft of the bill, saying back in February that it wouldn’t allow the trails unless it was assured it wouldn’t be liable should something shocking happen. This revised draft, the Houston Chronicle’s Mike Morris reports, covers CenterPoint all the way up to “willful or wanton acts or gross negligence.” And Morris writes that as many as 142 miles of right of way in Harris County could be available for trails if Gov. Perry signs off on the bill, many of them providing missing north-south connections between the existing trails that run primarily east-west along the bayous. (Houston Chronicle ($); previously on Swamplot) Photo: StateImpact
Read more about: Bicycles, CenterPoint, Recreation, Trails, Utilities
Yesterday, reports abc13, the city added to the original 3 B-Cycle kiosks 18 more, bringing the fleet of pay-to-play bikes to 175. Thus far, most of the rental racks are clustered Downtown — including the one shown here at the Tellepsen Family YMCA on Pease St. — but the expansion, funded wth $750,000 from Blue Cross and Blue Shield, also added racks to Hermann Park and the Westheimer restaurant row near Blacksmith and Underbelly. And even more are planned, says abc13, for the East End, the Med Center, and unnamed universities. (You can mess around with an interactive map of B-Cycle locations here and here.) [abc13; Houston Chronicle; B-Cycle; previously on Swamplot] Photo: Allyn West
Read more about: 77002, Bicycles, Downtown, Montrose, Transportation
March 26, 2013 – 10:30 am
Peter Muessig’s graduate thesis for the Rice School of Architecture imagines a system of symbiotic bike-only features he’s calling “Veloducts” that would be fused on, under, around, and through the city’s existing car-dominated infrastructure. This rendering shows just such a Veloduct, which appears to be similar to those foot bridges already spanning Buffalo Bayou. But OffCite’s Sara C. Rolater explains how a Veloduct is much more ambitious: “In variations of concrete, joists, and steel, [a Veloduct] can be grafted onto the pillars of freeways, hang suspended by girders, or stand on its own columns. . . . [allowing] cyclists to capitalize on precisely those systems that have previously hindered them. That [the project] enables different modes of transport to coexist without crowding each other seems especially critical for Houston, where a lack of safe-passage laws have made many of Google Maps’ bright-green highlighted ‘bike-friendly’ roads anything but.” [OffCite; previously on Swamplot] Rendering: Peter Muessig
Read more about: AIA, Awards, Bicycles, Bridges, Proposed Developments, Transportation
March 19, 2013 – 10:00 am
Looks like this mile and a half extension of a hike and bike trail leading north out of Terry Hershey Park is ready to go. Photos popped up on HAIF yesterday that follow the trail as it dives beneath the Katy Fwy. and banks west between Highway 6 and Eldridge Pkwy. along the Addicks Dam.
According to the Terry Hershey Park website, this extension now makes a continuous ride possible from neighborhoods around Wilcrest, Kirkwood, and Dairy Ashford to the Addicks Park and Ride to the northwest.
Here are a few more photos of what you’ll see:
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Read more about: 77079, Bicycles, Parks, Photography, Public Transportation, Trails
February 22, 2013 – 3:00 pm
A native Houstonian has set up a one-man bicycle-messenger service, reports Culturemap’s Whitney Radley: Within an hour, Clutch Delivery’s Liam Musgrave will pedal to your place almost anything — except dry cleaning, pets, and “illicit substances.” This map shows his service area, extending west out to the Loop and east to Lockwood.
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Read more about: Bicycles, Maps, Midtown, Montrose, Openings and Closings, Retail, Streets
February 4, 2013 – 11:00 am
Houston lawmakers Sarah Davis and Jim Murphy have each introduced a bill to the state legislature that would have more bike trails built here along CenterPoint-owned utility rights-of-way, but the energy provider’s response seems to StateImpact reporter Dave Fehling a little overprotective: “a CenterPoint media liaison said it would permit trails ‘if — and only if — the Texas Legislature provides additional liability protection to CenterPoint from people entering its rights of way.’” Fehling adds: “What has resulted, though, are bills that would give what lawyers say is almost blanket immunity to CenterPoint Energy should someone get hurt on company property while using it for recreation, even if CenterPoint was ‘grossly negligent.’” [StateImpact; previously on Swamplot] Photo: StateImpact
Read more about: Bicycles, CenterPoint, Proposed Developments, Quicklink, Rails to Trails, Recreation, Utilities
January 9, 2013 – 11:30 am
Long a fixture on White Oak in the Heights, the Blue Line Bike Lab has opened a second location in the East End. In early November, the repair shop and retailer moved into a suite that had been gutted for a CrossFit gym at 740 Telephone Rd. in the Tlaquepaque Market, a little more than a mile from U of H. The shopping center, bound on the east by Lockwood and on the west by Dumble, might not be the most obvious location for pedal-pushing hipsters looking for a fixie: next door, as the photo above shows, is Space City Hearing Aids. But Bohemeo’s is just a few doors down and Thai restaurant Kanomwan is tucked in there somewhere, as well. And the East End has had two railroad right-of-ways transformed into hike and bike trails. Paul Dale, one of the lab’s resident gearheads, says, “We’re betting on the neighborhood.”
Photos: Allyn West
Read more about: 77023, Bicycles, East End, Rails to Trails, Retail, Shopping Centers, Transportation
October 15, 2012 – 5:06 pm
Metro is showing off the first of 19 new California-made Siemens H2 S70 trains it’ll be adding to its light-rail fleet. The first new cars in 9 years are updated versions of the line’s original 18-member fleet, with one notable difference: Metro will be outfitting them with 2 bicycle racks each, at the front and rear doorways. Photo: Metro
Read more about: Bicycles, Light-Rail, Metro, Metro Rail, Transportation
Harris County Housing Authority interim CEO Tom McCasland takes a visitor from Portland along the path of the bike trail he hopes will soon connect Downtown Houston seamlessly to the city’s northwestern suburbs. From Georgia’s Market downtown they head out the MKT Trail into the Heights, which dead ends near the Shepherd-Durham overpasses. “The lot turned into a truck path, which ended at a decrepit railroad bridge. We took a sharp right down a singletrack path along the edge of the bayou far below us,” writes Elly Blue, who’s been touring U.S. cities to assess their bikeability. McCasland, an advocate for expanding Houston bikeways, tells the Houston Press‘s John Nova Lomax that “part of the city’s latest grand biking plan is to dynamite [that burned-out bridge] and rebuild it as a bike/pedestrian thoroughfare. The trail will then continue along White Oak Bayou’s banks and connect with the existing trail that begins at West 11th and TC Jester and heads north through Timbergrove, Garden Oaks, Oak Forest and all the way up to Acres Homes.”
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Read more about: Acres Homes, Bicycles, Downtown, Garden Oaks, Oak-Forest, Proposed Developments, Rails to Trails, Timbergrove Manor, Trails, White Oak Bayou
Whenever it gets around to reopening as a brewery, Second Ward hotdog HQ Moon Tower Inn will still have only a single off-street parking spot — thanks to an accommodation agreed to by the planning commission. Owner Evan Shannon agreed to provide rack space for 40 bicycles instead of the 5 additional car spaces that would have otherwise been required at 3004 Canal St. Helpful in securing the exception from the city: a few bike-riding employees — and plenty of on-street parking in the food stand’s mostly industrial neighborhood. [Houston Chronicle; previously on Swamplot] Photo: Marty E.
Read more about: 77003, Bars, Bicycles, Breweries, Development Regulations, Parking, Restaurants, Second Ward
Comment of the Day: The Plea of the Anonymous Bicyclist
“To all the anti-bike crew, I see some cyclists pull some pretty stupid maneuvers and I apologize that y’all have to put up with that. I mean, I see folks pull some really stupid stuff. Running signals without even checking for oncoming traffic, cutting people off, riding right down the middle of gaddang West Richmond at 5mph . . . On behalf of the majority of cyclists who don’t ride like jackasses please accept my condolences. They give all of us a bad name. But please, let’s realize two very important things in this situation:
1) Just as some cyclists pull stupid crap on the road, so do folks in cars. It’s not all drivers, of course not! But dang, Some folks are just straight-up dangerous. Running signals without even checking for oncoming traffic, cutting people off, driving down gaddang residential streets at 45mph . . . I mean, all those wrecks on 59 I keep hearing out my window at 7AM certainly weren’t caused by bikes.
2) We live in a city, y’all. . . . Part of living in a city means people getting in each other’s way, like ALL the time. It sucks, it does. . . . Just look at the traffic on the freeways! At 5PM you’d get through Midtown faster going 15mph stuck behind my slowa** on Fannin than parking on 288. Being inconvenienced by the existence of other humans is part of living in a big city. . . . If you can’t take the heat, get outta the kitchen. Just don’t blame it on bikes if your commute sucks.
So, here’s what I propose:
I’ll do my best to stay out of y’alls way. I’m not a spokesperson for cyclists or anything but I’ll encourage my friends to do the same. Believe me, I don’t like holding up traffic and I do my best to avoid it.
In return, all I ask is not to be treated like some insidious pain in the arse that is intentionally destroying Houston — and especially your life — because I cost you an extra 13 seconds on the trip to Randall’s. I’m just some dude who’s trying to get to work so I can pay rent and taxes and buy groceries and beer. Please cut me a break if I’m taking up the right lane and going all slow because there’s a headwind. Drop it into 3rd and write off that few seconds you’ll be delayed, or, I dunno, go around if there’s another lane. Just be nice. Getting angry over minor things will give ya heart disease or something.
Truce?” [dangdang, commenting on Ordinance Now Protects the Vulnerable from Passing Cars, Projectiles]