Urbana’s bike-lane plan available for public viewing

By Tim Mitchell

Sunday November 29, 2009

URBANA – Area bike riders and motorists can learn about plans to install additional bike lanes – and remove some on-street parking to make way for those lanes – in Urbana during an open house next week.

The open house will be held from 6 to 8 p.m. Thursday at the Urbana City Council Chambers, 400 S. Vine St.

Urbana civil engineer Jennifer Selby said the city plans to begin the implementation of its bicycle master plan in 2010.

The master plan, approved by the Urbana City Council in April 2008, calls for setting up a network of bicycle routes. Selby said the long-term goal is to have dedicated bicycle lanes from one end of the city to the other.

The bicycle master plan calls for installing a total of 4 miles of new bike lanes on Race Street from Windsor Road to Pennsylvania Avenue, on Philo Road from Florida Avenue to Washington Street and on Washington Street from Vine Street to Philo Road.

Selby said the city would like to remove on-street parking spaces on the three streets and convert those spaces into dedicated parking lanes.

Selby said the current proposal calls for removing 22 parking spaces on Race Street between Montclair Road and Pennsylvania Avenue, 25 parking spaces on Philo Road between Pennsylvania Avenue and Washington Street and 30 parking spaces on Washington Street between Vine Street and Philo Road.

Selby said the purpose of the open house is to give people affected by the proposed changes a chance to look at the plans and to provide comments on them.

“People can look at some preliminary plans and look at some aerial maps,” Selby said. “We’ll have some before and after images to provide people with the existing views and the proposed views.”

Selby said city staff will be available to receive verbal comments, and open house participants can also leave comments on comment cards.

The Urbana Traffic Commission will meet at 4 p.m. Dec. 8 at the city council chambers to make a recommendation after taking into consideration comments made at the open house.

Selby said the city council will then consider the recommendation at a committee of the whole meeting on Jan. 11, 2010.

Construction of the new bike lanes is scheduled to begin in the spring of 2010.