Bikeway Removals Must Stop
Mary Daval from Culver City and Michael Swire from San Mateo contributed to this post.
Getting approval and funding to build new bikeways can be an uphill battle. However, once a lane or bike path is approved and installed and people get to experience enhanced safety and traffic calming for all road users, it’s rare for cities to take bike lanes out. Unfortunately, two California cities are doing just that.
“When they go low, we go local” in Culver City
In 2021, Culver City got funding from a Metro Active Transportation (MAT) grant to help fund a project called Move Culver City. The stated goal of the project was to “create mobility options for everyone.” The project removed a lane of car traffic from Culver Boulevard and added a dedicated bus lane and a bike lane.
In 2023, a new city council voted to modify the project to add back the removed car lane. They accomplished this by taking out the protected bike lane and creating a shared bike and bus lane, a solution that negates gains for both biking and transit.
The ostensible reason for ripping out the bike lanes and increasing car space was congestion. Now that the removal is complete in what officials call Move 2.0, local advocates report that congestion is just as bad during peak hours and drivers move at freeway speeds during off-peak times.
Culver City advocate Mary Daval said, “We’re so far from Vision Zero. We’re so far from safe streets. We know terrible things have happened on the Move corridor.”
The MAT grant could be reduced by around $500,000 if Culver City maintains the project in its current configuration without protected bike lanes. However, residents recently elected a new city council that’s more friendly to active transportation. Since the project is a quick build, advocates hope that the original configuration can be restored. They are looking for crash and traffic data to point the way to an evidence-based plan for safer streets.
Local advocates aren’t giving up, despite a federal administration that is unfriendly to active transportation, citing a Culver City saying: “When they go low, we go local.”
Pedaling backward in San Mateo
San Mateo’s City Council recently decided to pursue removal of half a mile of separated bike lanes on Humboldt Street. The bike lanes offer greater safety for people biking and walking on a street known as one of the least safe in the city for vulnerable road users. The bike lanes provide access to multiple schools serving 6,000+ students and were paid for with a federal grant. Humboldt is in an equity-priority neighborhood, with almost 20% of residents unable to afford the high cost of auto ownership.
San Mateo could spend up to $3 million to rip out these bike lanes — money that could have been better spent on the dozens of projects that remain on hold in the City’s Bicycle Master Plan. It’s sad that there is never enough money (at the state or local level) to build bikeways, but there is always funding to expand car storage.
There is still time to save the San Mateo bike lanes. You can sign the petition and contact Move San Mateo to find out how to get involved.
Mike Swire, co-lead of Move San Mateo, told CalBike: “We are extremely disappointed in the San Mateo City Council’s decision to potentially spend millions of taxpayer dollars to rip out critical safety infrastructure next to several schools, in an Equity Priority Area where 20% of residents don’t own cars and the streets have the highest crash rates in the city.”
Swire added, “Meanwhile, San Mateo just saw its third vulnerable road user die in the past five months. Why should free car storage on public streets take priority over safety for those who bike and walk to get around?”
CalBike supports San Mateo advocates in their efforts to save these critical bike lanes. While most of our work is at the state level, we sometimes partner with local advocacy groups to provide support on issues of statewide significance. We hope destroying bikeways doesn’t become a trend across California.
