Summer is winding to a close and dotriderblog has begun riding across a wider spectrum of Boston Streets than usual. It’s funny how much more one sees on a bicycle rather than in a car. Here’s a few of the things we’ve noticed in just the past week.
The one that made me smile the most is the Hubway station on Yawkey Way. We’ve been chronicaling (and will do so with yestereday’s photos as well on the dotbike flickr site) the dire need for bike racks by Gate D on Yawkey Way at Fenway Park. We’ll show a continuing daily need for bike racks as there were a couple chained to trees and fences and just a half block later there’s the Hubway….Can a private bike use Hubway bays for parking?
There were only two bikes in the bays and the more time I spent in town the more I saw them riding around. So Hubway will be a success and I’ll be proved wrong (as predicted here or at least wished for). My criticism that it was miss timed and there is much to do around the city to make the infrastructure safer for riding for all of us still stands. We thought doing the safety stuff first made the most sense, but no one listened. Hopefully that will get more attention going forward.
Mass Ave compromised with Sharrows in a few spots and nothing’s happening north of Columbus Avenue really.
The Dot Ave Ten Intersection Solution continues to be a drag and as of now there are fewer Sharrows as south of Route 203 was paved and the sharrows have yet to return. It’s been over a year since they put the ‘temporary’ paint on Dot Ave from Old Colony to Broadway and there’s still no bike lanes… Any sharrows or lanes anywhere else have already been obliterated. Plus the turn lane from Dot Ave to Park Street heading west is an accident waiting to happen. It’s too bad State planners didn’t take our observations seriously. The road design still reeks of increasing automobile flow instead of promoting safety and traffic calming…
Parks got pounded in the hurricane and they’re still out there cleaning up. They got things barely passable but need to back through and clean up the smaller messes. Once Franklin Park was voted the second most beautiful park in the world, but Parks seems to see it as a great dumping ground for snow and brush… No doubt Franklin Park will get more than its share of brush dumped within it’s confines.
We’re still seeing more riders than ever on our short route to work. We’ve refound our camera and have filled up the memory card in recent days, so one day we’ll have to update the flickr site. The range and diversity of folks continues to be astounding. Add to that where you see folks and for this Dot-ite veteran it’s is heartening to see the old lines that separated us blur. While that may be happening with folks living in different spots it is way cool that bikes are leading the way in getting folks to ride into parts of town fearful folks might deem as “No go”. We’ll let you draw your own conclusions about that…
