Needless to say, I'm all for higher gas prices. Maybe congress should double the gasoline tax and halve the diesel tax (to help keep the cost of transporting goods down).

i was way into the b'way bike lane for a week or so, but i had so many close calls that i've stopped riding it and gone back to 9th ave for my trip from 57th street down to the williamsburg bridge.

my experience was that pedestrians are not at all aware of the bike lane and treat it like an expanded sidewalk. ped traffic waiting to cross broadway always always spills over into the bike lane and median.

the placement of seating in the median area between the bike lane and the roadway only compounds the problem by encouraging people to cut over the bike lane and take a seat.

i definitely feel safer (and it's faster) riding in between cars than negotiating the people walking across the bike lane.

wish the ped median was placed next to the sidewalk, and then the bike lane placed in between that median and the car lane, with a narrow physical barrier, a la 9th ave.

But now I'm going back and forth on the issue:

Ever been to the UK? What if DOT added a bunch more clear markings on the ground to the bike lane?
These are all over the place in the UK:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/designios/270247046/

They say, nice and clear, "Look left" or "look right."

I'm sure if the DOT put such clear markings in the green bike lane, "don't walk here" or "look up" or look left/right or just a whole bunch more pictures of bikes, rather than one or two per block, pedestrians would get the picture much more effectively.

To which I say of course they were oblivious! If you put the bike lane on the left side of the road, where no one would expect it to be, people are going to ride in the right lane. Don't forget that large numbers of people who are now riding bikes in NYC are tourists on rentals. While many may be experienced cyclists, all of these tourist riders will be expecting a bike lane (if one does exists) to be on the right side simply because that is where bike lanes are placed everyplace else in the world where traffic travels on the right hand side of the road.

Now that DoT is looking to go to protected bike lanes, maybe now is the time for them to think over their policy of placing bike lanes on the left since protected lanes negate nearly all the reasons for putting them on the left on the first place.

A lot of valuable city real estate is being given over to cars, some of whom lack any respect or sense of responsibility. A car has the ability to injure, main or kill a pedestrian (and frequently does, unlike a bicycle). Why is there so little enforcement of laws over their behavior?

(Sorry for feeding the troll.)

With the bike lane between the sidewalk and seating area, pedestrians are bound to walk back and forth across the bike lane, making it less useful for bikes.

With the bike lane between the car lanes and the seating area, there would be more space between cars and the seating area, making it a bit more pleasant for people seated there.

I don't think there is much difference for bike safety. Bikes are endangered by cars making turns across the bike lane, and that would happen with the bike lane in either location.

In fact, the problem with pedestrians crossing is probably one reason that many bikes are still riding in the car lane. It would be safer for them if the bike lane were where they want to ride.

When will the NYPD stop and ticket these guys? They ticket and harass delivery and double-parked cars in the bike lane; the law forces bikers to use the bike lane so harass and ticket them too.

Register bikes so they can be held accountable for the pedestrians they injure; ticket them for speeding, running red lights and creating havoc; and step up the confiscation of bikers who ride on the sidewalk.

A lot of valuable city real estate is being given over to bikers, some of whom lack any respect or sense of responsibility. A bike has the ability to injure, main or kill a pedestrian. Why are there no enforced laws over their behavior?

I was again passing though this area this past Saturday evening and there were some major conflicts between the pedestrians and bicyclists going on due to the position of the bike lane. With the installation of the planters and very nice benches, pedestrians got the hint that the pebblely area was a place for people to walk and enjoy. This in itself is great!

However these pedestrians (most of them gawking tourists) had no clue that the green lane was for bicycles only and they freely wandered into it. It also didn't help that all of the bicyclists and pedicab drivers that I observed using the lane were very rude.

Again major points for DoT having the fortitude to try a road diet on Broadway. Crossing the Broadway as a pedestrian was very easy in this area since it is only two lanes wide at the intersections. However the number of bike/ped conflicts I observed in the ten minutes I was resting on one of those new benches was intolerable. I guess this is where the wisdom of doing these projects in the beginning with temporary materials comes into play.

However, we should separate opponents of Livable Streets improvements from people looking critically at this design. "Streetsbloggy types" like us applaud these, because they're a sign of the way the wind's blowing. People who don't share our views might be looking at this as, well, a less-than-ideal design, rather than seeing the value to our public space. Both are important.

Critical questions we should ask ourselves (and the DOT!) include:
*is Broadway the right place for this?
*is it a good design to put a bike lane between two pedestrian spaces?
*do the glue-and-gravel ground and the plastic planters make for a pleasant environment?

I've got my answers to those questions.