Fresh markings are going down on the revamped approach to the Williamsburg Bridge at Delancey Street. Courtesy of Adopt-a-Bike Lane volunteer leader Marin Tockman, here's what the site looked like as of yesterday afternoon. Seems like a marked, one-block connection to the median at Suffolk Street is imminent.

Another reader informs us that Suffolk, which runs one-way north to south, is set to receive a bike box at the point before it crosses Delancey. So riding to the bridge from the north should feel a lot more convenient, safe, and "normal" than before.

I'm also digging those continuous zebra stripes across Delancey.

With nearly 40% of daily commuter trips taken by bike, Copenhagen, Denmark is generally considered the world's most bicycle-friendly city. Having been working with bike boxes for nearly 20 years, studies by Danish road engineers and transportation planners have found that bike boxes significantly reduce the number of crashes between right-turning motorists and bicyclists going straight through the intersection. The City of Copenhagen has concluded that bike boxes are most effective when combined with a brightly colored lane continuing straight through the intersection to help alert right-turning motorists to the fact that bicycle riders may be traveling straight through the intersection along their right side[9].

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We can't set this one up any better than Mr. Eckerson himself, so without further ado:

At just about any public gathering I go these days, there's usually at least one person who will come up and give me an enthusiastic "Bike Box!", based upon our earlier, popular Streetfilm. In my heart I hoped there would one day be a sequel to Bike Box, and it all came together last week while in Portland at the World Car-free Conference. Earlier this year, Portland's Office of Transportation installed many high visibility bike boxes that are filled in lime green to help cyclists avoid right hook collisions. (Note: NYC now has a few green ones as well.)

What we were unprepared for was being stopped by random cyclists who wanted to lend their collective "Bike Box!" exclamations. So watch and see all the fun improv as it flows.

Clarence and the Streetfilms crew are also looking for homegrown bike box videos to feature in the Streetfilms sidebar. To participate, post a vid of bike boxes in your city on YouTube and tag it "streetfilms."

Bike Box!

After taking an evening ride down Broadway in Williamsburg last week, Clarence Eckerson sent us a batch of pictures showing the street's nifty new road treatments. Between Kent Avenue and Bedford Avenue, Broadway now sports bike lanes, bike boxes, and pedestrian refuges with space for plantings. The changes have significantly narrowed the car travel lanes, Clarence reports. More pics after the jump.

Not only are Portland, Oregon's new bike boxes to be accompanied by a motorist safety campaign, they're also making them hard for drivers to miss at street level. Note the "Get Behind It" sign to the right.

Compare the Portland version to a New York bike box:

Could this call for a green paint line item in the livable streets fund? 

Photos: BikePortland.org/Flickr [Portland], Ian Dutton [New York]

In an attempt to improve safety at intersections in Portland, Oregon, the Department of Transportation will install the city's first bike boxes at 14 locations this spring. The city will also launch a marketing campaign, "Get Behind It. The Bike Box: Portland's New Green Space," intended to educate motorists.

As Bikeportland.org reports, large signs will be posted at intersections, and brochures offer an in-depth explanation of bike boxes. Portland DOT Project Manager Rich Newlands said, “we’re specifically concerned with the issue of encroachment. Our target audience with these signs is not the biker, it is the motorist.” 

The New York Times doesn't seem to have noticed, but DOT has been quietly rolling out dozens of bike boxes all over the city. As many cyclists don't seem to know exactly what bike boxes are or how to use them yet, StreetFilms thought the time was right for this instructional video.

Related:

• How About Two Bike Lanes Per Street?

• New Bike Lanes and Sharrows Lead to the Brooklyn Bridge
  

• New Bike Boxes Send Cyclists to the Front of the Line
  

Now for something completely different: Clarence Eckerson snapped these photos of a double bike lane on both sides of Second Avenue between 1st and 2nd Streets. The new street design also includes a rather massive bike box.

Has New York City ever had a street with bike lanes running along both sides? This seems to be a new one.

This new buffered bike lane begins at Petrosino Square at Lafayette Street and Spring Street and heads southbound all the way down to Duane Street on the way to the Brooklyn Bridge. Along the way you'll find quite a few bike boxes and sharrows, new bike safety tools in the Department of Transportation street design tool box. (As Project for Public Spaces has pointed out, Petrosino Square could easily be enlarged and transformed into one of Lower Manhattan's finest little public squares).

Heading towards City Hall.

In case you are wondering why there are no cars on the road, these photos were snapped early Sunday morning while all the motorists where still sleeping. 

Instead of ending abruptly, the bike lane morphs into sharrows at Reade Street.

The new sharrows lead cyclists right down the center of the busy intersection at Chambers Street and on to the bridge to Brooklyn.

Photos: Jason Varone

Ian Dutton of the Houston Street bike safety initiative snapped these photographs of yet another never-before-seen street design feature here in New York City. This is what's called a "Bike Box" at the  intersection of W. 9th St. and Sixth Ave. Bike boxes allow cyclists approaching the intersection with a red signal to position themselves at the front of the line of vehicles. This makes bike travel faster and the right turn onto northbound Sixth Avenue safer.

New bike boxes are also being striped in on Carlton Avenue at Bergen Street and on DeKalb and Flushing Avenues in Brooklyn. Technically, these aren't New York City's first-ever bike boxes. There have been previous attempts to install them in various spots but the design of these new ones seem to be much bigger, clearer, cleaner and closer to what you see in bike-friendly cities elsewhere.

One city that appreciates its bike boxes is London. Traveling on a German Marshall Fellowship in March I met with John Dinunzio, a Project Coordinator with the London Cycle Network (or LCN+), working to build out that city's bike infrastructure. John and his team are big proponents of bike boxes. I saw a lot of them throughout London. London motorists mostly seem to respect the bike boxes. Let's see if New York City drivers do the same.