Santa Rosa adds protected bike lanes on four busy streets

Santa Rosa plans to add more than five miles of protected bike lanes on four major stretches of road.

The city received $200,000 from the Metropolitan Transportation Commission to expand the city's network of so-called “low-stress” bike facilities.

Such facilities include Class 1 bike paths and Class IV protected bike lanes, where cyclists ride on the road but are separated from automobile traffic by physical barriers such as vertical delineators, planters, concrete curbs, or in some cases, street parking.

According to a staff report, the city will purchase more than 1,300 flexible bollards and install them over the next year.

Improvements are planned in the following areas:

• The section of Third Street that runs from Morgan Street to B Street under Santa Rosa Plaza is currently separated from vehicles and bicycles by a painted dividing line.
• Cleveland Avenue from Hopper Avenue to Guerneville Road.
• More than a mile of West College Avenue from North Dutton Avenue to Marlow Road.
• North Dutton Avenue from College to Jennings Avenue.

City planners have tried to improve bicycle availability throughout the city and increase road safety.

Cyclists and transport officials believe that physical barriers in particular are key to increasing cyclist safety and comfort, especially on roads with high traffic volumes or high speeds.

Yet there are less than a mile of protected bike lanes in the city.

Last summer, city engineers created a separate, two-lane bike lane on Armory Drive — the first in the city — and another on Santa Rosa Avenue to make it easier for cyclists exiting the Prince Memorial Greenway to merge onto the roadway.

A 2018 plan to improve cycling and pedestrian traffic envisaged the creation of only 3.5 kilometers of protected bike lanes over the next few years, but an update to the plan is in the works.

The proposed improvements would more than double that number and result in 9 km of new protected bike lanes, a staff report said.

The bollards will be installed as part of the city's planned annual maintenance on the designated streets and, in the case of Cleveland Avenue, the bicycle facilities will be added as part of a larger road construction project currently in planning.

Reach staff writer Paulina Pineda at 707-521-5268 or [email protected]. On X (Twitter) @paulinapineda22.