The Alameda County Transportation Commission (ACTC) is working in collaboration with the City of Oakland on the development of a program of San Pablo Avenue corridor projects. At the November 2, 2023 BPAC Infrastructure Committee meeting, Matt Bomberg, Senior Transportation Engineer and Colin Dentel-Post, Principal Transportation Planner presented the San Pablo Avenue Parallel Bike Improvements Project which includes neighborhood bikeway treatments along local streets parallel to San Pablo Avenue in North Oakland, Berkeley, and Albany.

An excerpt of the presentation is below, followed by the full presentation [2.7MB PDF], presentation notes, and discussion notes.

Project schedules

	Safety Enhancements	Parallel Bike Improvements
Planning/Scoping	2017-Spring 2022	2017-Spring 2022
Environmental Studies & Final Design	Winter 2022-Spring 2025	Winter 2022-Spring 2024
Construction	Fall 2025-Winter 2026	Fall 2024-Winter 2026

Presentation

Presentation notes

• Staff have been doing work on 3 separate projects on the corridor, dating back to 2017.
• San Pablo Ave has the 3rd highest rate of crashes in Alameda County, and runs through a number of equity priority communities.
• These 3 projects are “near term” — 3 to 5 year timeline.
• Today’s presentation focuses on the northwest Oakland segment of the “parallel” bikeways project.
  • This works in concert with other projects being delivered separately by local jurisdictions.
• Traffic calming treatments in Oakland are referencing the city’s Neighborhood Bike Routes Implementation Guide, and has been using it to help encourage traffic calming upgrades in other cities included in the project.
• Looked into closing the Market Street median at 63rd St to prevent left turning driver conflicts with Lowell to 63rd bike traffic, but it was determined that left turn movements were too high to restrict that movement for now.
• Collected vehicle count data for 65th Street and determined that car volumes were too high for a shared lane “neighborhood bike route” configuration. As such, paint-only bike lanes are proposed instead.
• Pedestrian Hybrid Beacons (red lights for drivers, walk lights for pedestrians & bike riders in the cross direction) are being proposed for bikeway crossings of multi-lane streets; Flashing crosswalk beacons proposed instead.  
• More than 700 comments were received on the two projects from outreach performed to date.
• Projects are fully funded, in part via federal grants.
• Email any comments or questions on these plans to staff within two weeks (by November 16).

Discussion notes

• Recommend keeping the Herzog to 66th segment, and not deleting it in order to support all turn movements. Bike riders won’t go out of their way just to follow the route.
  • Alameda CTC project won’t deliver this segment, but the city can potentially follow up on their own. This Alameda CTC project will not modify the Oakland Bike Plan recommendation for the Herzog/66th bikeway, this would be a separate city-led planning process.
  • Oakland city staff are interested in keeping route simple without over–complicated wayfinding which works best at T intersections.
• Recommend routing bike riders on Herzog and 66th St instead of Idaho and Harmon. Herzog has better connections to schools, 66th/Woolsey will eventually connect past Ashby BART and continue all the way to College Ave. Current proposal adheres to 2017 Berkeley Bike Plan too closely, but that plan is out of date and didn’t consider these factors.
  • Alameda CTC staff replied that the Parallel Bike Improvements project follows Idaho Street for a direct north-south routing from Mabel Street Bike Boulevard to the north to Lowell Street neighborhood bike route to the south.
• Half diverter needed at 63rd / Lowell / Market to eliminate driver right turn conflicts.
  • Or at least extend the sidewalk at the corner of 63rd at Lowell to prevent car parking and improve sight lines.
• 61st St should be the primary east-west bike route from Emeryville past San Pablo and past Market Street to connect with other bike routes, not 63rd which has less connectivity. Hopefully 61st will be prioritized for crossing upgrades via the following San Pablo Ave protected bikeway project.
• Bike lane widths on 65th St are too narrow, creates a danger from opening car doors.
  • Removing parking on north side of street would create enough space to widen and possibly add physical protection to the bikeways.
  • Staff response: Not feasible within the timeline of the current project.
• Flashing beacons flash when nobody’s walking. Drivers might lose trust in beacons
  • Push buttons plus passive actuation might be a good option, so people who don’t use the button still get a flashing light, but also if the passive actuation isn’t working there is still a backup option.
  • Maybe add a QR code for people to scan and report if the beacon is not working.