Somerville Approves Neighborways Improvements

An interesting proposal for improving the streets of Somerville.   From the email.

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Dear Somerville Cyclists,

Somerville has approved a Neighborways program.  Neighborways use paint and planters to create a hybrid playground/bike/ walk street.  While City approved, funding and implementation is completely up to we-the-people.  We hope to execute a substantial pilot in the next three weeks (before Labor Day). Our first big event is an amazing street painting this Saturday.  We could really use some help this weekend and beyond:

Painters!  If you’ve done any house painting and know how wield a brush we could use you.  If you have experience painting murals, we will worship the ground you walk on (maybe can drum up a stipend for a muralist if you know one).   Our first mural will hopefully be painted this Saturday (weather permitting).

Neighborhorways porch-presenters. Our model is to get everyone on our blocks involved.  Lots of beers on porches.  I need someone to hang with neighbors for an hour or so and talk up the benefits of Neighborways.

Midnight painting crew– have you ever seen people painting the bike lanes in the middle of the night?  We’ll be doing that!  If you don’t mind being up late, please join us for some serious tactical urbanism.

As I mentioned this coming Saturday we’ll hopefully be painting a mural.  There’s a myriad of small things that would help out if your free–  organizing music, buying food (we’ll provide cash for that), helping keep small kids out of the paint and setting up tables for workers, taking photographs and video footage of the event.

If you’re interested in helping, please let me know what interests you the most.

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New Bike Kitchen Co-Op In Somerville

This sounds awesome!  A bike co-op where you can use the tools, and the collective information of the folks around you for a very reasonable price.

About

The Somerville Bike Kitchen (SBK) is a bicycle repair cooperative where members of the community can repair their own bikes, learn about about bike repair and attend bike events. The SBK located in a 190 sq. ft. space just outside of Davis Sq. The space is managed by four volunteer staff members and is open to the public and members for drop-in hours one night a week.

Hours

Presently, the space is open to the public and members from 6pm to 9pm every Tuesday evening. We are just getting started and are working toward having having more drop-in hours. Bike stands and tools are available on a first come first serve basis.

more info on their website.

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New Bike Lanes On Broadway In Somerville

Somerville has been doing a lot of work to make the old nasty broadway, into a nice street.  They took out a lane, put in a divider, added larger sidewalks, and now have laid down what appear to be double buffer zone bike lanes.  Sadly the drivers still have not quite learned what to do with them.  But once the bike symbols are down, and they are used more I think they will come around.  (sorry for the poor quality pics, it was late at night)

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Somerville Most Popular City In The Northeast For Cycling

A contest where cities compete to be the most friendly is one in which we all win.  And Somerville has edged out “traditional” bike friendly Cambridge for the top spot this year.

Somerville is the top bike commuting city in the Northeast, according to an annual report from the League of American Bicyclists.

Somerville beat out its neighbor, Cambridge, and New Haven, Philadelphia, and Pittsburgh to capture the title. The study ranked cities by calculating the percentage of commuters who ride bikes, using 2012 American Community Survey data from the US Census Bureau.
In Somerville, 7.77 percent of commuters regularly ride bikes. Right behind them, in Cambridge about 6.49 percent of commuters travel regularly by bike.

Somerville Mayor Joseph A. Curtatone said he was excited, but not surprised, by the ranking: The city has invested in bike lanes and infrastructure for years. “This is not by accident,” he said.

Hayes Morrison, Somerville’s director of transportation and infrastructure, said there’s even more on the horizon for cyclists in Somerville. Adding to the city’s 14 miles of bike lanes, 6 miles of bike paths, and 25 miles of shared roads marked for bicycle travel, the city will soon break ground on its first cycle track — a protected bike lane.

Cambridge is also gearing up to further improve biking in the city.

“Every time we redo a street, we try to make it better for walking and biking,” said Cara Seiderman, the city’s transportation program manager. (via)

Awesome! I saw that they are putting in more bike lanes on Broadway and narrowing the street with a center divider and curb extensions. All in all a great idea to turn that nasty highway like section of Broadway into a livable walk-able community. Once they get that overpass tore down in union and put in the new green line station Somerville will be THE place to ride your bike.

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Somerville Bike Lanes Get The Green Paint Treatment

A whole bunch of bike lanes in Somerville are getting painted green.  I am not totally sure how I feel about this, but they do seem to be more visible.

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