This firsthand account was written by Carissa, a BTA member who was involved in a crash that occured earlier this morning in the new westbound bike lane at the east end of the Burnside bridge.
To all bike commuters: I got into an accident this morning on my bike at the new Burnside-Couch couplet. If you ride through that on your morning commute – beware. Cars were swerving into the bike lane where the road curves heading onto the Burnside bridge, so they put cones up on the white line dividing cars from bikes.
Unfortunately, from a bicyclist’s perspective it appears that the cones are directing bikes to merge into motor vehicle traffic. There’s no time to signal, the cars are driving fast, and bicyclists are at risk of what happened to me: hitting the fresh vinyl dividing strip which feels basically like a patch of ice that causes the bike to fly out from under you.
Fortunately, I walked off the street with some wicked road rash. Unfortunately, another woman on a bike came around about 2 minutes after me and did the exact same thing – only she broke her shoulder and had to be taken from the scene in an ambulance.
Someone from BTA happened to be right behind us and took a photo (in which you can see the skid marks of cars, where they stopped just before hitting one of us). He’s already notified PDOT and a correction is hopefully in the works.
In the meantime, if you have to ride this on your commute – please be extremely careful. Slow down, be aware of the cars around you, get off your bike and walk it around the corner if you have to. And for the time being, remember that the orange cones are not trying to divert you out of the bike lane (even though they reduce it by a good 8 inches). Stay to the right of the cones.
And for the love of pete – for those of you who are foolish enough not to wear a helmet – WEAR A HELMET! It will likely save your life. As they put the other girl on the backboard today and pulled her helmet off, the side was dented and scratched. Might not have saved her life today, but it certainly saved her face from some gnarly road rash.
Please forward the warning to anyone you know who commutes through this area.
Ride Safe and Wear a Helmet.
~Carissa
Saturday morning update:
The pylons protecting the bike lane have been removed from the Couch onramp to Burnside.
City project manager Chris Armes reports today that the East Couch approach to the Bunside Bridge had the bikelane restriped over the weekend. Bikes are gaining an extra 1 foot in the bike lane width, and the right hand turn will be getting an additional 4 foot buffer as soon as weather permits.
How about installing skinny knock-down cones separating the bike lane from the traffic lane along the entire length of the S-curve between MLK and the bridge? How about painting indicators on the ground to inform cyclists to stay to the right of the knock-down cones? How about continuing the bike lane lines to Couch on the east side of MLK to show west-bound cyclists where their lane goes? And regarding the second image above, how about keeping the bike lane free of mud, water, and debris?
Another danger that has not been talked about is the entrance into couch from Burnside. There are all the little intersections that funnel cars into it. It is very dangerous and cars will try to squeeze off cyclists from entering. There is a great deal of lane changing from cars as well. Also cars will make right turns without checking the bike lanes to see if they are clear. A co-worker and to other cyclists were almost hit in that manner last week!