Our mobility future is upon us! Plan for 2035!

Exciting things keep happening for the future of mobility in Los Angeles! Some of you who have been following mobility planning and implementation in the City may be wondering when Mobility Plan 2035, the primary planning document that guides planning and implementation of mobility for the City, could take effect.  Well you are in luck! On Tuesday, August 4th, the LA City Council Transportation and Planning and Land Use Management Committees will consider the decision to adopt the Plan at 2:30pm in Council Chambers.

If urban planning and government are not your profession, you might be wondering what a plan is, why we use them, or how you can learn more. Planning documents are developed (this one has been in development for nearly 4 years!) with an extensive process of outreach, studies, socio-economic forecasting, visioning, and strategic planning in order to guide unified decision making in the future.  Plans are not set in stone, but they provide goals (aspirations in vision) and objectives (ways of achieving the vision) that the City can pursue to achieve a desired future. Once adopted, Mobility Plan 2035 will become part of the City’s General Plan and provide policy and implementation guidance for LA streets for the next 20 years.

Mobility Plan 2035 is getting ready for a green light!

Mobility Plan 2035 is especially dynamic and groundbreaking in that it represents the first time Complete Streets policies and guidance will be reflected in the City’s General Plan! Complete Streets are considered streets that provide safe access for all users.  Mobility Plan 2035 includes a Complete Streets Design Guide that provides decision makers, departments, and the broader community a number of options for public rights of way (streets!) to achieve safe mobility access for people of all ages and abilities.

Next Tuesday August 4th at 2:30pm the LA City Council Transportation and Planning and Land Use Management Committees will consider the decision to adopt the the Mobility Plan 2035, the key planning document for mobility and streets in the City of Los Angeles. If the Committees vote to adopt the Plan, then the Plan will be heard at full City Council for final Plan adoption, the last step in the adoption process!

We’d like to tell you a little more about the Plan! Planning documents can be policy game-changers, and some of the substantial policy directives found in Mobility Plan 2035 are outlined in its Chapters:

1. Safety First
2. World Class Infrastructure
3. Access to All Angelenos
4. Collaboration, Communication and Informed Choices
5. Clean Environment & Healthy Communities

Reseda Boulevard, LA’s first iteration of the Great Streets program shows how streets can facilitate low-stress travel with a parking protected bike lane and an attractive walking environment

Mobility Plan 2035 provides a vision of integrated transportation networks for all road users. The Plan especially focuses on safe, low stress networks that encourage more people to embrace modes of active transportation, whether it be biking, walking, strolling, rollerblading, skating or more.

The plan also establishes objectives to measure success, including objectives to decrease transportation-related fatalities; establish slow school zones; provide frequent, reliable on-time bus arrival; increase vehicular travel time reliability; expand bicycle ridership; expand access to shared-use vehicles; share real time information to inform travel choices; and increase economic productivity by lowering the overall cost of travel.

Other cool Mobility Plan objectives include ensuring that 80% of street segments do not exceed targeted operating speeds and increasing the percentage of females who travel by bicycle to 35% of all riders by 2035

If Mobility Plan 2035 is achieved, it would take 219,000 trips off of our roads every day, and result in 1.7 million fewer miles traveled every day, which would be great for our health, our commute, and the health of our environment! Full implementation of the Plan would triple the number of Los Angeles residents living within a quarter mile of a Transit Enhanced Network (TEN) facility and would more than double the number of jobs located within a quarter mile of such transit facilities.

Don’t forget, on Tuesday, August 4th, the LA City Council Transportation and Planning and Land Use Management Committees will consider the decision to adopt the Mobility Plan 2035 at 2:30pm in Council Chambers. The meeting is open to the public and speaker cards will be available for those who wish to comment.

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Bicycle Parking Ordinance Passes City Planning Commission

The Los Angeles City Planning Commission today took a step towards making Los Angeles a truly bicycle friendly city.  In a unanimous vote, the Commission adopted a Bicycle Parking Ordinance that would vastly expand the number of new bike parking spaces required in new developments of all kinds throughout Los Angeles. You can follow the blow-by-blows of the hearing at the twitter feed BikeBlogChris, or the hashtags #bikeLA and #lamtg.  You can download a copy of the pdf here.

Over 15 dedicated bicyclists and advocates showed up in City Hall Room 350 today to support the ordinance.  Kudos are due to Rye Baerg, the driving force behind the ordinance in the City Planning Department, and all the dedicated members of the public who have helped the ordinance reach where it is today.

Thanks, Rye (image courtesy LACBC)

The next step for the Bicycle Parking Ordinance is a hearing before the PLUM (Planning & Land Use Management) Committee.  Once through PLUM, the ordinance goes to a full hearing before the City Council before becoming part of the City’s municipal code.  When the ordinance is agendized from the PLUM Committee, we’ll be sure to let you know.

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Interview with New BAC Chair Jay Slater

I had the great pleasure last week of getting to speak with Jay Slater, the newly elected Chair of the Los Angeles Bicycle Advisory Committee (BAC).  In February, during the BAC’s previous meeting, the BAC held their bi-annual election and voted in Jay as their new Chair.

The BAC has their next meeting this coming Tuesday night, at 7 PM, at Hollywood City Hall.  As always, BAC meetings are open to the public.  You can read the BAC agenda here, as well as the Bike Program and Bikeways Engineering reports submitted to the BAC.

In the speech he gave prior to the election, Jay emphasized the shortcomings of the BAC in years past and proposed a model of what the BAC needs to become in the future.  Below the fold Jay and I discuss what he plans for the BAC, the importance of getting the new adopted LA Bike Plan done right, his campaign to create a BAC liaison program, and his efforts to raise the profile of the BAC and their online visibility.

Newly elected LA BAC Chair Jay Slater speaking at the LA Bike Plan adoption celebration last month

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Next Stop: City Council – LA Bike Plan passes joint PLUM/T-Committee

Wednesday afternoon saw the penultimate stage completed in the years-long journey to get a new bike plan adopted for the City of Los Angeles.  In a special joint session, both the PLUM (Planning and Land Use Management) and Transportation Committees met to discuss the draft LA Bike Plan.  As the two committees with input on the bike plan, they are the last step before the plan faces the full City Council for adoption into the City’s general plan.  The crowd on hand was much smaller than those who turned out for the Bike Plan at the City Planning Commission, but there was still ample representation from the LACBC, Bikeside and the BAC.

The joint committee hearing was held in City Council chambers

While there was a small measure of conflict among speakers and committee members (mostly centered around equestrian/mountain biking conflicts), the plan itself easily sailed through committee.  Below the fold, we’ll cover the highlights of the hearing.  If you want blow-by-blow coverage, you can always check out the twitter feed of LADOT Bike Blog’s author Christopher Kidd (@BikeBlogChris).  You can also check out the twitter hashtag #LABikePlan to see what the collective bike community had to say during the hearing.

There were three items heard before the joint committee.  The first was an action item (requiring a vote) and the last two were “receive and file” items (which don’t require a vote).

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Live-Blog: LA Draft Bike Plan at CPC

It’s the moment we’ve all been waiting for.  At the Van Nuys Civic Hall Chambers, the City Planning Commission is meeting to discuss the most recent version of the Draft LA Bike Plan.  Jump below the fold to follow our live coverage.

LA Bike Plan taking one more step to adoption

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Draft LA Bike Plan Before CPC 12/16, Follow the Proceedings with LADOT Bike Blog

Finals, finally, are over.  That means LADOT Bike Blog is back to the grind, providing LA’s bicycling public with news and information from the LADOT Bike Program.  Look forward to a retrospective of 2010’s bicycle accomplishments, a continuation of the “Anatomy of a Bicycle Friendly Street” series, and coverage of the Draft LA Bike Plan as it wends its way through City commissions, committees, and (eventually) the City Council.

With changes made, the newest draft is closer to 1,680 miles...

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December is a Busy Bike Month

LADOT Bike Blog hopes all our readers will have a safe, cozy, and tasty Thanksgiving.  We apologize for the low number posts lately, but we’re smack in the middle of finals right now at USC.  We’re committed to coming back with a bigger and better LADOT Bike Blog once things settle down.  In the meantime, there are a number of bike-related events in December that you absolutely should not miss.

Happy Turkey Day, everyone!

Bike Path Opening, BAC, CPC Round 2

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