Mayor Jane Castor is launching a new plan to make Tampa roads safer for cyclists as part of the Transforming Tampa’s Tomorrow initiative. The city of Tampa will begin pilot testing new innovative products and application methods for protected bike lanes—lanes that are physically separated from motor vehicle traffic using a barrier.
The pilot projects leading this initiative are protected bike lanes with flexible delineators, which have already been installed on Azeele Street near the SoHo Publix and on Bayshore Blvd.; these locations were chosen specifically to discourage drivers from parking in bike lanes. These new protected bike lanes will either have a raised curb or a flexible delineator as a barrier to vehicle traffic.
Other locations that are currently being studied for protected bike lanes with flexible delineators are Cass Street/Green Spine in North Hyde Park, Floribraska Avenue in Tampa Heights, Florida Avenue and Tampa Street in downtown Tampa, and Beneficial Drive Bridge in Harbour Island.
“Tampa’s residents and our visitors demand and deserve safe pedestrian, bike, multimodal lanes and sidewalks and our team is hard at work delivering just that,” said Mayor Jane Castor in an official statement.
The city of Tampa’s recent efforts to make its roads a safer place for bikers couldn’t have come at a better time, as a 2018 study from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration found that Florida had the highest rates of cyclist mortalities.
Don’t let these new protected bike lanes stop you from wearing a helmet and reflective gear though.
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This article appears in Dec 12-19, 2019.