First, NBC is in Detroit today for an upcoming national story which includes biking in Detroit. It is expected to air later this month….

Detroit on Two Wheels: Wheelhouse

A short article from Papermag gives some love to the Wheelhouse Detroit, which is now open for business.

Not every form of transportation in the Motor City requires an engine. Wheelhouse Detroit, a bicycle shop in downtown Detroit, that offers rentals, retail, and service. They also offer tours that help make little-known tourist gems more accessible in a city that is spread across many miles.

Detroiters Kelli Kavanaugh and Karen Gage opened Wheelhouse two years ago and they emphasize the ecological practices of their business, including the t-shirts and sustainable water bottles they sell. “Our store is an opportunity to get to talk to people about road safety and spread the word that cars need to share the road with riders,” said Gage, who also works as an urban planner in the city.

Real Detroit also ran a nice article on the shop.

Big plans for the future Detroit

The Detroit Free Press published a big article which compiles the various plans for Detroit — including the greenway and non-motorized plans.

The city plans to put up about 30 miles of bike lanes and more than 12 miles of routes designed for cyclists starting in September in southwest Detroit, near Wayne State and on the east side. The aim is a network of hundreds of miles of biking and walking paths connecting neighborhoods and attractions across the city.

There’s also updates on the RiverWalk and Midtown Loop. The Free Press did a find job creating a map showing bike lane projects planned for this year.

The same issue included an editorial.

For all its troubles today, Detroit is also a place brimming with hope for tomorrow.

When you assemble all the proposals, plans and dreams that have been advanced in recent months, the city of 2020 looks dramatically different than it looks today: smaller, smarter, greener, more mobile, with more job opportunities — and once again the pounding heart of a metropolitan region.

You see thousands of kids attending schools that work for them. You see people using light rail and boarding buses in a transit system that serves them. You see a gleaming, growing medical complex; banners being hoisted to the rafters of a new sports arena; and people tending little farms that nourish their neighborhoods in more ways than one. You see convention-goers strolling a crowded RiverWalk and bicyclists coasting the downhills of a new trail network.

Bicyclists coasting the downhills? It’s a nice thought, but with Detroit being built on a former lake bed, there aren’t going to be many downhills of note.

Michigan residents are winners under new state parks passport law

Howard Meyerson, a columnist with the Grand Rapids Press, has covered the state park funding situation for years. His latest column celebrates the passage of the Recreation Passport legislation. He also shined some light on those that opposed or at least delayed these bills.

It wasn’t an easy passage. The Chamber of Commerce and transportation lobby opposed it. Speaker of the House Andy Dillon held it up over the holidays, reportedly to help an old college buddy, now a transportation lobbyist.

But in the end, wiser heads prevailed.

Yes, wiser heads did prevail. The new payment system begins this October, so everyone will still need to purchase their 2010 Motor Vehicle Pass stickers.

Detroit was represented well at the 10th annual National Bike Summit in DC

And, Model D just published an article on the recent National Bike Summit. They referenced our review of the event. Thanks, Model D!

Here are nine bike- or trail-related Detroit projects scheduled for design, construction and/or completion in 2010.

9. Bus racks on DDOT buses

SMART buses already have racks and DDOT says their fleet should have them by the spring — or so we’ve been told.

8. Milliken State Park

Okay, technically this was opened in December, but given the weather, not many may know about this RiverWalk connection. One key is it brings the RiverWalk trail much closer to the Dequindre Cut. The DNR has already received some funding to continue the pathway around the large grassy mound.

7. Dequindre Cut Trail Extension

Construction is underway on this trail extension which connects the existing Dequindre Cut to Atwater and Milliken State Park. Construction should be completed by the fall.

6. Bagley Street Pedestrian Bridge

This critical non-motorized bridge over I-75 reconnects Bagley Street in Mexicantown. While the bridge appears complete, the ramps were not the last we’d seen them. We expect the construction to be completed early in 2010.

5. Anthony Wayne Drive/Third Avenue

Anthony Wayne Drive through the Wayne State Campus is being reconfigured to add more on-street parking and bike lanes.

4. Second Avenue

New Center Council is looking at reconfiguring Second Avenue between Grand Boulevard and the Wayne State Campus. It’s expected that the new configuration will become two-way with either bike lanes or shared-lanes.

3. Conner Creek Greenway

Two miles of this greenway are already completed near the city airport. More segments should be constructed this summer, including bike lanes along St. Jean between Mack and Jeffererson. Clairpointe from Jefferson to Maheras Gentry Park will also get bike lanes. A third segment along the Mt. Olivet cemetery and continuing north to Eight Mile is becoming ready to go as well.

2. Midtown Loop (Phase I)

Construction of the first mile of this new greenway should begin this spring along Kirby and John R. Phase II will complete the rectangular route along Canfield and Cass.

1. Corktown/Mexicantown Greenlink

Construction is expected to begin this year. The end product will be 16 miles of bikes routes and bike lanes throughout the Corktown and Mexicantown neighborhoods.

The city of Detroit currently has about 7 miles of bike lanes, nearly all of which are on Belle Isle. That number should break 40 miles by the end of the year.

There are two other MDOT road projects that should have bike lanes but MDOT is providing flimsey excuses to not do so. Advocates are still pushing MDOT on those and if MDOT does the right thing, Detroit would surpass Ann Arbor’s bike lane mileage.

This could be one of Detroit’s shortest yet coolest greenways for peds and bikes.

It’s called the Green Alley Project and it’s located in Midtown near Second Avenue and Canfield. This Green Garage project will eventually connect to the planned Midtown Loop.

The project’s goal is “to create a model for sustainable alleys of the future for our city and region… yeah, maybe the world.” For now, we’d settle for it being a model for other Detroit alleys.

There is an opportunity to take leadership action in creating a new vision for one of the most under utilized assets of Midtown and the City of Detroit…our alleys. Today our alleys look abandoned with trash, broken pavement, overgrown weeds, and neglected sides of buildings. They are ribbons of blight throughout our communities. Imagine if one by one we changed our alleys into beautiful greenways that people wanted to be in because they expressed the best of our community.

This project represents that leadership action. We plan to transform one of our worst abandoned alleys in Midtown into a beautiful greenway for pedestrians and bicyclists to enjoy the beautiful gardens, stop and shop at the business establishments or gather with a few neighbors to talk about the day.

This is already a very bike-friendly part of town, but what makes this extra special is its proximity to the Motor City Brewing. This may be a great opportunity to emulate Buffalo’s Rusty Chain Beer program and raise funds for the bike racks to support the alley concept or to add more bike racks around town.

We’d raise a Ghettoblaster to that effort!

The first round of Metro Detroit’s transportation stimulus checks are in the mail and some are for major bike projects.

This funding is mostly from 3% transportation enhancements sub-allocation, which is $25.4 million for all of Michigan.

I-275 Bike Path (MDOT)

The original $10 million request to recontruct the bike path was reduced to two requests. The first is for $4 million. The second is for $5 million and will only be available if Michigan can recover unused road funds from other states.

Clinton River Trail Bridge (Pontiac)

This bridge at Telegraph and Orchard Lake Road has been long awaited. It will connect the two developed rail-trail segments on both sides of Telegraph. The funding amount is $2.1 million.

Midtown Loop (Detroit)

This $2.3 million in funding is going towards Phase I of the Midtown Loop, a 2-mile walking and (casual) biking loop through Wayne State and cultural center. It’s expected that this stimulus money will push previously secured funding into the second phase and possibly help fund the connector between this project and the Dequindre Cut.

Streetscaping

These projects are aimed at making a road more pedestrian and bicyclist friendly. For example, the Woodward project includes “sidewalks, tree planting, street lights, trash receptacles, bike racks.”

• Woodward in Detroit between I-94 and Euclid (MDOT)
• Monroe and Brush Streets in Greektown, Detroit
• Michigan Avenue in Detroit between Cass and Woodward
• Shelby Street in Detroit between State and Griswold

Transit-Related Projects

Both DDOT and SMART are receiving funds to improve/build bus shelters and related amenities. We’ll contact both to determine whether these projects include bike racks. DDOT has been pursuing bike racks for their bus shelters as well as their buses.

Other Detroit Road Work

We checked and none of MDOT’s Detroit stimulus road work coincides with the city’s non-motorized plan. However MDOT is replacing some bridge decks over I-96 which may coincide with the plan.

Wayne County is receiving funds to reconstruct sections of 7 Mile and Fenkel Roads. Both should have bike lanes. We will contact both Wayne County and the city officials to make sure this is known.

The city of Detroit is receiving over $14.4 million for major street repair. Once we learn which roads those involve we’ll cross check them with the non-motorized plan to see if they are scheduled for bike lanes.

This should clearly show the value of having non-motorized plans in place for cities.

All of MDOT’s Metro Region stimulus projects are available on-line. SEMCOG also has a list of all accepted project requests within their seven-county area.

M-DOT has just announced another $3.8 million in Transportation Enhancement funding for 11 projects across the state. These grants will be used to develop non-motorized trails, pave roadway shoulders, purchase bus bike racks and more. All projects will take place during the 2008 construction season.

Unfortunately the bus bike racks aren’t for D-DOT. Flint and Marquette requested those.

However, two of the grants are in Detroit and will undoubtedly improve biking in the City.

Here are the details from MDOT: (more…)