Belmont Pedestrian and Bicycle Plan Update
The City of Belmont is in the process of creating a new Comprehensive Pedestrian and Bicycle Plan and recently surveyed its residents as part of this process.Nearly 75% of survey takers ride their bike between every day or 1-2 days per week. Only 25% of survey respondents said that they don’t bike. Most respondents chose their bike route by finding the calmest streets with the least vehicle traffic, over the fastest streets or even those with bike facilities. The biggest concern with the bike network was a lack of connectivity, followed by poor pavement conditions. Some solutions proposed were: more bike facilities, better connections, better pavement conditions, and improved bike access to El Camino Real.The City of Belmont and the consultants working on the plan also conducted walking and biking tours of the city in February. The next steps are conducting a needs analysis and proposing bike and pedestrian capital projects. The Draft Comprehensive Pedestrian and Bicycle Plan should be ready this summer.SVBC has participated on an Advisory Group for the plan. We've recommended the inclusion of a Vision Zero policy as well as setting specific goals for numbers of people walking and biking.This plan does not look at Ralston Ave.; the decisions from the 2014 Ralston Avenue Corridor Study will be included in the biking and walking plan. SVBC worked on this study and were not able to get continuous bike lanes on the full length of Ralston, though many bike lane gaps will be filled in on the western segment of Ralston.The City of Belmont will also be making some updates to the southern segment of Old County Road (from Ralston Ave. to the southern border) in the near future. SVBC has encouraged Belmont to address Old County Road in the past, as it is part of the north-south bike route defined in the Countywide Bike and Pedestrian Plan and there are bike facilities on this road at Belmont’s borders in San Mateo and San Carlos, as well as in Redwood City. On the southern segment, Belmont will be refreshing sharrows on Old County Road. We've asked them to add "Bikes May Use Full Lane" signs along with the sharrows. In comments to the city last month, SVBC recommended the following to be included in the Comprehensive Pedestrian and Bicycle Plan and considered for the northern segment of Old County Road:
- Consider parking usage on Old County Road (number of spaces, occupancy, utility)
- Consider extending existing no parking zones to add protected or buffered bike lanes on both sides of the street or two-way cycletrack on one side of street
Stay tuned for the release of the Draft Plan this summer: a great opportunity to add your comments and feedback.
