DOT Responds to Park Slope Bike Lane Uprising With Thermoplast Surge

1:13 PM EDT on June 23, 2009

DOT contractors are putting down new bike lane markings on Park Slope's Fifth Avenue this afternoon. In addition to refurbishing the original bike lane laid down in 2004 and the sharrows installed in 2006, the crews are adding reinforcements, like the chevron markings through the intersections pictured below.

It would be entirely fitting if these improvements were DOT's response to the recent complaints from a small number of merchants and the idiotic editorial that ran in the Brooklyn Paper claiming that these pavement markings -- and the cyclists who use them -- are somehow interfering with deliveries and parking on the avenue. But this is probably just regularly scheduled maintenance. Winter snow plows really do a number on these bike lanes.

Aaron Naparstek

AARON NAPARSTEK is the founder and former editor-in-chief of Streetsblog. Based in Brooklyn, New York, Naparsteks journalism, advocacy and community organizing work has been instrumental in growing the bicycle network, removing motor vehicles from parks, and developing new public plazas, car-free streets and life-saving traffic-calming measures across all five boroughs. Naparstek is the author of "Honku: The Zen Antidote for Road Rage" (Villard, 2003), a book of humorous haiku poetry inspired by the endless motorist sociopathy observed from his apartment window. Prior to launching Streetsblog, Naparstek worked as an interactive media producer, pioneering some of the Web's first music web sites, online communities, live webcasts and social networking services. Naparstek is currently in Cambridge with his wife and two young sons where he is enjoying a Loeb Fellowship at Harvard University's Graduate School of Design. He has a master's degree from Columbia University's Graduate School of Journalism and a bachelor's degree from Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri. Naparstek is a co-founder of the Park Slope Neighbors community group and the Grand Army Plaza Coalition. You can find more of his work here: http://www.naparstek.com.

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