Monday: Tell CB 12 to Get on Board With Dyckman Street Upgrades Already

DOT will bring its plan for new bike lanes on Dyckman Street in Inwood back to Community Board 12 next Monday.

Local residents have been asking DOT for a protected bike lane on Dyckman, a major neighborhood thoroughfare that connects the east side and west side greenways, since 2008. CB 12 requested that DOT come up with a proposal for better bike infrastructure on the corridor -- Dyckman currently has painted lanes on the east and west ends, but they don't connect -- in 2011 and 2012.

But when DOT put forth a plan last spring, CB 12 declined to support it. Instead, after years of talking around Dyckman improvements, the board's transportation committee asked DOT for more meetings. Since then DOT has conducted site visits with CB 12 members to discuss the plan further, the agency told Streetsblog.

DOT has proposed a road diet for Dyckman between Broadway and Nagle Avenue, with a painted median and center turn lane flanked by one general traffic lane and a five-foot painted bike lane in each direction. Between Nagle and 10th Avenue, in place of existing painted bike lanes, DOT would install a nine-foot two-way protected bikeway on the south side of the street.

In addition to the bike lanes, the plan includes new median islands for pedestrians at Vermilyea and Post avenues and a painted curb extension and new crosswalk where Dyckman intersects with 10th Avenue, which right now is a vast expanse of asphalt.

The DOT plan for Dyckman is not the end-to-end bikeway that locals first proposed when George W. Bush was in the White House, but it would impose some order on a chaotic, heavily-trafficked street, acknowledging the presence of people on bikes and making intersections safer for walking.

Traffic crashes injured 276 people on Dyckman between 2010 and 2014, according to DOT, including 73 pedestrians and cyclists. Thirteen people were severely injured on Dyckman during that period.

Monday's meeting will be held at 7 p.m. at the Alianza Dominicana Cultural Center, at 530 W. 166th Street, on the 6th floor. Transportation Alternatives is calling on advocates to come out and support a safer Dyckman Street. You can RSVP to TA if you plan to attend the meeting. You can also add your name to TA's "Complete Dyckman Street" petition here.