Summertime and the lining is pleasing!
The Department of Transportation, under fire for not ensuring safety on the Brooklyn Bridge bike and walking path, has finally picked the lowest of the low-hanging fruit — painting a new center stripe and lane markings to discourage pedestrians and cyclists from mixing.
Streetsblog has been asking about the missing or faded markings since March, when we referred to the repainting as one of five easy, immediate steps the DOT could take without delay. The DOT did not comment for that story, but we kept asking.
Finally, on May 15, we again asked, "When will the DOT repaint the 'ped' and 'bike' lane markings on the Brooklyn Bridge footpath, or install enhanced lane markings?" The next day, we were told the work would be done "this summer." Follow-up questions were ignored, but the agency did indeed meet its promise, doing the work just five days after June 21, the start of the season.
Our call for simple solutions was motivated by the increasing crush on the bridge footpath, which is just 10-feet wide at some places. Faded paint confused many walkers and cyclists about where they should be at any given time. In addition, NYPD vehicles, which block the pathway at four key chokepoints, contain humans who rarely do anything to ease conflict between cyclists and pedestrians.
