Brooklyn Bus Route Redesign Gives DOT More Room For ‘Bike Boulevards’ on Dean And Bergen Streets

Project More Runway.

The Mamdani administration will be able to create great bike boulevards on two key cycle commuting routes through Downtown Brooklyn, thanks in part to the in-progress Brooklyn Bus Network Redesign, which envisions rerouting bus service on Dean and Bergen streets west of Washington Avenue

That redesign should disarm arguments that proposed bike boulevards would undermine bus service. In the past, one roadblock to an aggressive redesign of Dean and Bergen streets has been the B65 bus, which runs between Smith Street and Buffalo Avenue on Bergen Street, and between Rochester and Third avenues on Dean Street. But the redesign of the Brooklyn bus network will shift the B65 north to Atlantic Avenue.

The MTA says moving the B65 north has a number of advantages, including that Atlantic is wider then single-lane Bergen and Dean, that the new route will provide direct connections to the Atlantic Terminal transit hub and that buses will no longer need to make a difficult right turn from Bergen Street onto Smith Street.

More important from the city Department of Transportation perspective, the reroute also frees up one mile on Dean Street and 1.5 miles on Bergen Street for a bike boulevard design that won’t put cyclists in conflict with buses. DOT will also be able to design without bus conflicts in mind between Ralph and East New York avenues, which has advocates asking the agency to think big on the eastern and westernmost pieces of the corridors.

Why a bike boulevard?

Despite lacking protected bike lanes, Bergen and Dean have been crucial bike connections between Brooklyn and Manhattan for over two decades — the best east-west paired roadways between central Brooklyn and the Brooklyn and Manhattan bridges.

The streets have also recently become famous for the presence of the Bergen Bike Bus, a mass cycling event where parents chaperone their children to school by bike. Mamdani chose to make his redesign announcement after riding on the bike bus last week.

“I think it makes sense to have the most ambitious project in each of the locations,” said Transportation Alternatives Executive Director Ben Furnas. “[Bike boulevards are] a pretty proven intervention. And that this is a real opportunity to show what a great neighborhood street for biking could look like.”

In both areas, the lack of conflicts with buses allows DOT to use the types of designs seen in other bike boulevards in places like Williamsburg, Astoria, Sunnyside or nearby Underhill Avenue that emphasize local traffic by reversing directions on streets to prevent through traffic for the entire stretch.

East of Washington Avenues, though, DOT will still need to figure out a design that allows for effective bus service and safe cycling. The agency could just convert the existing painted bike lane to a parking protected bike lane, but advocates are also wondering if the agency can do more than that.

“This is an opportunity to expand the toolkit and show what can be done,” said Furnas. “I think DOT is full of talented engineers who can think about this in an ambitious way, and we want them to think as ambitiously as they can.”

It’s unclear what the full redesign of both streets will wind up looking like. City Hall said that a first look at the proposal will come later this year. DOT spokesman Vin Barone acknowledged that the B65 has been partly re-routed to Atlantic, but also tweeted last week that the agency could make room for both bike and bus if it needed to.

“And even with bus routes, DOT could create bike boulevard designs that accommodate buses,” Barone said.

He followed up with a statement to Streetsblog that the city will not make one form of travel better at the expense of another.

“We are working every day to speed up bus service for riders across the city,” said Barone. “We’re supportive of bus service on the corridor and, as we develop our bike boulevard design, bus service will be a key consideration.”