Williamsburg

For your viewing pleasure this morning, YouTube footage of yesterday's early a.m. direct action on Bedford Avenue in South Williamsburg. It's hard to say for sure, but it looks like the Hasidic bike lane painters chose to stay off-camera. After the jump, a look at the results in broad daylight, courtesy of a tipster.

The guerrilla re-striping of a portion of the Bedford Avenue bike lane at 4:00 a.m. this morning was the work of both secular Williamsburg residents and members of the Hasidic community, according to Baruch Herzfeld, a local bike-shop operator and cycling advocate with ties to both communities. 

Looks like some New Yorkers who bike on Bedford Avenue decided not to sit idly by after the city removed 14 blocks of bike lane in South Williamsburg. Multiple sources informed Streetsblog this morning that DIY, unofficial bike lane striping has appeared along the stretch of Bedford Avenue that was sandblasted last week. We don't know who is responsible for this act of civil disobedience and guerrilla safety enhancement, but apparently, their efforts have run afoul of the law.

The removal of the Bedford Avenue bike lane in South Williamsburg this morning proceeded without any public input. Although the thermoplast has already been stripped away, the cause of safer streets will be better off if New Yorkers who ride this bike lane speak out strongly in response. It's important, if you can make it, to enter your opinion into the public record at tonight's meeting of Brooklyn Community Board 1.

As reported by Gothamist, DOT is removing a 14-block stretch of the Bedford Avenue bike lane between Flushing Avenue and Division Street in Hasidic Williamsburg. Workers were seen erasing the lane this morning, taking away a safer cycling connection to central Williamsburg that had been in place since 2007. The northbound bike lane now ends abruptly at Flushing, with space that once belonged to bikes already converted to left-turn lanes and the like:

Clarence Eckerson sends these shots of DOT street safety improvements taken on a recent ride near the Brooklyn and Queens waterfront. Above is the newly traffic-calmed intersection of Joralemon and Hicks -- part of the Downtown Brooklyn Traffic Calming Project -- which now sports two sidewalk extensions. (According to the Post, a third corner was slated for a curb extension, but DOT changed plans after residents said they were worried about how fire trucks would negotiate the turn.) Says Clarence: "I am sure the speed reductions will be dramatic, the equivalent of a chicane."

The NYPD's 94th Precinct in Williamsburg, Brooklyn is working hard to build on its reputation for being New York City's most infamous bike thieves. Too much demand for bike parking in the neighborhood? "I know what to do," says the 94's commanding officer Dennis M. Fulton. "Bust out the circular saw!"

We've got another dispatch from the ongoing bike lane drama that is Kent Avenue. At Wednesday night's information session hosted by Brooklyn CB1, the DOT team gave a short presentation [PDF] outlining their plan to address truck traffic changes caused by converting Kent to one-way flow. Then the public was invited to comment.

If you care about safe biking in Williamsburg and Greenpoint and you'd like to see the Brooklyn Waterfront Greenway eventually reach completion, you'll want to show up at tonight's Brooklyn CB1 transportation meeting. The Kent Avenue bike lane is item number one on the agenda.