In the next year, at least four bike projects will open in the San Diego region, and construction is scheduled on several more.
The year will bring a new segment of the Bayshore Bikeway in National City, a trail along the San Diego River near Qualcomm Stadium and a bikeway along state Route 15. That's according to a project update from the San Diego Association of Governments, the regional planning agency.
Andy Hanshaw, the director of the nonprofit advocacy group San Diego Bike Coalition, received the update and shared it with KPBS.
The list of scheduled projects in 2017 also includes the start of construction on 4th and 5th avenues in Uptown, as well as an extension of the Coastal Rail Trail along Rose Creek. In 2018, construction is slated to begin on bike lanes in Uptown Mission Hills, Old Town, Hillcrest and the Bayshore Bikeway in Barrio Logan, among others.
Hanshaw said he is also looking to see the start of work on the Downtown Mobility Plan, which was approved by the San Diego City Council in June.
The plan will add nine miles of new bike lanes and more than five miles of widened sidewalks, including protected bike lanes on Pacific Highway and State Street; Fourth, Fifth and Sixth avenues; Park, J and C streets; and Broadway and Beech Street. It will also extend the bike lane on Harbor Drive and the bike path along the bay.
The next step for the project is to receive funding in the fiscal 2018 budget. But news that the city is facing budget cuts makes Hanshaw concerned that the bike plan will be left out.
"It gives a ridership network, a safety network, a comfortable place for people to ride and connect not only downtown but to the regional bikeway projects that are also going to connect to the downtown project," he said.
The bike plan will be a key allowing the city to unlock its ridership goals laid out in the Climate Action Plan, he said. The plan says by 2020, six percent of commuters should bicycle to work, and that number should rise to 18 percent by 2035.
