After an ongoing, controversial stint in the center of the street, the Valencia Street bike lane is expected to move back to the curbside soon, as shown in new designs presented in a community meeting on Monday afternoon.
That new design for a bike lane on Valencia between 15th and 23rd streets — unsurprisingly — received mixed reviews from bicyclists who came out to the open house: Some said they now prefer the center bike lane, which initially met with a great deal of hesitation and controversy from cyclists.
“I don’t like parking-protected bike lanes,” said cyclist Matthew Blain, referring to bike lanes in which the cars sit on the outside, closer to the road, with the bike lane between parking spots and the sidewalk. “I think the center one is much safer, because the parking-protected ones, there’s always conflict … even if people don’t door you, they’re getting in and out of their cars, walking across the bike lane.”
The new side-running bike lane will be “parking-protected,” meaning parked vehicles will function as a barrier between cyclists and traffic. It’s the same model that was implemented on Valencia Street further north, between 15th and Market streets.
Parklets, the small sitting areas built in parking spaces, will take two forms: Some will remain along the curb, while some will be floating parklets — separated from the sidewalk, with the bike lane in between the parklet and the pavement. The design is new to San Francisco, but has been successful in Oakland and New York City.
“My concern about this is, what is the plan when there’s broken glass or human feces?” said Jennifer, a Mission cyclist who said the above-mentioned situation happens to her almost every day. “Like there’s no way to clean that up.”
Other cyclists were more optimistic. Riley Smith, a cyclist who lives close to Valencia and 24th streets, said, “I’m okay with either a center-protected lane or a side-protected lane, as long as there’s protection.”
“I like it better than the last one,” said cyclist Brad Koester, because the center bike lane “isolates you.”
Coach, a bicyclist who lives at 26th and Dolores streets, also prefers the new design. The center bike lane is “only wide enough, barely, for three bikes across. And with all the new technology, the e-bikes, they’re very heavy, very fast. And people that ride them are typically new cyclists,” he said. The new one “is narrower, but you don’t have anybody coming at you at 25 miles an hour.”
After the center bike lane pilot project, which received a lot of unfounded blame for impacting local businesses, this time the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency has spoken to more than half of the businesses and met with each of the 26 parklet owners along Valencia Street several times. Ultimately, 21 merchants chose to keep the parklets curbside, three chose to rebuild them into floating parklets closer to the road, and two decided to remove their parklets before the new bike lane construction starts.
Each merchant who chooses to make their parklet floating will be reimbursed up to $30,000 through an SFMTA program. And all future parklets along the bike lane will need to be floating; no future curbside parklets will be allowed. Ramps will be placed between the floating parklets and the curb to slow down cyclists and protect parklet patrons.
Erin Fieberling, a bicyclist who lives in District 9, found the floating parklets concerning. “The floating parklet design, it will introduce more access points where bikes will interact with pedestrians,” they said. “Right now, the design is so great, because I don’t have to worry about hitting a person.”
For Fieberling, the new design “is a step backwards,” they said. “It centers cars back on the road, and cars kill people … my big takeaway of this is that SFMTA is redesigning this project from political pressure from businesses.”
“It seems silly to me that we’re going to bulge out around parklets when we don’t even know if that parklet is going to be there forever,” said Joe Roybal, a neighbor.
Compared to the current design, some 80 parking and loading spaces — 40 percent — would be removed for better visual clearance at intersections and around fire hydrants. Additional motorcycle and scooter parking spaces will be added around areas with a high volume of delivery workers.
The SFMTA is also putting up advertisements to make drivers aware of the existence of two SFMTA-owned parking garages nearby that are rarely at full capacity. That includes the Mission-Bartlett Garage at 21st Street between Bartlett and Valencia streets, and the 16th and Hoff Garage.
“Parking is one of those tradeoffs,” said SFMTA project manager Paul Stanis. “But flexibility in the street and a more predictable, more familiar layout is, to some people, the benefit” of the new design.
The finalized design will be presented to the SFMTA board in November. Even if it’s approved, the center bike lane will remain until at least the end of this year. Construction work on the new design is expected to begin in early January, and take two to three months, depending on the weather, according to Stanis.
“This is going to be a design that is much more familiar for both drivers and cyclists,” said SFMTA spokesperson Michael Roccaforte. “We’re committed to making sure this works best for everybody: The merchants, the people who live here, for people who drive through Valencia.”
With the new bike lane, drivers will still be prohibited from turning left off of Valencia Street, a key corridor in the city’s bikeway network.
A second community meeting will take place on Wednesday, Sep. 25, from 4 to 6 p.m. at City College San Francisco Mission Campus at 1125 Valencia St.
A narrow bicycle chute between parklets and the sidewalk? That’s a death trap. I am definitely riding my bike in the traffic lane!
A 25 year resident living a block from Valencia, I attended the meeting last night specifically to voice concern over the planned “Floating Parklets.” Many people go to Valencia to drink – which is great for the bars and restaurants. But not great for this design. Do we really believe people are going to “look out” for an oncoming bike – or control their children and pets who frequently roam free among the Parklets and adjoining sidewalks? Is anyone confident that an 8 foot long ramp will slow down a speeding cyclist – particularly one who is riding a rental bike for the first time in SF- or just downed a few beers? What is the MISSION of this project anyhow? So far as I understand, it is to build a safe, efficient and durable design for a vibrant Mission District bicycle corridor. So why incorporate an obviously serious safety design flaw to accommodate (3) business owners who choose to build floating parklets? Parklets were created as a Lifeline for businesses to survive the Covid economy by creating space for outdoor dining. They now exist as a Privilege and are often not well maintained. As another reader commented, why is this 2.0 redesign accommodating Parklets that may likely not exist in the near future? This is a big, complicated piece of urban engineering- and anyone who has been involved in such projects knows that not every constituency gets everything they want, or won’t be asked to make some sacrifice for the greater good. In any event, thank you to the team at SFMTA for hosting this event last night. It was well staged and staffed and generated an atmosphere of education and open discussion!
Your question implies that you’ve bought the premise that this was being demoed and replaced (2 times) with actual public safety as the primary concern and justification for spending the (large) amount of (taxpayer) money, vis a vis other safety corridor projects in the city that could really use it. That’s just not how Breed’s SF actually operates. Bicycle coalition “walk SF” busybody “non-profits” throw SF/CA taxpayer money around like it’s free, and Breed’s bespoke bureaucracy sees political pyrite in painting all the lanes and erecting all the useless curbs they demand. The rest of SF be damned, UNTIL it runs into another Breed political constituency – Say, Chinatown. That’s where the rubber meets the road, which group gets the political backscratch priority. Safety, lol. “Vision Zero”? There are more accidents than ever and near-zero enforcement of the rules of the road. Money well spent, bicycle coalition Breed-bought lackeys. Zero vision indeed.
Hi there —
You’re spamming our site with many comments and using multiple names to do so. Please stop.
JE
Curb bike lanes will have more pedestrian vs cyclist conflicts. In the cell phone driven world, noticing that one is standing/walking thru the bike lane seems rather low on the common SF pedestrian priority list, especially in the evening. For cyclists, the greater number of pedestrians to avoid, having the lane wander around or behind parklets that are hard to see around, while navigating elevation changes/speed bumps, avoiding getting hit by cars entering and exiting driveways and doing legal right turns, plus the illegal left turning cars makes this new version even less appealing. Very unfortunate to see the SFMTA increasing bike vs pedestrian conflicts and reducing the cyclist’s field of view.
Just rip the bandaid off and remove cars from Valencia already.
Rup the bandaid and get rid of the Parklets. That seems like a disaster for cyclists and Parker’s.
I literally just had the same thought. Not only make it a promenade, but make it one of those zones the city has been floating where alcohol is allowed outside. Take away the option for street parking and people will use the garages. I never use the garages. It’s not because I don’t like them, it’s because I forget they exist.
Imagine trying to get your 80 lb dog to Mission Pet Hospital in an emergency with no vehicle access. Imagine all of the revenue the restaurants would lose because delivery drivers cannot access them. Imagine the hell of keeping a restaurant stocked without delivery vehicles.
If bicyclist-groupies buy up ALL THE LAND and businesses and residences along Valencia, your proposal might make sense (to those unrealistic faux-environmentalists yuppies deluding themselves lol) – but until then?
LEARN TO SHARE SF, BICYCLE YUPPIE TRANSPLANT TECHIES. Just because you’ve got Breed in your pocket doesn’t make you more important than the rest of SF that existed before you discovered avocado toast on social media.
How about removing the whiners, sociopath, presumptuous, self-centered, phonies, freeloaders, cockroaches, and scroungers from their bikes, and ban them all from in any streets in the city?
Sheesh! is this a civil comment? I could say the same for all the cars that constantly violate traffic laws and put in danger cyclists an pedestrians. The original bike lane would have work just fine if cars wouldn’t double park on them forcing bicycles into traffic. Or if they would check for incoming bikes before opening their door.
Thank you. So sick of entitled bicyclists in the city.
It’s actually global, they have online hype-groups like streetwise.sf that have political yuppie-placating ambitions to make EVERYWHERE the transplant bicycle paradise they think Europe is already. *(Why they don’t just move to Europe with all their techie stock money, who knows, I think they just like to whine like it’s cathartic.)
Floating parklets seem like a very bad idea. No one would think it was a good idea to put parklets in the middle of the road, with cars between them and the sidewalk. Why is it okay to expect bike/scooter traffic to mix with people walking to and from the parklet?
Also, we should probably remove those parklets that are barely used, such as the Yasmin ones on the side street that take up two parking spots and are never used.
Is there still time to consider the Burrito Plan? One-way, one-lane car traffic, with space for loading zones and wider sidewalks?
Car drivers have Guerrero & Dolores (4 lanes of traffic), Mission, and SVN close by, and yet the corridor with the most shops, restaurants, and general human traffic still gives cars 4 lanes?
Car drivers want their cakes, cookies, and ice cream, and they want to eat it, too. Give people just ONE non-sketchy bicycle and pedestrian thoroughfare! Giving cars access in a just single direction would be a great idea.
You can safely walk your bicycle on the sidewalk instead.
Since you’re so safety minded.
Here is a link to the SFMTA report and a PDF of the sample block that you can actually read. https://www.sfmta.com/projects/valencia-bikeway-improvements
The center lane is the best by far. My coworker had to bail on to the sidewalk when a pedestrian ran across the bike lane without warning and was out of commission for 2 months last year. This year my husband broke his hip navigating one of those temporarily raised side running lanes under dark lighting. These things are dangerous and unintuitive. Pedestrians love to waffle in them because they don’t realize they are a traffic lane. The center lane is so much safer for everyone. I think the only thing it needs is mid-block islands/entry lakes for crossing pedestrians and exiting cyclists.
100%
Center lane is not safer, that’s a non-fact.
Someone is going to get killed with this new design. They should keep it in the center.
Erin Fieberling, a bicyclist who lives in District 9, found the floating parklets concerning. “The floating parklet design, it will introduce more access points where bikes will interact with pedestrians,” she said. “Right now, the design is so great because I don’t have to worry about hitting a person.”
I guess the other bikers who ride down the middle of the sidewalk aren’t worried about this at all.
I bike down Valencia regularly. The floating parklets design feels quite a bit less safe for me than the center lane.
That said, I would love to see some actual numbers of the impact of the center lane:
– how many bike related accidents with the center lane compared to without
– bike traffic with center lane compared to without
When the protected lane swings around curbside parklets, I hope MTA will protect the lane with concrete posts. If they don’t, we should expect Ubers and other drivers to be parked there more or less constantly, pushing people on bikes into the traffic lane.
I don’t love the center lane but I hope it doesn’t take >9 months to do this build like the “quick build” center lane did.
• The original bike lanes on the side worked well, except for people parking in them and the SFPD coënabling that. But that problem increased, exponentially it seems, when gig-workers showed up and were in the bike lanes nonstop.
Every change done since then has been to deal with the gig-workers’ cars, with varying degrees of success. The parking-protected configuration is something that works well all over the world, but here I’m concerned that this new treatment leaves places for gig-workers to pull into pinch-points and block the bike lanes, just like they already do in similarly-configured pinch-points on Valencia north of 16th Street.
“Compared to the current design, some 80 parking and loading spaces — 40 percent — would be removed for better visual clearance at intersections and around fire hydrants. Additional motorcycle and scooter parking spaces will be added around areas with a high volume of delivery workers.”
Here come the waterworks from small business.
You obviously don’t run a retail business nor respect those who do.
Per usual, not one word about the hundreds of people who live on the 400 block of Valencia. No accommodations were made in the center lane design for the pick up and drop off of residents, and it looks like this problem for us will be made even worse with the floating lane plan.
Dear SFMTA — hello, we live here and would like a minute.
I’m frustrated at the outcomes coming from the continuous desire to compromise and try to fit everybody on this street. It is not physically possible to fit everybody who wants to be on this street on this street. Valencia has been unsafe for bikes for a long time, and we need physical protection from cars. It is not however appropriate as a street for bikes to get through quickly. Whether or not people like it, Valencia is now a pedestrian-first street, which is primarily responsible for driving commerce (there are so many studies that prove this). The infrastructure does not support the activity, and sidewalks need to be widened to accommodate outdoor/parklet-style dining as well as the overwhelming demand for space on the street any day of the week.
It’s also a neighborhood street, and without parking or passenger loading on-street, neighbors will be impacted, but this can be controlled with residential parking permits, geofencing, and frequent ADA-only parking/drop-off either on Valencia or cross streets. Time-limited spaces can be accommodated on-street for passenger and delivery loading every other block, switching sides to ensure one side does not benefit disproportionately. This is the only way to get the space needed to accommodate the demand for the sidewalk, bikes, and travel lanes if you want to keep vehicle access to the curb. It is also a way to organize the loading needs.
For the bikes, we need to provide physical barriers in parking/loading-protected zones or just the soft-hit posts – but as others say it is important to provide sufficient space and warnings for people getting out of their vehicles.
The bottom line is that we are continually pitting people against each other but we need to rethink the corridor holistically, assigning infrastructure based on need, not on who is loudest.
This is SO stupid.
Valencia was the only safe cycling street in the city, with one lane in each direction, signals times for 13mph. It was set up for cyclists to take up the entire traffic lane.
Everything SFMTA has done just made it less safe and the “floating parklet” design will be so much worse.
I will be riding in the traffic lane. Way safer.
Absolutely correct. Imagine how that money could have been spent better!
FIRE BREED.
The center lane design is much better than this. Right turning cars and cyclists going straight is going to be an issue….
I am not sure how this helps merchants. I’m disabled and have to use a car for shopping and doctor appontments, etc. I don’t feel safe using Bart at 24th or 16th St. For some reason the 14 mission and some other buses don’t have shock absorbers by the time I get off the bus I’m ready for traction. I was looking forward to going back and visiting that area of town.
Mission street has had a lot of construction on it with mostly patchy covering which comes off with so many buses running along it so there are a lot of potholes that you can feel when riding the bus. That issue still needs to be addressed but perhaps it would also be helpful to have some designated disabled parking spots along valencia street, close to medical service providers and to allow easy access for people who may not be able to walk from the parking lots.
There should be removing public parking on Valencia for anyone _except_ the disabled and delivery vehicles.
No thanks, said the actual business owners, trying to survive.
How about you cyclist-extremist single-minders move instead
and make space for someone who can coexist with society? Valencia business corridor will certainly survive without your politics of division.
Who would ever want to park on the side of valencia street? probably all businesses on valencia get 10X more cycling customers than people who drove and parallel parked. These business owners don’t know what is best for themselves and shouldn’t be listened to. To me, seems like a much better solution is to completely remove parking, add space for curbside parklets/sidewalk expansion, and then make a large cement protected bike lane than cyclists can easily enter and exit that doesn’t have a large amount of pedestrian traffic
‘Looks like I’m going to need to find a new vet after 30 years. The parking on Valencia between 18th and 19th is either yellow or red zone or motorcycle. The one space that had been in front of my vet has been sacrificed for a bike corral.
I wonder if the vet knows — he told me that SFMTA had not notified him of any street modifications and that each one came as a surprise.
This design favors bikers and to a lesser degree, parklets. It is not “shared” space. It is co-opted space and bodes badly for businesses on Valencia. It’s just another example of the city’s pandering to a small percentage of the population.
for the floating parklets, it does seem to be up to the restaurant if they want to give up the parklets and have parking or hold on to more space for customers. Do they pay the city for the parking spaces they are using or is this a free subsidy for restaurants since they have a tough time staying in business in san francisco?
Ok so this will be take #3, for a still very compromised “solution”. How about, no bike lanes on Valencia. Street is too busy with shops, dining and people milling about. Find another nearby street for dedicated bike lanes.
Was this a victory for the last vestige of hipsters, AKA the SFBicycle Coalition?
Anyone answer me this one ?
Why have they completely left the one block section of Valencia running from 14th to 15th out of their plans ?
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Dawg howls up storm over bike lane from ‘4 barrel’ to 14th
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h brown
5:12 PM (0 minutes ago)
to Tony, Rich, Bulldog, Rosh, Adriel, h
Campers,
Is there an echo in here ?
What I’ve been fighting to avoid is hearing sirens some morning while parents are taking their kids to school down the street on those bikes with the double kid seating arrangements and find that some auto driver in a hurry to work followed the heavy white arrows showing him where to make a right turn and goosed it a bit and smashed a parent and their two little kids to smithereens because they were hurrying too but in a bike lane that no longer exists because it has no green paint left and SFMTA has ignored my 311 request and the two accidents that have happened there over the past year.
Hell, you use it in your lead photo but only the side of the street where there is still some Green paints although it seems to have been painted over a half inch of concrete (fine for bikes but when the custom mini-curb sweeper weighing a hundred times a bike passes through it has eventually broken out chunks of the veneer which my dog and I pick up daily) …
SFMTA has provided the section of Valencia running from Duboce to 14th with the best layout cause it includes the old Levis bldg. and it’s Friends School on one side of street and Greek church and school on other … sidewalk hugging bike lanes protected by raised narrow concrete islands … it’s a honey.
From 14th to 15th on Valencia there appears to be no plan.
When I asked the lady in your photo wearing the tiger headband about it she nodded and scratched it down on the paper covering the table.
We’ll see and, yes, there have been crashes from ‘4 barrel’ to 14th where there is no paint at all nor plans for any.
h.
I hope somebody polled drivers. Nobody seems to care what drivers think, but they are an important part of this decision — especially delivery drivers. Valencia Street businesses need delivery trucks and vans and they must stop somewhere.
I both cycle and drive, though I walk more than I do either of those. I suppose in the past SF didn’t take cyclists’ needs seriously enough. But lately I think they’re taking them too seriously. We need tourists to come back to Valencia Street, and they’re not going to do it on bicycles. We need drivable streets and parking spaces. It seems like these are curse words lately, but they are important for the city to revive.
Guerrero street is for drivers. Valencia is the biker/pedestrian corridor.
….have you seen how many tourists are on bikes at Marina green???
As the article mentioned there are two different parking garages in the mission and there will still be some spaces on the street.
Delivery drivers can still just double park (which they already do) and without the center line bike lane, other drivers will be able to get around them (via the oncoming lane) which they cannot do right now without running over the flimsy plastic bollards and going into the center bike lane.
I think this makes the street more drivable which benefits ubers, busses, and overall traffic flow.
Howard, what tourist in their right mind would drive a car to Valencia St.? Do you drive a car around Manhattan when you visit?
This is what’s so ridiculous about the complaints about parking – even a decade ago I would’ve done just about anything to avoid having to drive to (and thus find parking on) Valencia. It’s never been a great place to drive to! Just build out other transit infrastructure and stop trying to pretend this very walkable strip is a suburban mini mall.
Businesses rely on parking places, that’s a fact. Even deliveries can back up with only 1 functional lane with a single double-parking delivery truck, and those are common now because there’s no enforcement. Thank Breed.
I know this will come as news to you but people drive their cars into Manhattan every single day.
I live right near Valencia Street. I walk on it every day, bike on it sometimes, drive on it sometimes. Closing it to car traffic would make it much more difficult to get to and from my apartment, and would force me to make a U-turn on Guerrero almost every trip. This is another issue that isn’t talked about.
And yes, tourists drive to Valencia Street. Have you ever actually been to Valencia Street at night? You should check it out. It used to be livelier — because more people used to drive to it.
God cyclists are so whiny and entitled lately.
We can’t all be cool like you I guess. Oh well, goals right?
We’ll see how this shakes out. If anything the narrow lane will hopefully be less appealing to the creeps on their dirt bikes.
Those creeps really stink.
If you don’t respect the rules of the road, why should they or anyone else? You think a protected lane will matter when they’re blowing the stop signs and red lights anyway, because you think you’re above the rules? This changes nothing at all. You can and will get doored either way, so enjoy the expensive paved fruits of your political pandering to a non-solution. Just make sure your reflectors are up to spec, good luck.
Car drivers dominate the city and have killed 18 people this year already. People on bikes are whiny because people in cars have little regard for anyone other than themselves, at the expense of others’ safety. Air, noise, light, even visual pollution – all a product of cars existing everywhere. They’re necessary, but the scales are tipped a bit too much towards the car driver.
Here, watch me get pissy because I can’t store my 6 privately-owned refrigerators on publicly-funded infrastructure. Sounds absurd, right?
And they can’t wait to kill again! – statistics, brought to you by people with jobs, whiny unrealistic faux-environmentalism cyclist community. Yes, stuff comes in by ship, plane, car and truck and NOT bicycle-load. Your avocado toast, your slap bracelet, all of it kids. Get over it or move back in with mom and stop ordering everything on Amazon, Gen-Z. Bike-brained unrealism on this forum is emitting carbon as we speak, that’s just the world. Faux-environmentalism is not a virtue, it’s greenwashing, a fraud, and you’re playing the local mascot.
Lately, lol? Why was the decision to annually fund huge amounts of money to the Bicycle Coalition never placed on a ballot to be voted on by taxpayers?