FIRST - Thanks to Kai Addae and the Safe Streets Coalition of New Haven for the information below.
After a long delay, the city has scheduled another community input meeting on Wednesday, December 20th at 6 PM to hear feedback on Orange Street's redesign including the proposal of protected bike lanes.
At the meeting, city staff will present the recently completed parking analysis for Orange St, which describes the impact on neighborhood parking availability if the city removed a lane of street parking on Orange and installed protected bike lanes on both sides of the street, likely between Edwards and Cold Spring. The goal of the meeting is to get feedback from the community about the parking analysis and the idea of installing protected bike lanes.
How to Take Action:
Attend the Wednesday December 20th virtual meeting at 6:00 pm and speak up in support of protected bike lanes, traffic calming, and pedestrian safety. Our Alders and City officials need to hear us speak up in support of protected bike lanes, which we know make the street safer for everyone, help the environment, and increase traffic to local businesses. Join at: bit.ly/safer-orange, password is Fe99GyHV.
RSVP and invite other New Haven friends and neighbors to the Dec 20th meeting by using this Facebook event link.
Contact your Alder to let them know that you support redesigning Orange Street to include protected bike lanes. You can find your Alder and their contact information here.
Background:
In the Fall of 2021, Orange Street was repaved from Humphrey to Cold Spring and the bike lanes were removed, pending a decision about building protected bike lanes. In the Fall of 2021, the New Haven Safe Streets Coalition polled hundreds of folks (including every household in the affected section of Orange St) nearly all of whom support this. We heard many personal anecdotes from those we spoke to about feeling unsafe while biking on our streets that corroborate pedestrian and cyclist injury data (you can read more about motor vehicle collisions in East Rock in this New Haven Independent article). The city hosted a community input meeting in March 2022, but officials held off on deciding because of “community concerns” over losing parking on sections of the street.
We know that protected bike lanes are good for vulnerable road users, slow traffic by narrowing the perceived road width, support our local East Rock Businesses, and help us to care for our environment. While parking on one side of the street would be removed, the loss of personal parking spaces on the public street would reward everyone with the ability to get around more safely.
Please join us at the community meeting to speak up in support of a safer and more vibrant Orange Street!
The Bradley Street Bicycle Co-op is hosting a brief pre-meeting, social ride and projecting the community meeting so you can join among friends (and eat pizza). Details below:
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