Ojai Valley Green Coalition

Ojai’s Grand Avenue, aptly named with its splendid views of the mountains, is one of the most beautiful roads in Ojai. Grand Avenue to the East End is a scenic drive and a magnificent walking/bicycling/equestrian route for locals and visitors alike.

In the 1950s, when I was a student at San Antonio School, I rode my bicycle on Grand Avenue and all over the valley without ever worrying about being hit by a car. Over the years, with increasing congestion on Ojai Avenue, Grand is no longer the road less traveled. During peak traffic hours, when children are going to school and adults are rushing to work, Grand becomes a speedway—a thoroughfare for more than 6,000 car trips a day.

With these first sharrows on Grand Avenue, Ojai has taken a step in the direction of such other bike-friendly cities as Portland, Denver, New York, Seattle, and Chicago. Sharrows are appearing all over California including cities like Berkeley, Long Beach, Ventura, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Santa Barbara, Cambria and San Luis Obispo.

The sharrows were one of about thirteen alternatives that were researched and evaluated by the Planning Commission Complete Streets sub committee and City staff over several months time, including several publicly noticed meetings.

The concept of sharrows is relatively simple: share the road, with civility, neighborliness, and mutual respect. Look people in the eye, recognize them, give them a nod to show that you see them, and even say hi. Here in Ojai, the sharrows remind us to enjoy the journey—not just careen our way to the next destination.

As is to be expected with anything new, reactions have been mixed. One longtime Ojai resident wrote, “I just saw it, and it looks great! I ride my bike down there all the time and it’s awesome. Makes me feel safer. Good job!”

At the other end of the spectrum, one resident was angry about the sharrows. In his opinion, we have made motorists into “second-class citizens” by giving priority to the cyclists.

Several parents called to express disappointment that we hadn’t installed designated bike lanes instead. A man described how some drivers honked at him when he took an 8 a.m ride toward Topa Topa School to test the safety of the route for his child. One woman yelled at him to get out of the way, and when he pointed down toward the sharrows on the pavement she accelerated and nearly clipped him off his bicycle.

Perhaps some of our police on bicycles could monitor the traffic on Grand Avenue before and after school while motorists adjust to the new sharrows.

In the coming days, as we observe the pros and cons of sharrows, please keep in mind that the Grand Avenue sharrows are only one element of a larger, complete alternative-transportation-friendly bicycle/pedestrian/equestrian street plan that the City of Ojai (i.e., various citizens working with our City staff, elected officials, and planning commissioners) is developing.

Nationwide, sharrows are one of the elements supporting the U.S. Department of Transportation’s new stated goal that the needs of pedestrians and cyclists must be placed alongside, not behind, those of motorists. Sharrows were federally approved and adopted after research by the DOT revealed that the markings significantly increase the safety of bicyclists and reduce improper bicycle behavior such as riding on the sidewalk, riding on the wrong side of the street, not hand signaling when turning, and failing to heed stop signs.

Questions and Answers about Sharrows
Q. What exactly is a sharrow?
A. A sharrow, or shared lane marking, is a white stencil of a bicycle with an arrow, intended to show both motorists and bicyclists the minimum distance that cyclists should ride from parked cars to avoid being hit by a suddenly opened car door. Although it is the motorist’s responsibility to check before opening a door, riding too close to parked cars is a common mistake that can still lead to serious injury.

Q. What’s the difference between a sharrow and a bike lane?
A. Bike lanes provide a 4-to-5-foot-wide dedicated lane for bicyclists. Under circumstances where the street is wide enough (or residents agree to remove one or both parking lanes), they are usually the safest solution for children and people unaccustomed to riding in traffic. Sharrows are on-street legends that reinforce the existing rules of the road. They are not separate bike lanes: motorists can still drive over the sharrows. Sharrows tell motorists that they should expect to share the lane with bicyclists, while they indicate to bicyclists the best place to ride in the lane.

Bike lanes are one of several design options that may be revisited down the road. Bike lanes on Grand would require the removal of car parking on one side of the street and restriping of the street.

Q. Why sharrows on Grand Avenue instead of bike lanes?
A. Due to the straightness of Grand Avenue, speeding on this street is a huge concern. The wider and straighter the street, the more drivers tend to speed. Cars parked on both sides of the street actually make the street look narrower and may help to slow traffic. The decision to implement sharrows was made with the hope that keeping the parking lane on both sides, plus the addition of sharrows, would narrow the appearance of Grand Avenue—which has elsewhere been shown to help slow down traffic.

The City is also looking at ways to make the intersection of Summer Street, North Signal, and Grand (including the blind curve as Signal turns into Grand) safer for pedestrians and cyclists.

Q. As a cyclist, what should I do in the presence of these markings?
A. The markings are placed as a guide to where cyclists should be riding. In general, cyclists should ride through the center of the sharrows. However, if there are no cars in the parking lane they can choose to ride there. And, by law, a cyclist is also free to move left, into the main part of the travel lane, when it is safe to do so.

Q. As a motorist, what should I do in the presence of the sharrows?
A. Slow down and drive carefully. Because the travel lane on Grand Avenue is too narrow for safe side–by–side travel by motorists and cyclists, drivers should slow down and either wait for a cyclist to turn off the roadway or wait until the cyclist can move into the adjacent parking lane. Keep in mind that the cyclist may not want to weave in and out of the car parking lane and has a legal right to stay on the sharrows.

Q. Can’t cyclists just look into parked cars as they ride and see if someone is about to open the door?
A. Cyclists, like all road users, need to constantly scan the entire roadway for safety. Checking every car for a driver is hard to do without compromising attention paid to the road. Also, it’s often impossible to see drivers due to headrests, tinted windows, large vehicles blocking the view of other parked vehicles, etc. Drivers should check their side-view mirror or look back prior to opening their door. Although it is the driver’s responsibility to open the door only when safe (California Vehicle Code Section 22517), it is the bicyclist who ultimately pays the price.

Q. Can I drive my car over these markings, or is this a bike lane only?
A. Unlike a bike lane, which cars can drive in only when making a right turn, you may drive over these markings. They are meant to highlight that it is a shared roadway, point out to bicyclists the minimum distance to stay from parked cars, and instruct motorists to expect to see bicyclists out in the lane.

Q. Bicyclists riding over these markings often end up in the car travel lane. Aren’t they supposed to move to the right?
A. Not always. The move-to-the-right rule is part of California Vehicle Code Section 21202, which also allows a number of exceptions to the rule. One of those exceptions allows bicyclists to avoid conditions that make it unsafe to continue along the right side. It also provides the following list of examples for those conditions: “ . . . including, but not limited to, fixed or moving objects, vehicles, bicycles, pedestrians, animals, surface hazards, or substandard width lanes.” It goes on to define a substandard-width lane as “a lane that is too narrow for a bicycle and a vehicle to travel safely side by side within the lane.”

As with all slower-moving vehicles, cyclists are required to ride as far to the right as is practical. However, slower moving vehicles are not required to compromise their safety in order to allow a faster vehicle to pass.

The driver who honks and yells at a cyclist to get out of the way when streets are narrow or cars are in the parking lane is violating the California Vehicle Code. According to Section 21202, cyclists are to stay to the right except to pass other cyclists or vehicles, to prepare to make a left turn, or when necessary to avoid conditions (including fixed or moving objects, surface hazards, or substandard-width lanes too narrow for a bicycle and vehicle to travel side by side) that make it unsafe to continue along the right. Moving to the left in the lane to avoid car doors, for instance, even if it means taking the entire lane, is permitted by the CVC.

To summarize, in all situations where the lane is too narrow for a bicycle and an overtaking motor vehicle to travel safely side by side, the motor vehicle is required by law to slow down, whether or not there are sharrows on the road. The sharrows are there as a reminder to cars to slow down and share the road. In a location like the Arbolada where there are no sharrows, cars must still legally slow down to accommodate cyclists. If the slow speed of a group of students on bicycles, for example, is a problem for a motorist, it is the motorist who by law must take a different route, not the bicycle. The law does not require a cyclist to take a different route so cars can go faster. In a location like Ojai Avenue, where cars are often parked on both sides of the street, bicycles can ride in the entire travel lane to avoid car doors, potholes, etc.

Next time you see a bicycle on the road, remember that bicycling benefits motorists by reducing the number of cars on the road and freeing up parking spaces. More bicycles mean cleaner air and water, less reliance on oil, and improved public health and property values. It’s our hope that, like the Ojai Valley Trail, the sharrows on Grand Avenue will be a catalyst for change—the first of many further new elements that, over time, have the potential to make Ojai a world-class bicycle/pedestrian/equestrian-friendly city.

Suza Francina is Chair of the Transportation Committee of the Ojai Valley Green Coalition and a representative to the Planning Commission Complete Streets Subcommittee.

Note: A slightly different version of this article published in the Ojai Valley News, September 1, 2010, “Bikes, Cars, Sharing the road: Pavement Markings on Grand Avenue designed to promote bicycle use, safety.”

The author gratefully acknowledges and thanks her editors, Sonia Nordenson and David E. Moody PhD., and the Planning Commission Complete Streets Subcommittee, in the writing of this article.

Cross-posted http://www.ojaipost.com/2010/09/on-sharrows-and-sharing-the-roads-in-ojai/