The city is considering transitioning a protected bike lane on Roxbury Drive into a permanent street feature.
As part of that process, the Public Works department is encouraging residents and other stakeholders, including those living outside of Beverly Hills who use the bike lane, to complete a survey regarding their experiences traveling within or adjacent to the pilot lane.
The online survey link is available at beverlyhills.org/completestreets.
Installed in late 2021, the Roxbury Drive Protected Bike Lane Pilot Project includes a southbound parking-protected bike lane and a northbound conventional bike lane, connecting to existing bike lanes in Los Angeles and improving bicycle access to Roxbury Park. The southbound lane runs south of Olympic Boulevard alongside the park. Prior to its installation, the city held a demonstration ride for people to test out what the bike lane would look like.
Daren Grilley, assistant director of Public Works and a city engineer, said there are approximately 40-50 bikes per day using the pilot bike lane in the southbound direction. The Public Works department uses a citywide camera system, pulling data from that, he said.
City Council approved the pilot in Sept. 2021 as part of an effort to transform Beverly Hills into a more bike-friendly city. While the evaluation period of the lane was initially intended to be one year, it has lasted longer.
“It’s been working so well we just continued with it,” Grilley said. “We didn’t have any complaints.”
Grilley said most of the feedback about the pilot program has been supportive.
“It’s been installed for almost two years, and we’ve heard positive feedback. We’re bringing this back to our Traffic and Parking Commission because we want to find out what the community thinks about it now that it’s been there for a while,” Grilley said. “We’re still in that information-gathering stage.”
“It’s been working pretty well,” Grilley added. “There are a couple of things we’ve learned and modified.” This includes how to allow for angular parking so that larger vehicles can continue to park alongside the park as well as how to keep the area clean of falling leaves and other debris.
The survey, the city engineer said, provides important feedback for the city. Because the bike lane is located near the city’s border with Los Angeles, the city is interested in not only what Beverly Hills-based cyclists think but also anybody who makes use of the protected bike lane.
“It’s open to anybody,” Grilley said of the survey. “And we want to know what residents think, especially folks who live on that street.”
According to the Public Works department, the goal of the Roxbury Drive bike lane pilot is providing a more comfortable street for people to bicycle on by providing physical separation from moving traffic, while not removing any on-street parking or vehicle travel lanes.
Bike lanes on Roxbury Drive are identified as a high priority in the City’s Complete Streets Plan, a comprehensive vision approved in 2021 by City Council that aims to make the city more accessible to cyclists and pedestrians.
Presently, flex posts separate the southbound protected bike lane on Roxbury Drive from parking spaces and vehicular lanes. That may change, however, depending on community feedback and the decision of City Council.
The survey presents five options for the design of the bike lane. One option is replacing the current flex posts with a permanent curb barrier comprised of concrete and landscaping. Another is to raise the bike lane to sidewalk level and separate it from the street with paving material and landscaping. Yet another option is to remove the protected bike lane altogether.
The city does not yet have an estimate of what it’ll cost to transition the pilot into a permanent street feature.
“When we bring this to our Traffic and Parking commission, we’ll have rough cost estimates for different options,” Grilley said.
The deadline to complete the survey is Sept. 15.
Drawing on feedback provided by the survey, the Traffic and Parking Commission will review potential options during its Oct. 5 meeting before making a recommendation to City Council about next steps.
