A robust discussion over the pros and cons of installing dedicated bike lanes on busy Water Street, eliminating some 48 parking spaces there, took up a good half hour of the five-hour-plus meeting of the Georgetown Advisory Neighborhood Commission meeting on Wednesday, Sept. 6. It ended with the commissioners voting 6 to 2 to support a six-month installation of the bikeways by the District Department of Transportation, accompanied by a comprehensive evaluation of their impact on public safety and businesses in the area.
DDOT Bicycle Program Manager Darren Buck presented the plan for dedicated bike lanes in each direction along Water Street and parts of K Street. “It’s a matter of safety,” Buck said. “We need to take thousands of commuter bikes off the narrow streets full of cars and make it easier for pedestrians to cross the intersections and cars to maneuver. The lanes would be similar to those on 15th Street.”
Commissioner Lisa Palmer agreed. “When I ask residents along the K/Water Street corridor for their opinion about the current conditions, I hear things like, ‘It takes two hours to get from my home on Water Street to Rock Creek,’” she said. “People send me videos of fistfights on the street where cyclists are weaving in and out of car traffic, and more. Add in a constant stream of pedestrians. You have a scenario that is truly the Wild West. Roadway users are unsuccessfully sharing the same 50 feet of space in an unpredictable and unsafe manner.
“One of our tasks on this ANC is to position Georgetown for the future, to continue to attract people of all age brackets and lifestyles in a vital, interesting and forward-thinking community,” Palmer wrote. “Biking, as a mode of transportation and leisure, is 100-percent part of that future.”
Objections to removing the parking spaces came mainly from commercial enterprises along the corridor whom, Palmer noted, “are crucial for keeping our community safe, interesting and dynamic. As such, I highly recommend that we, as neighbors, do our part in supporting these businesses, including, but certainly not limited to, Malmaison and Gypsy Sally’s as well as Barre 3 and Water Street Gym. They all took a chance on this part of our neighborhood by building a consumer-based business in a previously less frequented area. I appreciate their investment in our community and I encourage you to do the same; be sure to stop in and enjoy their services.”
Palmer urged that within six months of installation, DDOT, in partnership with ANC 2E and the Georgetown Business Improvement District, will objectively evaluate the impact of the protected bikeways. “Focus would be on ensuring that the users of the roadway, including but not limited to cyclists and pedestrians, are being provided a safer environment. If such study proves otherwise, DDOT agrees to work closely with ANC 2E to either improve the conditions for the end users or to return the street to its original configuration.”
