Potentially Good News About Eliza St.

I was nearly jumping up and down with joy when I read Jared Paben's Traffic Talk post about Eliza St. today. He notes that, while the City Council approved the 6-Year Transportation Improvement Plan that includes the Eliza St. extension in 2012, Council also asked City staff to look in the 2012 budget and see if funds can be found to:

• remove parking on the west side of Eliza south of Bakerview
• add a bike lane to the west side of Eliza south of Bakerview
• pave the shoulder on the east side of Eliza south of Bakerview

Apparently this would cost $125,000 to $150,000. The Agenda Follow Up from the meeting on 6/20 where the Council took this action shows that Council Member Weiss first proposed amending the TIP to expand the Eliza St. project to add bike lanes in both directions, but no one seconded the motion so it didn't go anywhere. Thank you, Mr. Weiss, for trying. Then the full Council approved the motion to ask staff to look for money to make it happen.

Making the changes that the Council did ask for would, hopefully, make it so this stretch of road doesn't become entirely unsafe for cyclists when mall traffic starts using it sometime next year. Of course it's only half a solution to add a bike lane to one side of a busy street....

Previous posts on this topic, 6/3 and 5/23.

Update: The Herald has an article, too.