Along Bruin Walk on Monday, students were greeted by a makeshift lane, drawn anonymously in chalk and created for use by bikers and skateboarders.
The pathway extended from the top of De Neve Drive to the area behind the Powell Building. Large capitalized chalk messages at Bruin Plaza declared “Resist the dismount.”
“Look! Problem solved,” another message read, and pointed toward a chalked merging lane between the bike racks by the Morgan Intercollegiate Athletics Center.
Since the beginning of the school year, UCPD and UCLA Transportation have distributed fliers on campus, sent maps to the dormitories and placed signs and sandwich boards warning students about the new regulation. According to the 2006 UCLA Bicycle Master Plan, the campus does not have any designated areas for bicyclists or skateboarders.
“I think it’s great that someone put that bike lane up. I think it’s essential that they have a designated area where people can skate and bike through. The school should actually put up a bike and skate lane,” said Joe Hale, a third-year geography and economics student.
Hale learned about the dismount policy when someone handed him a flier while he was skating down Bruin Walk. Many students, though, said they had not heard about the policy.
“(The policy) wasn’t publicized enough. ... I bike from Westwood every day through Pauley Pavilion, and I haven’t seen any signs,” said Elliot Emmer, a fourth-year philosophy student. A regular bike commuter, Emmer said he believes a bike lane would be a better solution to the safety and traffic problem than adding more fees that students need to worry about.
The regulation comes as Bruin Walk has become more heavily trafficked with bicyclists and pedestrians, and the safety of all commuters has become an issue, said David Karwaski, Planning and Policy Manager for UCLA Transportation.
The $202 citation for violating the dismount policy was determined by the Los Angeles County Superior Court, not by UCLA, said Karwaski.
Unlike parking tickets, the money collected from violations of this rule is not used by UCLA. While state law requires parking enforcement revenue be used for alternative transportation programs, moving violations are a different case, Karwaski said.
velocipedus wrote:
Congratulations to the chalk crew! There are plenty more bike lanes waiting for you to be born, and the background to this form of sidewalk art has been told wonderfully by Dan “Banana & Bicycle” Koeppel in Paint Your Lane http://www.bicycling.com/article/0,66...
But at UCLA the problem is bigger and deeper. We have a Transportation Service on Campus in charge of bicycles, who are not experts, who do not cycle, who do not “Improve Bicycle Accessibility to Campus” (Recommendation No 1 in the Bicycle Master Plan). They have no cyclists to talk to, and so they start dreaming about cycling as a public safety issue.
True, there are some areas on Bruin Walk where uneducated bikes and pedestrians, all ears duly plugged, put themselves into danger. But to pull out CVC 21200 at a rate of 202$ is a bit harsh. And to say that it is consistent with the Bicycle Master Plan may be rather creative, or perhaps deceptive: first because in my copy of the plan, the exclusion is limited to the period between 10:00am and 2:00pm, secondly the exclusion along parking structure 8 has been added without authority of the plan, and thirdly because the Bicycle Master Plan has plenty of recommendations which have not been acted upon – so why pull out the one which limits human powered transportation, and leave all the others in the drawer?
And there is wider sense of injustice among cyclists: What do cyclists get in return for such restrictive policies? Is there equity in the treatment of bikes and cars on the campus when safety is the issue? Or are those cyclists a lost cause, a tiny minority, not listened to, who will have to make do after the cars have had their share?
3:33 p.m. Oct. 13, 2009
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ehengesb wrote:
Agreed! Well done to the sidewalk chalkers!
And velocipedus, I am interested in some sort of solution to this biking on bruinwalk issue. Let me know if you have any ideas . . . and I'll share mine.
Ride on
8:32 p.m. Oct. 13, 2009
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zabbabruin wrote:
Thank you for your courageous acts!
As a bike commuter, I too think the new regulations are rather harsh, and even unfair. I would be 100% supportive of any efforts to come to a better compromise regarding this policy.
1:14 a.m. Oct. 14, 2009
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