BY JACKSON CHEN | The Department of Parks and Recreation wants to separate pedestrian and cyclist users along a key stretch of Riverside Park’s riverfront esplanade by creating a separated inland bike path.
According to the parks department as well as many users of the esplanade, its shared design between West 72nd and 83rd Streets often creates risks for collisions between speedy cyclists and pedestrians caught unawares. With many near-misses and accidents, Parks concluded the safest option was a division of users.
“For anybody that’s a pedestrian in that area,” said Margaret Bracken, the department’s landscape architect and chief of design and construction, “if you could turn your head 360 degrees, you would want to do it all the time because you constantly need to be aware of what’s happening and where the next obstacle is coming from.”
The separation through a designated bike path was presented at Community Board 7’s Parks Committee meeting on October 17. The new cyclist route would run north from 72nd Street to 83rd Street, east of the esplanade. Bracken explained the $200,000 bike path project – paid for with funds allocated under City Councilmember Helen Rosenthal’s participatory budgeting process – would require grade reduction in some areas due to its steepness, tree pruning to increase visibility of the path, and improved lighting.
According to Bracken, the project should reduce instances of pedestrian and cyclist conflict, though some points of cross traffic would still exist. To reduce risk there, Parks would be widen the paths around the West 72nd and West 83rd transitional zones forming the terminus points for the new bikeway.
For some cyclists, the proposal presents issues related to both the path’s hilliness and its secluded nature.
According to an Upper West Sider who rode along the proposed path over the weekend, it had a feeling of isolation that could prove hazardous in emergency situations.
“It’s Saturday night, and I decide I’m going to go along this path and see what it’s like at night… but I felt really unsafe,” Reed Rubey said. “Instead of being at the water where people are, I’m way up the hill, I’m nowhere near where people are.”
Rubey added that despite the West Side Highway’s proximity, because of the tree canopy surrounding the bike path, nobody would be able to see him if he were in trouble. He also said that while he enjoys riding up hills, many other cyclists may have difficulty adjusting to that.
Beth Oram, an occasional biker on the esplanade, said the new bike path would pose a burden for many riders, including herself, because the steep areas would prove to be too challenging.
“I’m very sad because this is going to keep me off the greenway, I’m not one of those fit Tour de France cyclists,” Oram said, noting she underwent surgery a few months ago. “My salvation was I can bike on level ground and I have worked up so I can bike a fair distance on the greenway. But this will keep me off the greenway. I can’t do the hills.”
But CB7 felt that, despite the concerns, the push to reduce collisions by separating bikes from the esplanade was a worthwhile goal.
“It’s so extremely nerve-wracking and dangerous, and I absolutely have been almost struck by cyclists,” CB7 member Meisha Hunter Burkett said. “Any effort to help children, elderly, tourists, I just think is very laudatory.”
The bike path project is bundled together with a sidewalk reconstruction near Grant’s Tomb at West 122nd Street in the park and a landscaping improvement project in Crabapple Grove. The landscaping project was also presented to CB7.
The Crabapple Grove project, running from West 91st to 95th Streets, was made possible with $500,000 in funding from Councilmember Rosenthal and a $100,000 contribution from a private donor who was described as a horticulturist.
Bracken explained that the landscaping effort mostly involves repairing deteriorated path edges, repaving the path’s existing asphalt that is spotted with potholes, and planting more diverse and colorful greenery in the area.
CB7 voted to approve both the landscaping and bike path projects, but recommended the fence for Crabapple Grove be reduced from four feet to three and include two gates for access. As for the bike path, the board noted it would like to revisit the option of seasonality – allowing bikers to use the esplanade during months when it is underutilized – over the two years following the bike path’s implementation.
According to Bracken, the earliest construction start date for the new bikeway would be late 2017.
