Last night, Bike OCNJ's 9
th Annual Public Forum served as a bit of a celebration of all that Ocean City has accomplished in the past eight years to create bicycle-friendly amenities on the island.
Eight years ago, Ocean City had the boardwalk and beyond that, bicycle riders were on their own on the streets.
Since then, the city has put most of the pieces in place for a safe bicycle route that runs the length of the island north-to-south. The route features marked bike routes, various features that slow car traffic, the HAWK signal that helps bikers cross the busy Ninth Street corridor and a reconfiguration of West Avenue at the south end of the island to create buffered bicycle lanes.
Bike OCNJ, a volunteer group that promotes safe cycling in Ocean City, hosted a full room of citizens Tuesday evening at the Ocean City Community Center.
With most of the bike route successfully in place, the group is now advocating for more improvements to the bicycle corridor including better signage and measures that would allow the city to eliminate stop signs while diverting or otherwise slowing car traffic, as well as the creation of safer corridors for biking east –to- west on the island.
The forum invited the public to share opinions and ask questions on bicycle-related issues.
Sgt. Brian Hopely, head of the Ocean City Police Department's Traffic Safety Unit, responded to some of the issues raised:
- Lack of enforcement of bicycle laws: Sgt. Hopely said bicycle laws are enforced, primarily through a warning system — a "soft-handed approach" that with the encouragement of the city administration doesn't rely on heavy fines for bicyclists in a tourist town. He said the department works through "engineering, education and enforcement" to promote safe bicycling.
- HAWK signal at Ninth Street: Sgt. Hopely said the department has been disabling the signal on busy summer weekends in an effort to "flush (car) traffic into Ocean City." He said the signal is otherwise synced with the signals and Ninth Street and Bay Avenue and never activated until a pedestrian or cyclists pushes the button. When the signal is not activated, bicyclists can cross at West Avenue or Bay Avenue, he said.
The meeting wrapped-up with Tom Heist and Drew Fasy announcing that the city has received a federal grant that will allow for 10 additional on-street bike corrals in the business district and 30 new beach street end racks for the summer of 2017.
Additionally, they said that new bike lanes are planned for E. Atlantic Boulevard to Beach Road to the Boardwalk and from 1
st & Simpson to 5
th, behind the Primary School connecting to 5
th & Haven to 8
th Street.
Below is a copy of the PowerPoint that covers all of the evening’s topics:
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