Let’s Build A Better, Safer North Lake Ave for Northwest Pasadena
N. Lake Ave can work for everyone!
Pasadena’s Department of Transportation recently released its conceptual design for the North Lake Avenue Traffic and Pedestrian Safety Enhancement Plan. The plan calls for improved safety enhancements for public transit users, drivers and pedestrians who use N. Lake Ave, between Mountain St and Maple Ave. The plan is a great start, but it still leaves N. Lake Ave as an incomplete street.
****UPDATE****
We will have a second design option for N. Lake Ave that includes landscape protected bike/mobility lanes! Full announcement found here
What N. Lake Ave will be under the current proposal
Cross sections of segments of N. Lake Ave as proposed in the City’s initial conceptual design
To make N. Lake Ave a complete street and safe for all road users, the city’s design should account for all modes of transportation including: bikes, scooters and other micro-mobility devices. The N. Lake Ave Safety Enhancement Plan can be improved by:
Adding protected sidewalk level bike/mobility lanes for safe, clean travel
Adding a second row of street trees and landscaping, to help make this a more comfortable place to walk and ride
*According to the Pasadena DOT, protected bike lanes are the most appropriate bicycle facility for roads with speeds higher than 30MPH and traffic volumes higher than 6,000 vehicles per day.
What N. Lake Ave could be with our proposal
A cross section of what N. Lake Ave could look like, with the inclusion of protected bike/mobility lanes and a second row of street trees. Image: Streetmix
A landscape protected bike lane on Rosemead Blvd in neighboring Temple City. Adding bike lanes like this to Lake Ave would make the neighborhood safer, greener, and better for business.
Image (here and above):
Joe Linton/Streetsblog LA
Another landscape protected bike lane, recently installed in 2020 on Foothill Blvd in Claremont.
Image/PasadenaCSC
Mobility & Community
Past transportation policies and priorities resulted in the destruction of numerous Black, Brown and Japanese American neighborhoods in Pasadena with construction of the 210 Freeway and because of this N. Lake Ave is one of the few remaining streets connecting our city north and south.
Including protected bike/mobility lanes along with additional street trees and better sidewalks would transform N. Lake Ave from a high speed highway to a healthy, vibrant community where people want to walk, bike, shop and dine.
Extending the North Lake Ave protected bike/mobility lanes south of Maple St and connecting them to the Union St cycle track would create a high quality network of protected bike/mobility lanes, something Pasadena sorely lacks.
If the protected bike/mobility lanes were extended to Union St, it would only be block away from the proposed North Hollywood-Pasadena Bus Rapid Transit stop at Lake Ave and Colorado Blvd, thus connecting to two high quality mass transit systems (light rail and BRT) along a bike network.
Aerial shot of the construction of the 210 Freeway (1972)
Access to the Lake Ave Metro Station
Residents of Northwest Pasadena use N. Lake Ave to access the Metro L Line (formerly the Gold Line) Station.
The Lake Ave Station is one of Pasadena's most heavily used metro stations, but has very limited parking by permit only. Most Metro travelers do not access the station by car. It is an ideal location for investment in safe access by bicyclists and pedestrians.
Other Metro stations located in Pasadena in different neighborhoods already have existing infrastructure for vulnerable road users or are planned to receive infrastructure.
Sierra Madre Metro Station - Existing bike lanes on Sierra Madre Villa and Halstead St.
Allen Ave Metro Station - Planned buffered bike lane on Allen Avenue between Villa St to Maple St.
Memorial Park Metro Station - Planned protected cycletrack on Union St.
Del Mar Metro Station - Existing bike lanes on Marengo Ave, planned extending buffered bike lanes on Cordova St.
Filmore Metro Station - Existing bike lanes on Marengo Ave.
Safety
According to the 2018 rankings by the California Office of Traffic Safety (OTS), compared to 59 similar-sized California cities, Pasadena is the 2nd most dangerous city for walkers 65 and older, the 3rd most dangerous city for people who are walking of all ages, the 18th (in 2017 were were ranked 4th) most dangerous for people riding bicycles , and Pasadena is the 31st most dangerous city in regards to traffic violence overall.
A recent 13-year study of multiple cities around the US found a dramatic reduction of road fatalities for all road users on streets that had protected bike lanes.
North Lake has a high amount of traffic collisions so any safety measures should be seriously considered.
Climate Action
52% of Pasadena’s GHG emissions come from transportation. We urge Pasadena to align its design with its own Climate Action Plan by including protected bike/mobility lanes on N. Lake Ave that connect to the Metro Station.
Pasadena needs to take Climate Change seriously and that means actually building infrastructure that encourages alternative forms of transportation.
The addition of a second row of street trees with landscaping would help address the heat island effect.
Equity
Our streets should be safe spaces for everyone, with or without a car. According to the 2019 study “A Tale of Two Cities,” “Pasadena’s percentage of low-income households remained unchanged since a prior report at 19 percent.” Low income households typically rely on transit and bicycling for transportation. Enabling easier access on foot or by bike to the Metro station and to businesses on Lake means better access to jobs, education, resources, and opportunities for lower income residents of Pasadena. Failure to provide better access for pedestrians, bicyclists and transit users is a social injustice that further widens the gap between low income and high income residents of our city.
According to "Car Dependency is An Unequal Burden", our current transportation system "fails to serve people who cannot, should not, or prefer not to drive, and imposes unfair financial burdens on many lower-income households."
Economic Benefit
Multiple studies have found that building safe bike lanes increases retail business.
A safer Lake Ave would attract neighborhood residents to shopping and dining.
Lets Talk About Parking
In order to facilitate landscape protected bike/mobility lanes the existing curbside parking lanes would need to be converted. A benefit of this approach is that ALL TRAVEL LANES WOULD BE PRESERVED.
N. Lake Ave was designed around car centric zoning practices established in the 1950’s which accounts for it’s large parking lots and numerous drive-thrus.
To determine the number of off-street parking spaces that exist along the corridor, Pasadena CSC volunteers conducted a parking audit. The results of the audit found that approximately 1,813 off-street parking spaces exist in private parking lots, compared with only 45 on-street parking spaces.
97.6% of parking along the corridor is available via off-street parking located in private parking lots.
2.4% of parking along the corridor is available via on-street parking spaces (*data provided via Pasadena DOT).
It’s clear that curbside parking on N. Lake Ave is largely unnecessary and converting the parking lane to protected bike/mobility lanes with a second row of street trees would not impact parking for businesses.
Join us in supporting a better, safer N. Lake Ave!
Use the links below to send a message like this to Pasadena City:
“Please add the following to the Pasadena N. Lake Ave Traffic and Pedestrian Safety Enhancement Plan
- protected sidewalk level bike/mobility lanes for safe, clean travel
- additional street trees and landscaping, to help make this a more comfortable place to walk and ride”
Send a comment to Pasadena Department of Transportation
E-mail city council and Mayor Victor Gordo, and cc: info@pasadenacsc.org