Eyes on the Street: New Bus and Bike Lanes in Progress in Downtown and South L.A.

None of them are quite done, but they are getting there. New bus lanes have been striped on 5th and 6th Streets in downtown Los Angeles. The eastern half of these will include new protected bike lanes. Also downtown, the existing Olive Street buffered bike lane is being moved to the left side and made parking-protected. In South L.A., the new 6.3-mile-long Avalon Boulevard bike lanes are nearly complete.

LADOT spokesperson Colin Sweeney estimates that all four of these projects - 5th, 6th, Olive and Avalon - will be completed in August.

5th Street

Pavement markings appear to have been completed (though no red paint) on the new 5th Street bus lane, which extends 1.2 miles from Central Avenue to Flower Street. Fifth is one-way westbound. The project will include a left-side one-way protected bike lane east of Main Street, through Skid Row.

6th Street

Very similar to its westbound couplet partner 5th Street, the new 6th Street eastbound bus lane has pavement markings extending from 1.2 miles from Grand Avenue to Central Avenue. Like 5th, 6th will also feature a one-way left-side protected bike lane east of Main.

Olive Street

Olive Street was also supposed to have a bus lane soon, though there is no anticipated schedule for it yet. The city recently repaved Olive as part of its ADAPT accelerated repaving program. An existing right-side buffered bike lane is being moved to the left, and will be upgraded to a parking-protected bike lane. Crews were out today striping the street.

The new bike lane striping appears nearly complete, though no bollards have been installed. The one-way northbound protected bikeway extends 0.7-mile from Pico Boulevard to 7th Street.

Avalon Boulevard

LADOT is also installing new bike lanes on Avalon Boulevard through South Los Angeles. They will extend 6.3 miles from 120th Street to the five-way intersection at San Pedro Street and Jefferson Boulevard. These will be among the longest continuous on-street bikeways in the city of Los Angeles. They appear to be the third longest, after Venice Boulevard and Devonshire Street.

Much of the new Avalon bikeway was created mostly by removing a car lane, called a road diet. The new bike lanes are mostly buffered or conventional bike lanes, with about a dozen blocks of parking-protected bike lane.