Thomas Blvd looking toward Lexington St in North Point Breeze

Clearly marked Penn Ave Alternative goes in

Several months ago, there was not one, but two bicyclists killed along a particularly dangerous stretch of Penn Ave in Point Breeze within a week. The immediate response from the city was to send traffic police on motorcycles to enforce the speed limit and safe driving, but even one of the police officers was struck by a reckless driver.

After the crashes, the City began working on clearly marking the Penn Ave alternative routes, namely along Thomas Blvd, Meade St, Reynolds Ave, and Hamilton Ave.  They began by installing route signage to help direct cyclists onto the safer roads that will allow one to get to the same locations, but on slower moving parallel neighborhood streets.

They planned on following the route signs with marking the streets with either bike lanes or sharrows. The first segment of road markings recently went in with the installation of bike lane lines on Thomas Blvd – an unusually wide street that’s been begging for bike lanes. We are expecting the bicycle markings to go in soon, along with shared lane markings on the other connecting roads. Once complete, there will be clearly marked bikeways from the neighborhoods of East Liberty, Shadyside, and Squirrel Hill to Point Breeze, Homewood and onward to Braddock Ave, mostly on tranquil roads.

Check out the map below.

The new Thomas Blvd Bike lanes make a key connection.  The solid green represent existing bike lanes or sharrows, with the brown segment representing the trail through Mellon Park.  The translucent green represents streets that will be outfitted with bike markings in the near future. The red is Penn Ave. Click to make bigger.

Not a member of BikePGH? Join today! We need you to add your voice! Bike Pittsburgh works to protect cyclist’s rights and promote the vision of making Pittsburgh a safer and more enjoyable place to live and to ride. For more info, check out: www.bikepgh.org/membership