Decatur Heights Neighborhood (Decatur, GA)

Instructions for sharrows (by Bike Emory)

Here's an excellent poster summarizing how sharrow lanes should be used by bikers and drivers:

Source: http://bike.emory.edu/wp-content/uploads/images/sharrow-instructions.png

The safest use of our new sharrow lanes

Not many motorists nor bicyclists know how to properly use and adapt to sharrow lanes. Hopefully, Fred Boykin, who is our City commissioner and also owns Bike South, will post some clarification in the Google group.  In the meantime, here is my understanding from reading everything I could find on the subject:

A bike rider should ride right down the center of the sharrow lane, as this indicates:

As the above imbedded article mentions, a bicyclist riding to the right of the sharrows is at risk to run into a quickly opening door of someone who has just parked, or swerve out to avoid the person and door and get hit by a vehicle.

A motorist, when seeing a bicyclist ahead, should slow down until uncoming traffic is far enough away so that he/she can safely swing across the yellow line to allow the mandatory three feet clearance from the cyclist.

What if there are no cars parked on your side of the street for an extended distance? Sycamore Drive between Ponce and Pinehurst is the equivalent of four lanes wide, so one might think it is safer and more courteous to right closer to the curb in this case, thus allowing motorized vehicles to stay in their lane. But if a bicyclist swerves in and out based on where cars are parked, he/she runs the risk a (possibly speeding) vehicle will not see the bike until it is too late. It's safest to just stay in the sharrow lane the entire distance.

Obviously, if you're riding at night or in the low light of dawn or dusk, your bike should be equipped with front and rear reflectors and lights, so vehicles can easily see you (as required by law).

Riding over near the curb implies (to some drivers) you don't feel you have the right to share the roadway, and emboldens some drivers to pass very close to you (even though a 3 ft distance is now required in Georgia).

Remember that adults cannot legally ride on Decatur sidewalks.

Bikers are required by law to stop for stop signs and red lights, but frequently don't, so pedestrians should make sure of what a biker intends to do before crossing the street.

FYI, Georgia Bikes! has a summary of current Georgia bike laws at http://bit.ly/ox2Jqo -- unfortunately I don't see any specific mention of sharrows.

Sharrows on Sycamore Drive

This is a great example of how the City of Decatur is responsive to the requests of city neighborhoods, when it can. These make (responsible) vehicle drivers slow down, realizing there might be a biker ahead and (even for the irresponsible ones) suspecting they will be less likely to beat a charge for hitting one. 

The City has limited resources, and it can sometimes take quite a while to "get to it" but if a neighborhood association develops a prioritized list and the city agrees something is a good idea, it will eventually get done.

In the words of Deanne (in an e-mail):

BIG thanks to John Madajewski, Senior Engineer, and to David Junger, Assistant City Manager-Public Works. BIG props to the friendly crew who did the work on this hot, sunny day!

The requested speed limit reduction is an example of where the City agrees with the request, but is restricted by State law (based on surveys of the average speed of 85% of drivers) from lowering the speed limit from 35 to 30. It could change the signage, but it couldn't enforce the lower speed limit.

For those in Decatur Heights who tweet

Unless (and until) someone has a better suggestion [if, please comment], I'm establishing the #DecaturHeightsGA tag for tweets about our neighborhood.

If you will add this hashtag when you tweet about anything in our neighborhood, others can easily follow all tweets about our neighborhood.

If one searches for the hashtag in Tweeter, or uses a helper program like TweetDeck or TweetGrid, one can easily see what has been posted about our neighborhood. 

This should prove especially useful in situations like we had not that long ago, when a fallen tree knocked power out for many hours for much of the neighborhood. [Admittedly, this assumes one checks before one's computer battery backup runs out or uses one's smartphone.]

If a crime incident, such as a car breakin, occurs, one could rapidly alert those neighbors who monitor the hashtag in a TweetDeck column.

Why add the GA at the end?  Because there are multiple Decatur Heights.

I am @DaveKell on Twitter. I'd appreciate your following me. I'll follow you in return when I can. Right now, I'm pegged with 2002 follows and only 1794 follows. I need to run a utility to clear out some room. But, I will add you to my DecaturGA list.

Subjot

I'd like to see neighbors alerting each other to neighborhood happenings and events online. Subjot is a tool which might work well. Here is your invite to the beta: http://sjot.it/nXM96E  Use the "Decatur, Heights, GA" subject when talking about our neighborhood.