Thursday, April 23, 2009

$40 million in new bike facilities Silicon Valley

Santa Clara County, California will spend about $40 million in bike facilities, which is possibly more than is spent in some entire states.

The opening of a new bicycle-pedestrian bridge in Sunnyvale and another a half-mile south over Highway 101 at Borregas Avenue off an unprecedented $40 million worth of improvements stretching from Cupertino to Santa Clara to San Jose.

Next week, a one-of-a-kind overpass will open across Interstate 280 in Cupertino, followed in June by the opening of another bridge over Moffett Boulevard near Highway 85 in Mountain View. Then in the summer, three underpasses in Santa Clara will be ready for riders on the San Tomas Aquino Creek Trail.

And by Labor Day, work should be under way on extending the bike path along the Guadalupe River from Woz Way to Virginia Street, opening up the downtown San Jose river park to surrounding neighborhoods and improving a popular commute route from South San Jose to job sites in North San Jose.
Read more by Gary Richards in the Mercury News.

Meanwhile in Massachusetts, the state left $80 million in Federal transportation funds for bicycle projects unspent since 1991.

5 comments:

  1. that's excellent news!
    I haven;t bike down that way in a long time, but know of people like you and others that do ;)
    thanks for shairng the news, this is a good m.news midday read

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  2. I wished they would also spend money to pave the trail in los gatos creek trail to Lexington reservoir...this will allow another alternative bike route from San Jose to Santa Cruz besides going up highway 9 and skyline

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  3. Yeah, that gravel road is pretty rough on road tires. That's the way I usually go but paved would be better.

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  4. I heard a rumor, unfortunately I've been unable to confirm that is anything more than a rumor, that when the current piping project at Lexington is finished, they are goint to pave from Main st to the dam. I ride about once per week from LG to Capitola. I used to do it on a Mt Bike so could take the lexington trail. Since I converted to a road bike, I've had to go highway 9 to Santa Cruz or 9 to Skyline to Capitola (rather dangerous sometimes). Has anyone else heard anything on a paving project?

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  5. Anon: No I haven't heard of that! I'll ask around, though. You're talking about paving the Los GAtos Creek Trail to the dam, right? Thanks for passing that along.

    I ride my road bike along that gravel, but I admit it's pretty sketchy.

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