Join Bike East Bay staff, Bike Concord advocates, and other local partners at this meeting to demand safe bicycle facilities be included with a Treat Blvd paving project this summer.
When:
Thursday, April 18, 6 PM to 8 PM
Where:
Concord Civic Center, 1950 Parkside Drive, Permit Center Conference Room
Meeting Agenda:
Get Involved
We encourage anyone who can make it to attend the Concord bike/walk committee meeting coming up on the evening of April 18 (info above). Unfortunately this is an in-person-only meeting with no virtual option.
Whether or not you can make that meeting we also encourage everyone, and especially if you are a Concord resident, employee, or business owner to email City Council at the address below:
Here is some suggested text:
Honorable Councilmembers,
Safety upgrades can’t wait on Treat Blvd. I support the inclusion of continuous and separated bicycle facilities on Treat as part of this summer’s paving project from the Contra Costa Canal Trail to Clayton Rd.
This part of Treat Blvd was highlighted as a priority hazard zone in Concord’s 2022 Local Road Safety Plan, which also recommended bike lanes with raised barriers or plastic posts and painted pavement as a low-cost/quick build safety mitigation.
More still needs to be done and I support city staff’s proposal to apply for grant opportunities to fund additional work along the entire Treat Blvd corridor through Concord.
But this process will take many years leaving people’s safety at risk in the meantime. Please support near-term improvements and help prevent additional tragedies on this corridor.
Thank you.
Â
An Incomplete Street
Back in Summer 2022 we reported on the progress of several new bikeway projects in Concord, calling out problems with the city’s proposal for a 3.2 mile stretch of Treat Blvd.
The plan at that time called for only half the project (from the Contra Costa Canal Trail to Clayton Rd) to get bike lanes, and with only paint but no physical protection (concept plan available here).
Our appeal letter to the city called for the use of best-practice engineering standards prioritizing safety, including physically protected bike lanes throughout the project area as well as pedestrian crossing upgrades.
Continuing Danger
These appeals gained even more urgency a year later in Summer 2023 when a small child riding a bike with his parents was hit and nearly killed by a driver, while crossing the street legally in a crosswalk.
Our additional letter submitted to City Council on behalf of Bike East Bay and Bike Concord reiterated the concerns about a lack of any bikeway proposed for half of the Treat Blvd project, and a paint-only bike facility for the second half.
We received a response from city staff to this communication, but no acknowledgement of the ongoing safety emergency nor a commitment to address it with near-term fixes via the planned Treat Blvd project.
From Bad to Worse
Unfortunately the first half of the project moved forward to construction with street repaving but no bike/walk upgrades.
We gained a little hope in late 2023 when we stumbled across a city planning document that showed a nearly complete design for the second half including a significant portion upgraded with physical separation in the form of robust plastic curbs and posts (view the full plan here).
The plan was still far from perfect, but a big step in the right direction. We shared the news with our local partners and were so thankful that city staff had listened to the community concerns and responded.
However, our hopes were dashed just this past week when we learned that not only was the project actually moving forward without the separated bikeway upgrades as shown, but that even the paint-only bike lanes were not included.
Treat Blvd would be repaved and returned to its current design, with the project already finalized and already advertised to contractors.
We were told by city staff that construction will start this summer, with only a commitment to apply for highly competitive federal grant program for a planning/design funding to “properly evaluate the feasibility and safety of bicycle facilities on Treat Blvd”.
Even if successful in winning the funding, this process will take many years before we see any safety improvements.
Another Appeal
For the third time in three years we are again asking Concord staff and electeds to prioritize quick-build safety improvements on Treat Blvd, at the very least as part of the Phase 2 paving work from from the Contra Costa Canal Trail to Clayton Rd.
This segment of roadway was highlighted as a priority hazard zone in Concord’s 2022 Local Road Safety Plan, fitting many of the plan’s collision profiles including excessive speeding, hill pass collisions, and driving under the influence.
This plan also included a recommendation for physically separated bikeways as a mitigation tool, specifically stating the following:
“Separated bikeways improve safety by reducing conflicts between bicycles and vehicles on the road and by creating a road-narrowing effect with buffers or vertical barriers, which may reduce vehicle speeds.
A raised barrier or plastic posts and painted pavement is a low-cost/quick build.”
