Workers this week are installing
a pilot “bikelet,” or bike parking area, outside Equator Coffees & Teas at Miller and Throckmorton avenues.The project includes the installation of standard metal u-racks that would accommodate up to 10 bicycles in one parking space just outside of Equator at 2 Miller Avenue. The pilot bike parking area will have planters on either end of the space and a painted pattern on the street surface to further designate it.
Though the City has been eyeing a pilot project of this sort for some time, the owners of Equator have sought to add bike parking for their customers and the larger bicycling community. Equator donated all materials and installation and maintenance of the facility. All components of the bike parking area would belong to Equator and would be constructed in such way that they could be easily removed if the project proves to not be successful.
The proposal was recommended by the City’s the Bicycle and Pedestrian Advisory Committee (BPAC), which made the installation of new bicycle parking facilities a priority in its 2014 Annual Report and its forthcoming update of its 2008 Bicycle and Pedestrian Transportation Plan.
Here’s a rendering of what it will look like:
