The shuttles that ferry bicyclists across the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge when the bike path is closed were mostly empty on Monday, the first day of service, but the process seemed to go smoothly.
Richmondside took a few rides to test the service, which will run when the path is closed (from 6 a.m. to 8 p.m. on Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesday and from 6 a.m. to 2 p.m. Thursdays).
The shuttles, which seat 13 passengers, tow large trailers that can hold a variety of up to 10 bikes (plus a couple on the front rack). Aaron Lesavoy, chief operating officer of Code3, the shuttle company, said he only expect to be take “one to three bikes at any time.” There will be two shuttles running in the morning and one in the afternoon.
Day one ridership was sparse. Shuttle driver Natasha Wright said just two bicyclists showed up at the Point Richmond stop, located at the Tewksbury bus stop at Castro Street and East Standard Avenue, for the 6 a.m. Monday shuttle. (Shuttles run about every 20 minutes during service hours.)
At 7:30 a.m. just one rider got on to take the Marin County bound shuttle, which drops riders off at the Vista Point Parking Lot in San Rafael at East Francisco Boulevard and Main Street, and just one rode back to Richmond at that time.
At least one cyclist was enthusiastic about the new shuttle system. Arthur Hernandez of Union City didn’t know that the bridge bike lane was closed when he was stopped by Caltrans as he tried to use the path.
He doesn’t have a car and said he was traveling to San Rafael to meet his cousin.
“That was nice,” he said as he got off the 6 p.m. shuttle in Point Richmond. “That’s really nice that they ride you back and forth for free, because I thought I was going to get a ticket.”
This enthusiasm was not shared by Gray Douglas of Point Richmond.
“Coming back was OK, going this morning was a bummer because it doubled my commute from here to Mill Valley, and I don’t think anything changed about the traffic on this circle because of the bike lane being taken away,” Douglas said. “There’s a lot of people who thought it was going to be a magic fix, and it’s only if there’s an emergency, so personally, I’m very unhappy with the decision to take away the bike lane.”
Robert Prinz, advocacy director of Bike East Bay, was at the shuttle stop Monday morning. He was part of the campaign to establish the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge bike lane in the first place.
“Leading up to 2019, we worked with Caltrans and the Metropolitan Transportation Commission to agree to a three-year pilot project, to see what (would be) the impacts of turning that shoulder into a bike and pedestrian trail.” Pointing to the more than 400,000 riders who rode the trail over its lifetime, he said it was, “a big success.”
Prior to the bike lane closure, Douglas said she used the path four to five days a week.
“I work in Mill Valley at the High School and because the days are long this is my exercise as well as my commute,” she said.
When asked if she wants the bike lane back, she said, “Yes, absolutely, 100%.”
Prinz decided to time the shuttles and found that it lengthened riders’ commute times.
“The shuttle from here (Point Richmond), just to the bridge, the freeway ramp alone, was around, you know, 25 minutes. Biking across the bridge from here to the San Rafael side, it’s usually around 30 minutes.”
Prinz raised concerns about the accessibility for certain populations, such as disabled persons and children.
Lesavoy said that there are still lots of kinks to work out. While they offered real-time tracking of shuttles, “compound delays from traffic are out of our control,” he said.
They’re also reworking the trailer configuration to “try and make it as user friendly as possible.” He also said there are a number of supplies they are still waiting on, including spinlocks.
The revised bike lane hours were approved by the San Francisco Bay Conservation and Development Commission (BCDC) in August as part of a design alternative assessment now known as the Westbound Improvement Project. Transportation officials will collect data on motor vehicle, bicycle and pedestrian travel through the Richmond-San Rafael corridor to study the feasibility of establishing a part-time bus/carpool lane and a part-time bike/ped path on the upper deck.
I’m really looking forward to a future when the lane reverts to a third commute lane. It will be sorely needed as they futz with 37 on the north side of the bay.
Although I agree with the concept of a permanent bike lane on the Richmond San Rafael bridge, my experience with the 3 year experimental program led me to the conclusion that a permanent bike is impractical for the general public.
If there are no accidents or stalls on the bridge during commute hours the bike lane makes no difference for car commuting.
Any incident that involves tow truck assistance on the bridge creates disruptions that cause lost work hours, more exhaust pollution and general disruption for a much larger segment of the population than our fearless biking citizens losing their commute lane.
May the shuttle solution evolve to the point of satisfaction for the bikers who commute to work. Biking to work is such an elegant means of commuting and speaks to the future.
I didn’t realize that it is not going to open a 3rd lane! That will NOT help the backup.