'Bike Boulevard' coming to 10th Ave.

The Municipality of Anchorage is holding an open house Thursday night to preview the “Bike Boulevard” project along 10th Avenue from P Street to Medfra street.

The open house is from 4-8 p.m. at the First Presbyterian Church at 616 W. 10th Ave.

The Bike Boulevard project is the first of its kind for Anchorage.

Anchorage’s 2010 Bicycle Plan identified a need for an east/west bicycle corridor in downtown Anchorage.

A bike boulevard routes bikes along routes with low traffic volume and low speeds. Brooke Blessing, the Municipality’s administrator on the project, says 10th Avenue already fit that bill. She said bicyclists have already taken to the street in the area because of the narrow sidewalks along the Park Strip.

While it is legal for bicycles to ride on any street, Lindsey Hajduk with Bike Anchorage says that doesn’t mean all streets in Anchorage are safe to ride on.

Hajduk says the biggest change motorists will notice is signs and paint on the road that will bring more notice to bicyclists, and that they are allowed to be on the street.

The first part of the project, which at this point is primarily paint and signage, was changing the parking along 10th Avenue at the Delaney Park Strip. Parking spots used to be perpendicular to the lane of traffic, but last fall they were angled, so that drivers back into them. When drivers pull forward to leave, they have a better view of approaching vehicles, pedestrians, and bikes.

Blessing, with the Municipality, says there’s the possibility of another bike boulevard sometime in the future in the Mountain View area.

and taken to the hospital with non-life-threatening injuries. Click through to the story to see safety tips for bicyclists from the Alaska Injury Prevention Center.