In Berkeley, Calif. a citywide network of bicycle priority streets called Bicycle Boulevards allow cyclists to navigate safely. They are marked by smart traffic management, bountiful traffic calming, and the aura of livability and putting people first, cars second. Among their most unique trademarks are the purple signage and street stencils larger than a car!
In this trip to Berkeley, StreetFilms' Clarence Eckerson Jr. talks to advocates and users of the boulevards about their history and benefits.

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<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman">[intro music]</font> <br>
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<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><i>Sarah Syed:</i> [00:22]
The bicycle boulevard network is an idea to create a system of bicycle
priority streets that can really provide a safe way for people of all
ages and abilities to bike across Berkeley. </font></p>
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<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman">[music]</font> <br></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><i>Cathy Rion:</i> [00:38]
I love being able to bike around and not drive and have that flexibility.
And the bike boulevards and the bike lanes are what makes that possible. </font></p>
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<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><i>Kris Worthington:</i>
[00:48] I bicycle to work at City Council every single day, and to my
meetings all over the city and beyond, not just on the bicycle boulevards,
but if I’m going a long distance I can take my bike on the bus or
I can take my bike on BART.</font></p>
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<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><i>DeAnna Tibbs:</i>
[01:05] Safety is one of the number one concerns of why people don’t
choose to bike because they feel like it’s dangerous. And streets
like these really make people feel the safety that they need to actually
get out on their bikes, to bring their kids out on their bikes.</font></p>
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<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><i>Dave Campbell:</i>
[01:22] We’re out on Russell Street which is a bicycle boulevard in
town. We’ve got a couple of bicyclists coming up the street,
a couple of pedestrians walking across. That’s the whole goal
of the programme here is to make the streets safer for both. One
thing we’ve done to do that is put huge bicycle stencils down on the
street. It’s the same size as the Stop sign symbol and that’s
key, any other city looking to do this, to keep that in mind.
The idea is that you want to create the same, you know, optical image
that the Stop sign stencil creates to a motorist. The bike stencil’s
just as wide as the Stop sign stencil and it’s actually much longer
because it has more information in it.</font></p>
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<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><i>DeAnna Tibbs:</i>
[01:59] Cos it really gives a cyclist a sense of owning the road and
being able to take the lane, being able to be in the middle of the street
where they can avoid the door zone. Cars are expecting that they’re
going to have to wait for bikes, they’re going to be seeing bikes,
you know, it’s not going to be a confrontational thing if a cyclist
is in the middle of the road because it’s expected on these streets. </font></p>
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<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman">[music]</font> <br></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><i>Dave Campbell:</i>
[02:22] The signs we use on our boulevards here in Berkeley is purple.
We use big purple signs that tell you you’re on a boulevard and give
you information about where you’re going. But in addition, the
actual street signs are purple for the boulevard streets, and you can
see that here with the Russell Street sign. Why purple?
There’s only a few colours, really noticeable colours, that traffic
engineers don’t already use. Purple was one of them. Every
street block has a purple sign. So the combination of those two
things, and the stencils on the roadway, is to raise motorists’ awareness
that there are more bicycles out here, so drive more cautiously. </font></p>
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<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><i>Sarah Syed:</i> [03:01]
Berkeley does have a very broad traffic calming programme that was installed
primarily in the 1970’s. </font></p>
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<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><i>Heath Maddox:</i>
[03:08] We have numerous different obstacles for cars. Berkeley
was one of the first cities to experiment with traffic calming and traffic
reduction in the neighbourhoods. And so there was a pretty comprehensive
citywide network of diverters and barriers and half-barriers that went
in to create a hierarchy of streets.</font></p>
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<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><i>Sarah Syed:</i> [03:26]
The idea with that is that you can still have an urban grid to preserve
through movement for cyclists and pedestrians, while getting some of
the benefits of a cul-de-sac when it comes to auto traffic. </font></p>
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<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><i>Heath Maddox:</i>
[03:39] The original barriers and diverters that went in in the early
‘70’s, they didn’t really consider cyclists at that time, but
all along the bicycle boulevards we’ve actually modified the existing
barriers and upgraded them so that cyclists can pass through more easily.
There’s a hole in the barrier for cyclists and/or emergency vehicles
to continue through. This is an example of one of our nicer ones,
it’s been very tastefully landscaped.</font></p>
<p> <br></p>
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<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman">[music]</font> <br></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><i>Heath Maddox:</i>
[04:07] So we’re riding up to Channing bicycle boulevard, approaching
Martin Luther King Junior Way. And there’s a special signal
here which detects cyclists, it gives you protected area and allows
cyclists to continue straight while motorists can’t. Martin
Luther King as you can see is a major street, four lanes. There
are two magnetic inductive loop detectors in the pavement meeting up
to the final detector just before the crosswalk. And these detect
the presence of cyclists and give them a green. Behind me is a
right turn only sign, this is for motorists. You can see below
it in small letters it says “except bicycles” and that’s to keep
the motorist from continuing straight on the bicycle boulevard. </font></p>
<p> <br></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"></font></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><i>Dave Campbell:</i>
[04:50] To prevent all traffic from going through they put a little
staple down in the ground, it’s actually a big metal staple, that
these days prevents only cars from going through, it really doesn’t
prevent an SUV or any kind of vehicle at height chassis from going through.
But all of our traffic control stuff is designed for emergency access.
This is a semi diverter. You’ll see the sign says emergency
vehicles and bicycles are allowed through, but the cars can’t continue
on this way. It’s a semi diverter so the neighbourhood can get
out of the neighbourhood, but cars won’t be using this street as a
cut-through.</font></p>
<p> <br></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"></font></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman">[music]</font> <br></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><i>Dave Campbell:</i>
[05:28] We’ve put in a lot of traffic circles, about 30 to 35 in the
last couple of years. You’re going to see two or three traffic
circles in this street which has a lot of beneficial effects.
One, if you’re a motorist driving down the street you’re going to
slow down just cos you… the street looks smaller, it looks narrower
and it doesn’t look like a through street that you would just travel
down real quickly to get to where you’re going. The neighbourhood
adopts their circles, so the plantings in here are watered and kept
up by the neighbourhood.</font></p>
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<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman">[music]</font> <br></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><i>Charles Siegel:</i>
[06:00] During the 1980’s a group of people got together and proposed
a slow street on Milvia, which we hoped would be the beginning of a
slow street network all over the city. And we flipped the parking
from one side of the street to another so there’s a curve in the middle
of the block. In order to make the street curve, we put these
bulb outs here and similar bulb outs in the centre. The trees
are further out into the street than the ordinary street trees and the
planting strip are, and so they narrow the street visually. We
also added the speed humps. The speed humps are designed to slow
traffic to 15 miles an hour. All these generations of traffic
calming devices have ended up creating lots of locations that are safe
and comfortable places to bicycle, where there’s either very little
traffic, or the traffic is very slow.</font></p>
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<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"></font></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><i>Heath Maddox:</i>
[06:52] In Berkeley really everybody’s using the bicycle boulevards
and I think one of the reasons that they get such wide currency is because
they feel safe.</font></p>
<p> <br></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"></font></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><i>Cathy Rion:</i> [07:01]
You can get pretty much anywhere in Berkeley on the bike boulevards.
If I want to take my godson in the bike trailer, take him on the bike
boulevard, know that we’ll be safe even when it’s dark out, knowing
that there’s not going to be that many cars, and if they are they’re
going to be going slowly.</font></p>
<p> <br></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"></font></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><i>Kris Worthington:</i>
[07:14] It really isn’t a dramatic change from, you know, what the
street used to be, but the fact that people are told that these are
bicycle boulevards makes more bicyclists likely to ride on it.</font></p>
<p> <br></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"></font></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><i>Sarah Syed:</i> [07:26]
In many cases these were formerly bike routes and now we’re trying
to make improvements that will really increase the convenience and comfort
of cycling across Berkeley.</font></p>
<p> <br></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"></font></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><i>DeAnna Tibbs:</i>
[07:37] I think that it not only makes for a more beautiful city, but
just is kind of positive reinforcement, you know, it kind of starts
help that cycle of getting people out of their cars and onto their bikes
and decreases pollution and decreases the need for people to have cars.</font> <br>
</p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman">[music]</font> <br></p>
http://transcriptdivas.ca/transcription-canada/
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