Route 23 Evaluation Ride results.

The rides are done and had a total of about 100 riders for both rides.  The results were a surprise to me so once again the world has put me in my place.
There was overwhelming consensus for each day.  To the north, the route through East Nashville and Goodlettesville was favored. To the South the more westerly route via Old Natchez Trace and Del Rio Pike was favored. Both favored routes had constructive comments that resulted in several changes.  These have been incorporated and a few of us will be riding the most recent routes in both directions before publishing as final. The link will be posted where once it is done. 

After that it is back to the phones to garner support from all the jurisdictions.

Thanks to all who have supported us and propelled the process to this point.

Nashville Area Evaluation Rides

USBR 23 Route Evaluation Rides

During the last few months, Bruce Day and Dave Shumaker have met with city officials and bicycling community stakeholders to obtain suggestions and support for USBR 23. This will be the first USBR in Tennessee and will provide a designated bicycle route connecting Bowling Green, KY through White House, Nashville, Franklin, and Lewisburg, TN to Huntsville, AL. We have now consolidated suggestions into two separate North/South routes from White House to Franklin.  

We plan a final evaluation of both routes.  The Nashville center point for both of the routes is Cumberland Park, on South 1^st Street at the eastern end of the Shelby Street Pedestrian Bridge.  

We invite you (and others you wish to invite) to join us to ride and critique these route options.  The rides will start at 9:00 AM each of two consecutive Saturdays.  These rides will be conducted at touring pace with rest and water stops along the way.  

USBR 23 NORTH Routes Evaluation Ride

9:00 AM, March 16, 2013

Cumberland Park

http://ridewithgps.com/routes/2181754

54 miles, 3149 Ft Elevation Change

USBR 23 SOUTH Routes Evaluation Ride

9:00 AM, March 23, 2013

Cumberland Park

http://ridewithgps.com/routes/2182003

49 miles, 2650 Ft Elevation Change

We hope to see you for the rides at 9:00 Saturday, March 16^th and March 23^rd starting in Cumberland Park, Nashville.

White House, Franklin, Nashville and USBR 23

Much is happening. David Shumaker set up meetings with representatives of the cities of White House, TN, Franklin, TN and Nashville, TN.  We met with White House City Administrator Gerald Herman and Director of Parks and Recreation Ashley Smith. The city already has the route striped as a bicycle lane and suggest they would install USBR signs when the route is approved.  We are to have a meeting with the Leisure Activities committee in the next couple of months to discuss how White House can be even more bicycle friendly.

In Franklin we met with Mayor Ken Moore and Assistant City Administrator Vernon Gerth who also expressed full support for the project. Franklin is a bit tougher with no obvious best route. It will need to be done in close coordination with Nashville.  The plan is to get input from the very active and well respected Harpeth Bicycle Club, submit some options to the city, and they will review and act on them.  We also picked up names of persons to contact in Williamson County.

A meeting with stakeholders in the Nashville Metro area is scheduled for 6 pm at the Oasis House on Feb. 12, 2013. Adams Carroll of Walk Bike Nashville has taken the lead. It is hoped this meeting will produce a route from White House through Nashville and Franklin into rural Williamson County. From there we will contact representatives of the jurisdictions in the southern counties.

One final note, Kerry Irons with Adventure Cycling who is handling the initial corridor designations prefers to leave USBR 25 as it is and name the route from Louisville though Nashville and into Alabama USBR 23. No big deal since it will be a while before signs are erected.

Update on Route through Nashville, Adding USBR21

A lot is happening. David Shumaker is moving the Franklin, KY to Ardmore, AL route along. He has set up a meeting with the Mayor of White House, TN,  to discuss the route with him and his office.  White House has been very proactive with cycle infrastructure, having one of the first multiuse paths in the area and recently getting bike lanes striped on the shoulders of US 31 W  through the city.  We expect a friendly house but are still nervous about our first go at whipping up community support.  Dave has also solicited the support of Walk Bike Nashville in setting a route through Nashville. Walk Bike Nashville plans a meeting with community input for January, 2013.
Next, Rick Robinson of London, KY, has contacted us about moving along USBR 21 which would connect Lexington, KY with Knoxville, TN, Chattanooga, TN then on to Atlanta, GA.  I know very little about that part of Tennessee but hope to get some support from cyclists in the area.
The renewed activity causedme to revisit the Adventure Cycling USBR website. They have a lot of new, useful information. Worth spending a few hours with.

Back in Business

After a long hiatus, the plan is back on.  The action plan is to review the Franklin, KY to Ardmore, AL route for reasonableness, then solicit input and support from potential communities along the way.

Not dead

The inactivity on this blog is embarrassing.  There has actually been less activity.  With the new Tennessee State administration the documents to submit to AASHTO have languished with no real hope of action.  Unless there is a drastic change in the political and advocacy landscape I'll soon abandon this blog and place the proposed routes on some other site, such as the Fogbees or Bike Walk Tennessee where the lack of action will be less noticeable. 

RPM draft Report is out

RPM's draft report on bike suitability/Bike routes is out.  It is linked on the right sidebar under Resources.  Please give it a look and post your comments. A version that will show routes in Google Earth is on the way. You should be able to better identify specific roads then. I will post that when available.

Note, the file is stored in Dropbox. Firefox, Dropbox, and pdf files are not playing well of late.
Internet Explorer is working fine.  For Firefox you may need to go into Tools, Options, Applications and set Adobe Acrobat Reader files to always save.
Bruce

This blog is alive. and March 2011 update

My first idea of how to use this blog made it appear nothing was happening.  The idea was to keep the routes from scrolling down as new posts were added.  This has been rectified by placing links to the routes on the right panel.  Now we can comment and it will show the latest post correctly. 

As of mid March, TN is still awaiting the results of RPM consultants current survey of bicycling suitability for state roads.  Good news that Kentucky now has a Bike Ped coordinator who is interested in working with Tennessee to establish routes.

Tennessee Music Heritage Trail

Phil Pugliese and others discussed creating a Tennessee Musical Heritage Trail while at the National Bike summit. On his return Phil set up a phone conference with several interested parties and this project appears to have legs. The first step is to identify the physical sites to include on the route with a weighting of the ones deemed most important.  Jessica Wilson is working on that. When we get that list we will begin work to determine a route to include as many points as possible, look at spurs, and start working on local partners.
We we recently featured on Ginny Sullivan's Adventure Cycling Blog.
Stay Tuned.

Things to do now

Much of this is on hold while our role with RPM consultants is better defined, here are some things we can still work on to good purpose.

1. Evaluate TN NS 4a for cycling suitability.  Especially all South of I-840 needs to be checked as new rumbles have been applied in that area since my last visit.

2. Tweak TN NS 4a  thought Nashville.

3. Establish contacts for route coordination with MS, VA, KY, GA. 

4. Look at and amend as appropriate the other routes in your area.  Especially need suggestions for route from Nashville to Memphis north of US 70.