MyBikeLane

After a distracted driver drifted into the bike lane and killed Larry Mahr in 2000, I began pressuring the City of San Diego and Caltrans to make changes to Kearny Villa Rd. When U.S. Marine Captain Patrick Klokow, a decorated veteran who survived two tours in the Middle East, was killed by a hit-and-run driver in 2005, I let them know that their failure to act was negligent. The first step was in 2006 to move the bike lanes toward the shoulder and stripe a buffer zone between lane 2 and the bike lane. I have heard from a reliable source that the next step will be to accentuate the bike lanes by painting them light blue, a "cote d'azure" or "blue band," for you track riders out there. This of course amounts to window dressing until the transition ramp from southbound Kearny Villa Rd. onto southbound I-163 is reconfigured so that traffic must stop at a signal to allow cyclists and pedestrians to cross the ramp safely. The problem here is that the area is a jurisdictional grey zone between the City of San Diego and Caltrans. Bureaucratic inertia will continue to delay this reconfiguration until pressure from the public overcomes it. Casualties in and of themselves do not seem to influence local and state planning agencies, so keep the pressure on. Contact your elected officials regularly. City Council District 7 (Jim Madaffer and staffer Jay Wilson) 236-6677. They are tired of hearing from me and have stopped returning calls and e-mails. It's time for someone else to take a pull on the front!