Oak Park will either have a new bike plan, or the transit engineers will have to go back to the drawing board after this week’s village trustee meeting.
The proposed plan aims to make Oak Park more accessible for cyclists of all ages, with short-term infrastructure additions in the plan including new bike lanes, neighborhood greenway treatments and other added road sharing measures. It’s an update to a plan that was first ratified in 2008 and last updated in 2014, according to the village.
Village staff have said the plan leans on nationwide standards to create a comprehensive plan for the village as governments around the region look to improve and modernize bike access in Chicagoland.
“The Bike Plan Update network recommendations detail actions along 20 corridors we will pursue over the coming years, with short-, mid-, and long-term timelines,” village staff wrote in the plan. “To meet the plan’s objectives, we must act on different scales – at the intersection, corridor, and village-wide while considering regional connections. While this plan focuses on infrastructure, we will embrace a holistic approach. The village must upgrade our infrastructure, test new street designs, and continue to support new policies and programs that promote a culture of safety.”
The plan’s supporters have said it’d be a win for safety and sustainability in the village.
If it’s passed, the short-term updates described in the plan will be worked into the village’s 2026-31 capital improvement plan during this fall’s budget cycle, according to the village.
The proposed plan has earned a cohort of opponents, many of whom live in south Oak Park either on or near Harvard Street. Harvard Street has become a lynchpin of the discourse around the plan, as the proposal eliminates parking on both sides of the street in favor of striped bike lanes.
The bike lane would impact more than 50 residential driveways, they said.
Critics say that bike lanes on both sides of the street don’t make sense for the relatively quiet residential area and that the village hasn’t been consistent or clear on why it believes believe that bike lanes are the most appropriate intervention for the road. Harvard Street is low-traffic and has had few cyclist involved accidents over the years, the opponents have said.
Harvard-area residents also argue that the intervention doesn’t make sense because the only parts of the street that exceed the average daily traffic threshold in which experts recommend a bike lane intervention are in front of the schools on the street, which will not be protected by the bike lanes.
Opponents also say that lanes on both sides of the street could put a burden on disabled or elderly residents, especially those who rely on door-to-door services. Village staff has vowed to work to make accommodations for people with disabilities, but Harvard area opponents have said the responses were too vague on how the accommodations would be implemented.
These opponents maintain that they are not against the bike plan on the a whole and have said that they would welcome neighborhood greenway treatment on Harvard Street.
Some residents feel that Harvard Street is being signaled out as a test case for future village projects which will remove parking from even larger groups of residents in favor of bike lane expansion.
“This isn’t justified by the traffic volume or speed or the way Harvard is used by cyclists now, the street doesn’t even extend to Harlem,” resident Evan McKensie told Wednesday Journal by email. “Nothing about this is necessary to the plan. It doesn’t make sense by the terms of the plan itself. So why was the change made? I continue to believe that the plan was changed in order to generate opposition from residents, so that the cyclist advocates can make an example of the opponents and silence the opposition when they go for the north-south routes. We are being falsely portrayed as selfish NIMBYs, not just by the cyclist advocates, but by Wednesday Journal, especially your editorial cartoonist.”
Supporters of the plan say that Oak Park needs an east-west bike lane south of the Eisenhower Expressway for the entire village to be accessible for cyclists. To them, Harvard Street makes the most sense out of the available options.
“Harvard is most appropriate, it’s not right along the highway, it’s slower, parking utilization is relatively low,” said Sylvia Schweri, a leader of the Bike Walk Oak Park group that’s championed the proposed update in recent months. “It is also so well placed in terms of connecting neighborhood amenities.”
Village staff also points to the street’s lighted crossings at intersections of busy north-south streets like Ridgeland Avenue and Oak Park Avenue as reasons for why Harvard Street is the right choice for south Oak Park’s bike lanes.
“The reason Harvard was selected as the east-west route through the Village south of I-290 is because it is one of two streets that span the entire Village, it is centrally located and has traffic lights at Oak Park Avenue and Ridgeland Avenue, as well as an all-way stop at East Avenue and Lombard,” staff wrote in the plan’s supporting documents. “This makes crossing the major north-south routes safer and more predictable. Harvard also directly touches three parks and two public schools and several other points of interest.”
The proposed short-term plan calls for striped bike lanes on Augusta Street from Cuyler Avenue to Harlem Avenue, and protected bike lanes on Chicago Avenue from Ridgeland Avenue to Kenilworth Avenue.
The board’s vote on the plan comes about 6 weeks after a rowdy by municipal government standards meeting that took place on June 3, in which dozens of village residents shared perspectives on the plan.
In the time since that meeting, the board has appointed a new trustee in tech entrepreneur Derek Eder.
Eder spoke in favor of his “deep support” for the bike plan at June 3’s meeting, saying that he and his family live in the Harvard area and would welcome bike lanes on the street.
The village also held a pair of community feedback sessions last week, hearing from a few dozen more residents about the plan. At the meetings, residents recorded their opinions on the plan to be shared with the trustees.
Check Oakpark.com for more coverage following the board’s vote Tuesday night.