Bike-lane battle could shift to Tremont Street in the South End

The City Council  agreed today to consider whether moves to make Tremont Street safer for pedestrians and bicyclists in recent years are costing business owners untold thousands in lost sales and making it harder for first responders to get to emergencies.

Councilor Ed Flynn (South End, South Boston, Downtown, Chinatown) moved for the hearing, saying it's time to consider whether "road diet" changes to the thoroughfare have made life increasingly impossible for motorists and the shops they patronize - and that it's past time for the city to start listening to "the lived experiences and the institutional knowledge" of people affected by them.

"We have to have a Tremont Street that works for everybody," he said, adding business owners he's talked to say they are losing money hand over fist because their customers can't find a place along Tremont to park. "Small businesses are the life blood of our economy" and at a time when commercial property values are falling and people are working at home, "we should be doing everything we can" to help them, he said.

"It's almost impossible for commercial and delivery vehicles, patrons looking to park, visitors looking to go to the library," he said, adding police, firefighters and EMTs have trouble getting down a street clogged by ride-share and delivery drivers simply stopped in the road to pick up or drop off people and packages because they can't find a place to park.

Flynn, who has yet to meet a bike-lane/road-diet project he likes - except, as he will tell you, that one time on Day Boulevard in South Boston, which is not a city road - said there are other ways to make things safer for pedestrians, such as reducing the default city speed limit even lower than the current 25 m.p.h.  In the past, he has also pushed for such measures as raised crosswalks; he did not mention those today, but cautioned any naysayers that he has been fighting for pedestrian safety for more than seven years now.

But Councilor Sharon Durkan (Back Bay, Fenway, Beacon Hill, Mission Hill), says she's grown increasingly frustrated with people rage blaming everything on bicycle lanes, that the point of them and related road changes is to make roads safer for "those that are most vulnerable - pedestrians and people on two wheels."  She said that while riding her bike recently, some guy in a vehicle yelled at her from behind: "You better move, you fat B word!" She did not say which road she was on at the time.

"With every bike lane that we have built in the city, we absolutely have saved lives," she said. "With every bike lane that hasn't been built, with every protection that does not exist, with every barrier that does not exist, we have had injuries. In district 8, we have had two deaths, one on a scooter and one a pedestrian, since I've been in office, and I think, for me, pedestrian safety, and the safety of the most vulnerable road users are people that we do need to prioritize, in addition to businesses, in addition to other voices and residents."

Councilor Tania Fernandes Anderson (Roxbury) said "the constituency in my district, which shares Tremont, has expressed, virulently, they are in opposition to this."

She said that while she recognized that "obviously, bike lanes are a good thing, safe streets are a good thing," the city needs to do a cross-neighborhood study, to see how bike lanes along a street in one neighborhood might be affecting people in a neighboring area.

Watch the discussion: