Southern Avenue Bike Lane: Update

The Southern Avenue bike lane is moving towards completion.

At the intersection of Perkins Extended and Southern--on the far eastern end of the road improvement--the roadway has been primed for repaving.  Because the process of re-paving requires a "scouring" of the the street, the roadway becomes pretty rough before it's repaved.  But it's a small price to pay for the super smooth asphalt that follows. 

 

(This stretch of rough asphalt currently stretches from Goodlett to Perkins on Southern.  By the end of next week, most of Southern between Cooper St and Perkins should have new asphalt.)

Heading westbound on Southern this morning, we found the street closed for re-paving beginning at Goodlett.   Most of Southern between Patterson and Goodlett has been repaved. 

 

Paving crews are putting on the finishing touches today.   

 

Pedestrians will notice that along most of Southern, the City of Memphis has completed "curb cuts."  The curb cuts are just as they sound: they are areas where concrete has been cut out of the curb at street crossings to provide handicap accessibility on the sidewalk.  

 

(A curb cut near the repaving zone at Goodlett and Southern)

 Near the  University of Memphis, where today the street was closed between Patterson and Goodlett,  re-paving crews were hard at work. 

 

Heading west from Perkins, repaving along Southern Avenue will end at the intersection of S. Highland and Southern Avenue. 

   

Readers will remember from our last blog entry that Southern will not receive new pavement between S. Highland and Semmes during this fiscal year's repaving cycle.  The City of Memphis hopes this stretch of Southern will be re-surfaced during fiscal year 2012.   

(The intersection of southern and Prescott is within the .8 mile stretch of Southern that will not be repaved this year)

Beginning at Semmes heading west, bicycle riders will enjoy smooth sailing all the way to S. Cooper St.  New pavement has been poured and smoothed.  Best of all, the beginnings of a bike lane are now striped on the road.  

The bike lane actually begins at Goodwyn, one block west of Semmes.   This bike lane is part of Mayor A.C. Wharton's 2010-2011 Bicycle Facilities Program, which began with striping bicycle lanes on Horn Lake Road in July of this year. 

 

Here's a shaky and hazy but continuous video of the bike lane from Goodwyn to Cooper.

Note that "bicycle lane" signs have not been erected by the side of the road and bicycle emblems have not been installed inside the bike lane.  These features should be done, along with crosswalks on the newly repaved Southern Avenue, within the next week or two.  We'll keep you up to date.

Once again, thank you for helping make this bicycle lane a reality.  Advocacy works.