After several years of successful campaigns, including passing the Freedom to Walk Act,the Complete Streets Bill, and securing $1 billion for the Active Transportation Program, 2025 is shaping up to be a dismal year for active transportation efforts in Sacramento. A combination of budget shortfalls, literal and metaphorical fires, and a federal government openly hostile to the Golden State captured legislators’ attention. Bold steps sucked up most of the attention and the steady progress toward safer streets took a hit, though legislators found time to pass several minor e-bike regulations.
Killed by suspense (i.e. the state budget)
We won’t have the final tally until the governor finishes signing bills on October 12, but the suspense file took out CalBike’s Quick-Build bill.
The death of the Quick-Build Bill, AB 891, which went on suspense in August, was a shock. The bill, which would give Caltrans expanded ability to use quick-build methods to swiftly fix road hazards, had sailed through the legislative process. Caltrans didn’t oppose it, and we anticipated an easy passage.
Quick-build has been adopted by many communities, but Caltrans rarely uses it on state routes that double as local streets. With low-cost materials and a shorter planning time, quick-build’s quick fixes can save the lives of vulnerable road users and are cheaper and faster to build than traditional road projects. It’s strange to see a bill that would save California money get tanked in the Appropriations Committee, but that’s the mystery of the suspense file.
The demise of the Bike Highways Bill, AB 954, was expected. The author has now pulled the bill after amendments stripped it of most of its substance due to Senate Transportation committee concerns that the bill went too far. Assemblymember Steve Bennett hasn’t wavered in his support for bike highways; he plans to return next year with a revamped bill. We think this concept is an excellent way to approach the need for connected, protected bike routes that facilitate regional bike travel and we’re looking forward to working with Bennett on his new legislation.
Budget woes hit active transportation harder than highways
We had held out a sliver of hope to secure more money for the Active Transportation Program through the Cap-and-Trade (now Cap-and-Invest) reauthorization, but that window has closed. The ATP will have to struggle through another cycle with inadequate funding unless legislators make up the shortfall and return the $400 million cut from the program in next year’s budget.
The ATP represents a tiny fraction of California’s $20 billion transportation budget, but it has been the first place Governor Gavin Newsom has cut in tough budget times. It’s frustrating to watch California fall even more behind on its climate goals while pouring money into climate-killing highway projects. We will continue to work with our allies to redirect our state’s spending priorities next year.
The only bikes that got attention are electric
While legislators didn’t stand up for active transportation and safe streets where it counts, they did cave to the clamor for e-bike regulation with a slate of e-bike bills. Two of these bills have been passed and signed by the governor already and we expect the same for the remaining three bills. The one bill CalBike supported, SB 455, died in committee.
The evolving e-bike market does need better regulation, but the mix of bills moving through the legislature this year will only add to the confusion. Look for an announcement from CalBike soon as we take steps to build consensus on e-bike regulation.
Finding reasons for hope
Not everything is doom and gloom this season. CalBike is actively working with Caltrans on the implementation of SB 960, the Complete Streets law, and we’re hopeful that will herald greater investments in biking, walking, and transit infrastructure from the state’s SHOPP program. While the statewide e-bike incentive rollout has proceeded slowly, more and more local governments, utility companies, and other agencies are providing financial help for people who want to get around by e-bike. That, in turn, is increasing the number of bikes on the streets, leading to greater safety in numbers for bike riders.
The challenges of this year point the direction for future action. We need to elect stronger bike champions in greater numbers to the Assembly and Senate as well as local governments. California will elect a new governor in 2026, and having a state executive who understands and cares about active transportation and its role in mitigating the climate crisis would make a big difference. Look to CalBike for endorsements during the next election cycle.
As bike advocates, we know not to lose hope because of a couple of setbacks. We’re in this for the long haul.
https://www.calbike.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/sylwia-bartyzel-vQvzGsG3KWY-unsplash.jpg47973198Laura McCamyhttps://www.calbike.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/calbike-logo.pngLaura McCamy2025-09-15 13:59:042025-09-15 13:59:05Bike-Friendly Bills Bite the Dust
Getting bikeways, crosswalks, or other Complete Streets elements into a Caltrans project can be challenging. Convincing Caltrans to alter a previously approved project to add bikeways is an even bigger lift, but local advocates in the East Bay did just that. We spoke with Robert Prinz, Bike East Bay’s advocacy director, and Drew Dara-Abrams, who sits on the City of Alameda Transportation Commission, about what worked to get Caltrans to change its plans.
The project: SR 61 from San Leandro to Alameda
The project, approved in the 2020 State Highway Operation and Protection Program (SHOPP), would repave State Route 61 from Davis Street in San Leandro, where it’s named Doolittle Drive with a 45-50 mph speed limit through Oakland, and across a bridge to become Otis Drive in Alameda, then move over to Encinal Avenue, bisecting the island city.
The most cost-effective time to build new bikeways is during repaving or repair work. CalBike’s Complete Streets bills all called for including Complete Streets in SHOPP projects. Yet getting Caltrans to take the infrastructure needs of people biking and walking seriously when planning projects that impact local streets has been a challenge. CalBike’s Incomplete Streets Report highlighted some of the excuses the agency has used to shortchange active transportation. With the passage of SB 960, the Complete Streets Bill, we are optimistic that Caltrans will do better on future projects.
But that doesn’t solve the problem of SHOPP projects approved in the past, some of which are only now being constructed. With SR 61, advocates faced the challenge of getting present-day Caltrans to honor Complete Streets obligations in a project initiated by past Caltrans. Here’s how they did it.
San Leandro to Oakland: Bike East Bay
Bike East Bay’s Robert Prinz worked mainly on the San Leandro and Oakland segments of the project, while local advocates in Alameda took the lead on the segment running through that city. The Project Initiation Document (PID), completed in 2020, failed to reference local bike plans from Oakland and San Leandro calling for protected bikeways on Doolittle Drive, even though the bike plans predated the PID. Bike East Bay pointed this out to Caltrans; Prinz has email threads going back to 2020. It took until 2024 for Caltrans to agree to reconsider the plan.
This segment covers a gap in the Bay Trail, a biking and walking trail that is envisioned to one day provide an unbroken route around the San Francisco Bay. While a future Bay Trail segment is planned to connect to Alameda, a protected bikeway on Doolittle closes a “gap between where one part of the Bay Trail ends and another begins,” Prinz said, noting that there’s no room for a Class I separated path in this area, so a Class IV protected bikeway is critical.
Prinz noted that some SHOPP projects do a good job with active transportation infrastructure, but the process could use more transparency. “We’ve had some good SHOPP projects funded, and it’s just a mystery as to why,” he said, citing a $40 million Complete Streets project in Union City and Fremont that he didn’t know was in the pipeline.
The breakthrough for Prinz was getting Caltrans to come to a meeting of the Infrastructure Committee he chairs on Oakland’s Bike/Ped Advisory Commission. It was hard for Caltrans staffers to refuse — their office is just two blocks from OakDOT’s. “Later we learned that Oakland DOT staff had been saying the same thing to Caltrans,” he said, noting that “ultimately I think it was Caltrans hearing from a lot of different partners” that got them to add a bikeway to the plan.
Prinz also cited the local bike plans as essential to the process with Caltrans. “Plans matter,” he said. “Very often, plans get overruled, but it does still help if you can point to something in one or more adopted plans to back up your requests.” He added, “Individual design details are important, and I wish we could spend more time working on that.” Making sure the bikeway is usable and “not just a line on a map,” he said, is just as important as the bikeway class, noting that some of Oakland’s bike lanes have had to be upgraded multiple times as design standards change.
He also cited the value of having more pools of advocates when working on a cross-jurisdictional project like this one. He hopes to see more advocates looking across borders and joining forces to work on projects that span multiple cities because “most people don’t bike in only one city.”
Alameda: Drew Dara-Abrams
Drew Dara-Abrams describes the four-lane state route that cuts across Alameda as running next to a city park, an elementary school, and houses with minimal setbacks. It’s the kind of roadway where cities like Alameda have consistently added bulbouts and other traffic calming features.
Not so with the Caltrans project. “Caltrans is stuck in the past of auto throughput, auto throughput, auto throughput,” he said. “Compared with all the design aspects we can expect to be part of a process for locally controlled roads, it’s just a black box.” When he first reached out to Caltrans to ask why project plans didn’t reflect statewide Complete Streets policies adopted in 2021, district staff said certain project documents were filed internally in 2019 and therefore avoided all subsequent requirements — including policies requiring sign-off on Complete Streets reviews by their district leadership.
Photos of Otis Drive in Alameda courtesy of Drew Dara-Abrams.
Like Prinz, Dara-Abrams also found that getting Caltrans staff to a public meeting was crucial. Holding a City of Alameda Transportation Commission meeting on the project “enabled residents to write in and attend and speak,” he said. “That really brought some light to the project.” They got 40 pages of emailed comments, including a letter from the principal of the neighboring elementary school. Public awareness and input didn’t move Caltrans, but it moved local leaders to meet with Caltrans staff, which was an important part of the process.
Dara-Abrams began writing about the project on his blog in 2023 and describes his advocacy as “pingponging back and forth between different groups and local leaders, which helped elevate this and make the local Caltrans district care at a leadership level.” Involving Caltrans leadership was crucial. “It turned out city staff and Caltrans staff had been going back and forth about the project for years,” he said. “The impetus for change has to come from the leadership level to give them permission to do things that might take a little more time or a little more budget.” With public scrutiny, Caltrans could no longer ignore local staff.
He said getting to know local staff was crucial because they know what projects are coming up. He’s learned from them and given himself an education in reading complex Caltrans and CTC documents.
In the short run, the changes make Caltrans staffers’ jobs harder, Dara-Abrams says, but “in the long run, this is in Caltrans’ interest — getting these details right.”
CalBike: Support from the statewide bike coalition
While local advocates took the lead in working with Caltrans on the SR 61 project, CalBike played a supporting role. We wrote letters of support and helped open lines of communication with Caltrans staff, while continuing to put pressure on district and headquarters regarding their CS policies and SB 960, which was signed into law during this time.
Hearing a similar message from a number of organizations let Caltrans know that people were paying attention and helped elevate the message up the chain of command to key decision-makers. This included an official response letter from then-District 4 Caltrans Director Dina El-Tawansy, who has since been promoted to Caltrans director at headquarters in Sacramento.
“The work Robert and Drew did on this project shows what’s possible if you’re persistent in working with Caltrans,” said Jared Sanchez, CalBike policy director. “I hope to have the opportunity to support more local advocates in finding the right levers to apply pressure to improve local projects.”
Results and takeaways
For both segments of the project, the advocates didn’t get everything they wanted. On Doolittle Drive, the bike facility won’t be very wide and doesn’t provide separation as robust as many other new East Bay bikeways. But, Prinz said, “It’s all iterative. We want Caltrans staff to get more experience with this kind of stuff, and we’ll get them to beef it up at some point.” And, once complete, this will be one of the longest Class IV bikeways in Oakland, and the only one east of Fruitvale Avenue.
In the Alameda segment, there will be small but targeted additions of pedestrian refuge islands and curb extensions at popular intersections, which fell short of the lane reductions local advocates wanted. But they got a promise from Caltrans District 4 to study a road diet and potentially implement lane reductions. That project is expected to get programmed into the 2028 SHOPP with construction in 2032, moving at the normal, glacial pace of Caltrans projects. CalBike’s Quick-Build Bill could provide more momentum, especially for projects that address safety hazards for vulnerable road users. The bill would allow Caltrans districts to use quick-build methods, when warranted, to swiftly address dangerous roadways.
“The fact that Caltrans was willing to update their plans at all is progress,” Prinz said. “It’s been a long process, but thanks, Caltrans, for listening.”
Key takeaways from this project:
Take your concerns to district leadership, and also reach out to staff at Caltrans headquarters and the California Transportation Commission, which provides funding for SHOPP projects.
Hold public meetings with Caltrans staffers present to hear comments and answer questions.
Ask Caltrans staff for project initiation documents, traffic analyses, and engineering plans. Use these materials to ask targeted questions and propose specific improvements.
Be persistent. Working with Caltrans is a long-term project.
Find your allies. Work with city staffers, elected officials, other advocacy groups, and people who live in adjacent cities or neighborhoods toward your shared goal of safer streets and connected bike routes.
CalBike continues to work at the state level to implement better policies on our state-controlled streets. Those policies pave the way for more transparency at Caltrans and a greater role for local communities in shaping the roads that run through their neighborhoods.
https://www.calbike.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/07/SR-61-bike-riders.jpg14752617Laura McCamyhttps://www.calbike.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/calbike-logo.pngLaura McCamy2025-07-23 02:06:102025-07-23 02:06:11Adding Bikeways to State Routes: Two Local Advocates Share Strategies for Change
A secure place to park is essential to making bicycling an appealing way to get around. So, CalBike and 17 of our local partners submitted a letter to the California Building Standards Commission, which is updating California’s Green Building Standards Code. Including robust residential and commercial bike parking standards in those codes is an important step to creating bike-friendly neighborhoods.
Bike parking standards
The letter outlines several basic suggestions:
Refer to and follow the Association of Pedestrian and Bicycle Professionals (APBP) Bicycle Parking Guidelines.
Require some bike parking spots to accommodate larger bikes such as e-bikes, cargo bikes, and adaptive bikes.
Site short-term bike racks near entrances — ideally within 50 feet, but no more than 100 feet away.
Include at least one long-term bike storage space per residential unit in multifamily buildings.
Provide access to charging outlets for e-bikes with long-term spots.
Use only APBP-approved bike racks.
Restrictions on new building codes may affect bike parking regulations
The letter also asked for clarification on the impact of AB 130, a new law intended to encourage more residential construction by easing requirements. The bill prohibits new building standards unless certain conditions are met. Hopefully, the rush to get more residential units built won’t leave bikes in the dust.
Advocacy continues
The new bike parking standards are expected to go into effect on January 1, 2026. However, the California Department of Housing and Community Development is holding a workshop on July 30, which might be the final chance to give feedback on the new bike parking requirements. CalBike will be there, continuing to advocate for safe, abundant bike parking in and around new buildings.
https://www.calbike.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/CalBike-Insider-Image4.png7201280Jared Sanchezhttps://www.calbike.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/calbike-logo.pngJared Sanchez2025-07-22 12:55:302025-07-23 02:01:17CalBike Insider: Updating Bike Parking in Green Building Codes
Recently, Big Highway — the companies that profit off expanding highways and driving California to climate ruin — spread misinformation about vehicle miles traveled (VMT) mitigation requirements driving up the cost of freeway building. So ClimatePlan, a consortium of advocacy groups of which CalBike is a member, created a fact sheet to dispel the VMT myths and set the record straight about mitigation costs and benefits. Please take a walk deep into the weeds with us as we nerd out on a proposed VMT mitigation bank and the costs of road building, both financial and societal.
VMT explained
We can’t explain VMT any better than the ClimatePlan fact sheet. Here’s their basic explanation:
“Vehicle miles traveled” (VMT) is a measure of driving.
One vehicle driving one mile = 1 vehicle mile traveled, or 1 VMT
One vehicle driving two miles or two vehicles each driving 1 mile = 2 VMT
The transportation sector is responsible for about half the greenhouse gas emissions in California, so getting people to drive less is one of the more effective ways to combat climate change. VMT affects pollution levels, which impact people biking and walking. And VMT affects quality of life. CalBike’s mission is to create livable neighborhoods where people can get where they need to go safely with a variety of transportation options. Transportation deserts, where people are forced into a car to get anywhere, are bad for communities and health.
VMT mitigation funding can be used for biking and walking infrastructure improvements, so California’s commitment to reducing VMT can support our mission of gaining more funding for active transportation projects. A proposal to create a VMT mitigation bank to collect and dispense funds to transit-oriented development projects that reduce VMT would also include funding for improved active transportation infrastructure adjacent to those projects.
What about EVs?
Electric cars and trucks solve some but not all of the issues with VMT. Projects that add highway lanes induce more driving and don’t solve the congestion problem that initiated the project in the first place. More cars on the road, whether powered by fossil fuels or electricity, means more time spent driving for those in the cars; importantly, it also means more exposure to collisions for vulnerable road users traveling on shared roadways. Plus, we can’t make the transition to electric vehicles quickly enough to prevent the worst impacts of climate chaos.
The bottom line is this: we drove ourselves into a world of extreme temperatures, extreme inequality, and extremely poor health. We can’t drive ourselves out of it — we’ll have to take the train, walk, or bike.
What California invests in grows. If we keep investing in new highway lanes, driving, pollution, and VMT will keep increasing. If we instead invest more in connected, projected bike networks, quick-build safety projects, transit priority lanes, and other projects that expand access to sustainable transportation, we’ll start to make a meaningful shift away from clogged freeways and toward a future full of bicycles.
https://www.calbike.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/Longlineofcars-1.jpg16992549Kendra Ramseyhttps://www.calbike.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/calbike-logo.pngKendra Ramsey2025-07-08 16:02:432025-07-08 18:16:40Don’t Believe the Myths About VMT Mitigation
In 2024, with help from our allies and thousands of CalBike supporters, we passed the Complete Streets Bill, SB 960, requiring Caltrans to add or upgrade facilities for people biking and walking when they repair state routes that serve those travel modes. Passing the bill was just the first step; as we’ve seen with the rollout of California’s new daylighting law, lack of implementation, based on so-called lack of funding, can get in the way of the effectiveness of new safety regulations. So, CalBike is working with Caltrans to ensure the agency takes active transportation safety seriously and better implements Complete Streets on its highways.
Sitting down with Caltrans
Last week, we met with Caltrans’ leadership, including Acting Complete Streets Lead Advisor Susan Lindsay and other key executives, to discuss progress toward implementing SB 960.
Every project in Caltrans’ State Highway Operation and Protection Program (SHOPP) that isn’t on a limited-access freeway should be evaluated for active transportation and transit infrastructure needs. In fact, many state routes run through neighborhoods and serve as local streets where people walk, bike, and take the bus.
Caltrans outlined some plans to implement its Complete Streets policy during projects on those routes and comply with SB 960. These include transparency: Caltrans will post justifications for recommended Complete Streets elements included or excluded from projects online. Caltrans has a form to document this for each project, but it hasn’t been available to the public. In 2023 and 2024, CalBike had to make public records requests to obtain the project records we reviewed for our Incomplete Streets report. We commend Caltrans for taking this step.
There will also be more accountability within Caltrans. Rather than district personnel making the final decision about new bikeways or sidewalks, leading to large variations in implementation among Caltrans districts, high-level staff from headquarters will review cases where district staff have not included recommended Complete Streets elements in SHOPP projects. This formalization of the exception to the Complete Streets policy is meant to narrow allowable exceptions and streamline application across districts. Caltrans will also report on this to the California Transportation Commission, which oversees funding for the program.
Caltrans reporting
In addition to these reporting and transparency steps, as well as several other new policies, Caltrans is undertaking a review of the 2026 SHOPP projects that had recommended Complete Streets elements. This is similar to the analysis CalBike did of the 2024 projects, and the agency has promised to share its findings with us. When CalBike released our Incomplete Streets report, we had statistics that Caltrans hadn’t compiled internally, and we’re glad to see the agency take up the practice.
CalBike plans to keep reviewing and analyzing Caltrans SHOPP project documents to double-check its progress on Complete Streets. Caltrans has offered quarterly meetings with CalBike to share information and input on the process to provide Complete Streets for all users.
Working with Caltrans has always been part of CalBike’s mission. Our agency work is less visible than our legislative advocacy, but it’s no less important. So, when you see a new crosswalk or protected bikeway on a Caltrans-maintained road in your neighborhood, you can thank the Complete Streets Bill and CalBike’s advocacy for Caltrans to step up since 2008, as well as tireless advocacy from local partners, that brings the changes to the street level.
https://www.calbike.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/thumb-scaled.jpg17032560Jared Sanchezhttps://www.calbike.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/calbike-logo.pngJared Sanchez2025-06-11 14:48:482025-06-11 14:48:50CalBike Works with Caltrans to Move Complete Streets Forward
The Bike Highways Bill, AB 954, passed the Assembly by a wide margin, showing strong support for protected, connected bikeway networks. CalBike is sponsoring this bill, authored by Assemblymember Steve Bennett, which will create a pilot project pathway to create bike highway networks in two regions.
The networks could be planned using existing segments of fully separated bike paths and on-street protected bikeways, as well as new facilities. Creating a regional network that allows riders to seamlessly get where they need to go without facing missing links or dangerous intersections is the magic of the bike highways plan. This project could significantly increase bicycle mode share and become a model that can be replicated throughout California.
Although we don’t have complete bike highway networks yet, there are several existing bikeways used for long-distance bike commuting. We spoke to some of the people using one of these bikeways in Southern California.
“AB 954 is our chance to link the enormous stack of bicycle benefits with well-connected, longer-range networks. In Burbank, for instance, major bike paths including the Chandler, the San Fernando, and the Channel Bikeways, do not connect to each other or to the Los Angeles River Bike Path. Without safe, direct connections, these human-powered corridors remain isolated and ineffective. Bike highways are the way to weld segments together into something truly useful. By linking these networks, we unlock a complete system where biking becomes not just possible, but a life-affirming celebration for all.” — Kreigh Hample, Project Coordinator for Walk Bike Burbank and the Burbank Advisory Council on Disabilities
Southern California Trails
The San Gabriel River Trail is a 35.4-mile multi-use path. The LA County website lists mountain biking as one of the uses and seems to view the trail from Seal Beach to Azusa as recreational. We reached out to users via Reddit and found at least one bike rider who uses it for commuting as well as recreational rides.
“The SGRT is one of the few places where cyclists can truly bike without ever encountering the crazy drivers of LA,” Justin Williams told CalBike. “I use the path to commute to work and on the weekends for fun. It is one of the only ways to cross the 405 without on/off ramps… PCH gets sketchy, and I wouldn’t recommend it to my friends.”
The trail passes through numerous cities, including Norwalk and El Monte, and could provide the basis for a bike highway network if connected with local bike routes.
An anonymous commenter rides the San Gabriel River Trail but prefers the Santa Ana River Trail farther south for recreational rides because of poor pavement in some sections of the SGRT. The San Gabriel River Trail is shared with horseback riders, and some sections are gravel rather than asphalt.
The Santa Ana River Trail is an ambitious project to build 110 miles of trail from the San Bernardino National Forest to the Pacific Ocean in Huntington Beach. This trail, which started construction in 2005 and is 60% complete, will ultimately pass through San Bernardino and Santa Ana. It will end at the Pacific Coast Highway, a few miles south of Beach Boulevard, a state route that CalBike evaluated as part of our Incomplete Streets report.
While these two trails are largely intended for recreational bike riding, they could provide the spine for connected, protected bike highway networks, allowing people to travel by bike between and within Southern California communities. There are numerous trails like this throughout California. With your help, we’ll pass the Bike Highways Bill and experience the positive impact of truly regional bikeway transportation networks.
https://www.calbike.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/06/San-Gabrient-River-Trail-bh.jpg4441267Jared Sanchezhttps://www.calbike.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/calbike-logo.pngJared Sanchez2025-06-09 16:54:352025-06-09 16:54:37This Is What a Bike Highway Could Look Like
Caltrans issues Design Information Bulletins (DIBs) that set the parameters for specific types of facilities on the state highway network. DIB-89 provides guidance on how to build Class IV bikeways. Class IV lanes are on-street bikeways separated from car traffic by some type of physical barrier. CalBike’s analysis of Caltrans data found that, although protected bikeways have been legal in California since 2015, Caltrans added almost no Class IV lane miles between 2018 and 2023.
Caltrans first issued DIB-89 in 2018 and updated it in 2022. It’s now preparing to do another update of this design guidance. Later this month, the California Walk and Bike Technical Advisory Committee (CWBTAC), which advises Caltrans on matters related to active transportation, will have an opportunity to provide feedback on DIB-89 to inform revision later this year. Kendra Ramsey, CalBike’s executive director, sits on the CWBTAC, so we will be able to comment. We are working on our own comments, but want our supporters to have an opportunity to weigh in as well.
DIB-89 is important because it will govern how Caltrans implements Class IV bikeways, which are the safest on-street bikeways and proven to reduce injuries for all road users. Often, local agencies also look to Caltrans guidance to inform how they construct facilities on local roads. The design guidance could encourage or discourage the use of Class IV lanes, depending on how it’s written. This is very deep in the weeds, but we don’t think that only traffic engineers should weigh in on something that could have a profound impact on how we all get around. We’ve put the current version of DIB-89 into our Google Drive and opened it for comments. We invite you to read it and add comments by June 23 so we can read them before the meeting. CalBike wants to bring as much feedback as possible to the CWBTAC meeting at the end of this month, so we are happy to hear what you think should be changed.
https://www.calbike.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/CalBike-Insider-Image4.png7201280Laura McCamyhttps://www.calbike.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/calbike-logo.pngLaura McCamy2025-06-09 15:38:052025-06-09 16:57:43CalBike Insider: Design Guidance on Class IV Bikeways
On May 27, 2025, the Kern County Grand Jury released a preliminary report titled The Proliferation of Bike Lanes: Whose Road Is It? The grand jury had been asked to “examine the impact of bike lanes in Bakersfield.” It returned findings that questioned the value of installing bike lanes in Bakersfield and accused the consulting firm that developed the city’s bike plan of being “biased toward bicycles.”
This is a questionable use of the grand jury process to circumvent California’s climate goals for the transportation sector and the rightful role of local government officials to make transportation plans for their city. Here’s what we know about the grand jury report and what’s next.
The Civil Grand Jury
Every county in California convenes an annual civil grand jury for the express purpose of investigating local government. Unlike federal grand juries, which generally determine whether there’s enough evidence to charge someone with a crime, California’s Civil Grand Juries may investigate noncriminal matters.
According to Kern County’s website, a grand jury can review complaints about “inefficiencies and misconduct in government.” Based on the report, bike lanes appear to fall into the inefficiency bucket.
The complaint process is confidential, so the report doesn’t state who requested that the grand jury investigate the “proliferation of bike lanes” in Bakersfield. Citizens can request civil grand jury investigations, as can elected officials or government staffers.
Findings: “conflict of interest” and cost/benefit analysis
The findings of the four-page report include benefits of biking, such as a 53% reduction in injuries after bike lanes are installed, the half ton of CO2 that switching from a car to a bike takes out of the air annually, and the fact that bike lanes are cheaper to install and maintain than car lanes.
The negative findings can be summarized as:
It’s too hot to bike in Bakersfield in the summer.
The air is too polluted in the region, so everyone should stay inside a car.
H Street in Bakersfield can’t afford to lose a traffic lane to accommodate a bike lane because nearby streets are too congested.
The city should have made sure that the consulting firm it hired to create its Bicycle & Pedestrian Safety Plan didn’t have a “predetermined goal of moving many people from cars to bicycles.”
The last point appears to be directed at Alta Planning + Design, which prepared Bakersfield’s most recent bike and pedestrian plan in 2020. The grand jury seems to have found that specializing in active transportation planning is a disqualification from developing such a plan.
The issue with H Street is oddly specific in a report that otherwise more broadly questions the decision to add infrastructure that makes it safer to ride a bike in Bakersfield.
The complaint about air quality is self-contradictory. The solution to polluted air might be to ride a bike instead of, for example, driving a car and…polluting the air. And, while heat is certainly a factor in the comfort of bike riding, the grand jury seems to assume that everyone riding a bike in Bakersfield could drive in an air-conditioned car if they chose. The jury didn’t consider the fact that some Bakersfield residents don’t own or can’t afford a car, so making biking safer is critical for their mobility. It also doesn’t factor in the rising number of e-bikes, which can make it easier to bike in hot weather by doing some of the work. It also doesn’t consider that many people ride bicycles in other communities that experience summer heat.
The civil grand jury requests that the City of Bakersfield, by July 1, 2025, amend its RFP materials to “better identify potential conflicts or biases of proposals.” We hope this will apply to any road construction or maintenance contracts as well. Those shouldn’t go to companies that favor infrastructure for motor vehicles.
Starting September 1, 2025, the grand jury wants Bakersfield to conduct automobile and bicycle counts before constructing new bikeways. This sounds like a way to support the argument that “no one bikes here” to avoid putting a bike lane on a roadway that’s too dangerous for most bike riders until the bike lane is installed. It’s a circular argument that has no good outcome for people who want or need to get around by bike.
The final recommendation is to develop a cost/benefit model for bike lanes by September 1, 2025. Presumably, this will calculate the greenhouse gas savings, which the report deemed too small to justify bike lanes. The grand jury obviously didn’t realize that this model already exists: Caltrans has developed a life-cycle cost/benefit analysis model that can be applied to any transportation project.
There seems to be a bias in this report against the utility of bike lanes. It’s a familiar stance, one every bike advocate has witnessed at civic meetings when new bike infrastructure is proposed. The civil grand jury appears to have made its findings and recommendations without considering all the data relevant to active transportation planning decisions. That’s not surprising; they’re probably not urban planning experts.
What happens next
The Bakersfield City Council has 90 days to submit a response on the findings and recommendations in the report to the presiding judge of the Kern County Superior Court and the foreperson of the civil grand jury. The Bakersfield Public Works Department has 60 days to submit responses to selected findings and all three recommendations.
It’s a stretch to argue that decisions about creating and implementing a bike plan (something required to access certain types of transportation funding) are not within the purview of the Bakersfield City Council or Public Works Department, even if some residents disagree with the outcome. Grand juries are designed to look for fraud, malfeasance, and mismanagement. None of that seems to be present here.
We hope the city council and public works department will stand up for safe streets for all Bakersfield residents. If you live in Bakersfield, let your city council member know you expect a strong rebuttal to the biased report on bike lanes. Here’s the letter CalBike sent to Bakersfield’s mayor, vice mayor, and city council.
https://www.calbike.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/Central-Valley-Bikeways-Project-Bakersfield.png10021146Kendra Ramseyhttps://www.calbike.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/calbike-logo.pngKendra Ramsey2025-06-03 10:16:212025-07-07 12:36:44Bakersfield Convenes Grand Jury to Investigate Bike Lanes
The State Highway System Management Plan (SHSMP) “presents a performance-driven and integrated management plan for the State Highway System (SHS) in California,” according to its webpage. Every other year, Caltrans presents the SHSMP to the California Transportation Commission. CalBike dug into the sections on bicycle and pedestrian infrastructure and submitted comments, part of our ongoing efforts to ensure that Caltrans adheres to the requirement to build Complete Streets passed in SB 960.
Good news and bad news for biking and walking
The 2025 draft SHSMP outlines the 2026 State Highway Operation and Protection Program (SHOPP) performance targets for biking and walking infrastructure on the state highway system, which includes many local routes that double as community streets used by all travel modes. The clarity in this reporting gives CalBike and other advocates an opportunity to speak up in advance to pressure Caltrans to better serve people using active transportation.
For sidewalks, the report shows 31 miles of repair for existing sidewalks and 38 miles of new sidewalks in 2026. That’s a decent amount of sidewalk work, and we’re glad to see Caltrans prioritizing the safety and comfort of pedestrians.
The 2026 SHOPP target is to repair 5 miles of existing Class I bikeways, which are off-road bike paths. The agency also plans to fix 20 miles of existing Class II bike lanes, which are designated by paint only. There’s no plan to rehab Class III (shared bike/car lanes, which are no longer recommended in Caltrans guidance) or Class IV protected on-street bikeways.
Caltrans plans to build 210 miles of bikeways, a significant number. Of those, 15 miles will be Class I and 44 will be Class IV. The Class IV bikeways are particularly significant: CalBike’s research found that Caltrans has rarely included Class IV bikeways in its projects, often downgrading to Class II when Class IV is recommended, so this is a welcome goal.
Unfortunately, 75% of the planned new bikeways on state-controlled streets are Class II. Class II lanes, particularly next to the high-speed vehicular traffic often found on state routes, do not provide adequate protection for people on bikes and won’t encourage people to choose bike riding over driving a car. Plus, although the SHSMP doesn’t include any Class III lanes, Caltrans will still add them to its projects.
More questions for Caltrans
We see this SHSMP showing signs of progress while demonstrating that Caltrans needs to do more to prioritize the safety of people who get around by bike. We are interested in how Caltrans will allocate these statewide targets to the districts to implement. The devil is in the details for SHOPP projects.
We are concerned that the level of funding projected for the 10-year SHOPP investment has not increased significantly since the 2023 SHSMP ($2.45 billion in 2025 compared to $2.37 billion in 2023). It’s also not clear why the performance need decreased so much between the 2023 and 2025 SHSMPs for bike/ped infrastructure ($10.6 billion in 2025 compared to $14.6 billion in 2023).
CalBike looks forward to working with Caltrans and getting more details on how the 10-year need and investment were determined and what the differences were between 2023 and 2025.
The 2026 SHOPP programming is just around the corner. Transportation officials are assembling the program of projects now, and we’ll learn what sort of recommendations align with these new goals in the winter.
https://www.calbike.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/CalBike-Insider-Image4.png7201280Jared Sanchezhttps://www.calbike.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/calbike-logo.pngJared Sanchez2025-04-16 15:50:062025-05-08 17:46:16CalBike Insider: Digging into the State Highway System Management Plan
CalBike supported the Caltrans Data Bill, SB 695, in 2023. Starting January 1, 2026, the bill requires Caltrans to post information about projects from the prior fiscal year. But first, the new law tasked Caltrans with releasing project stats going back to 2018. CalBike has reviewed the data, which showed Caltrans was reluctant to install protected bikeways while installing more paint-only bikeways.
Caltrans built 554 new highway miles over the period covered by this data, at a time when California needs to reduce, not increase, vehicle miles traveled. At the same time, the agency built just 160 miles of bikeways, more than half of which were Class 3 lanes where bike riders share the lane with motor vehicle traffic.
While the SB 695 data doesn’t provide enough detail to fully understand Complete Streets projects on state routes, this first release of data shows that Caltrans isn’t doing enough to meet California’s goals to increase biking and walking.
Caltrans bikeways prioritized paint over protection
From the 2018/19 fiscal year through 2022/23, Caltrans added 160.37 miles of bikeways on state-controlled roads. Every Caltrans district and every California county saw some amount of Caltrans bike infrastructure, though in some cases, the amount was very small.
The total number of miles is less impressive when you break it down by class. More than half — 93 miles — was Class 3 bikeways. Class 3 bikeways are lanes with shared bicycle/car traffic, often delineated by sharrows. Caltrans also counts shoulder widening as building Class 3 bikeways; it’s hard to know how much of the 93 miles were wider shoulders on rural routes or simply regular travel lanes to be shared with bicyclists.
Another 53.2 miles were Class 2 bike lanes: lanes marked by paint. While reviewing project files for our Incomplete Streets report, we discovered that Caltrans counted the repainting of existing Class 2 bike lanes as adding Complete Streets to a project. We don’t know what percentage of the 53.2 miles were new lanes and what was simply repainting existing lanes.
Class 1 bikeways are off-road paths completely separated from vehicular traffic. Caltrans reported 11.97 miles, or a little less than 3 miles per year in the whole state of California, over the four-year period.
Caltrans built just 2.2 miles of Class 4 bikeways — separated on-street bikeways with physical protection from car traffic. That’s about half a mile per year. Many local governments in our state built more protected bikeway miles during this period.
Bikeway trends over time and space
The pandemic appears to have taken a bite out of Caltrans bike projects. It built a little more than 50 miles of bikeways in 2019 but just 4.4 miles in 2020. By 2023, that number had crept back up to 44.4 miles. The percentage of different classes of bikeway fluctuated over the covered time period, but 71% of the total bikeway miles added in 2023 were Class 3, only slightly less than in 2019.
The geographic distribution of bicycle infrastructure was also uneven. More than half of the Class 3 bikeways were added in just two counties: 37.7 miles in Kings County and 30 miles in San Bernardino County. San Diego County had 14 miles of Class 3. These three counties accounted for 81 of the 93 miles of Class 3 bikeways, likely reflecting specific projects underway during the years in question.
Caltrans added the least bike infrastructure in Merced County over this four-year period: just 0.04 miles of Class 1 path. That’s about 211 feet. The Caltrans District with the fewest miles of bikeway installed was Caltrans District 12, which covers Orange County: 1.1 miles. That included 0.1 miles of Class 1, 0.9 miles of Class 2, 0.1 miles of Class 3, and no Class 4 bikeways.
It’s not possible to draw definitive conclusions from this data, especially without knowing more about the specifics of the projects and what the bikeways actually look like. What is clear from the information we have is that Caltrans rarely built protected bikeways while installing many more miles of paint-only bikeways.
Uneven sidewalks
The data also included sidewalk construction and reconstruction. Over the four-year period of this reporting, Caltrans built 47.9 miles of new sidewalks and reconstructed another 28.9. The pandemic didn’t seem to have as big an effect on sidewalk construction; it went up in 2020 and has bounced up and down in the years since.
There was sidewalk work in every district, with some notable highs and lows. District 12, once again, built the fewest sidewalks, with 0.1 miles of new sidewalks and 1.5 miles reconstructed. Amador County had the fewest sidewalk improvements, just 0.03 miles of new sidewalk. Santa Clara and Solano Counties had no new sidewalks and less than a mile of reconstructed sidewalks.
At the other end of the scale, Los Angeles County got 17.68 miles of new sidewalks and 5.73 miles reconstructed. LA alone accounted for almost a third of the sidewalk construction on state-controlled routes.
Again, it’s hard to draw too many conclusions without reviewing the original project documents, which are not available online. And the report doesn’t quantify other pedestrian elements that may be vital during road repair projects, such as new crosswalks or protected intersections.
Highways keep on truckin’
Caltrans built 554 miles of new highways during this four-year window, a time when major climate disasters were accumulating across California. It’s past time to stop building new highways and spend our transportation resources on other travel modes.
While some of the new miles were ramps and interchanges, almost 40% — 214 miles — were general purpose lanes that will add more vehicle miles traveled, more pollution, and more climate stress.
Almost a quarter of all the new highway building was done in LA County, though the majority of that road building was High Occupancy Vehicles (HOV) and toll lanes rather than general purpose lanes. San Bernardino County built the most new general purpose roadway: 62 miles.
More data = good
There are additional tables with information about buildings moved and planned and pending projects. You can find it all at https://dot.ca.gov/programs/asset-management/select-state-highway-system-project-outcomes.
As we get more data from Caltrans, more trends and avenues for improvement will become apparent. The SB 695 reports should, over time, become a helpful resource to track Caltrans’ progress toward focusing on projects that serve all road users.
https://www.calbike.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/Car-priority-on-Beach-Boulevard.jpg588627Laura McCamyhttps://www.calbike.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/calbike-logo.pngLaura McCamy2025-04-01 15:47:222025-04-01 15:47:23New Data Sheds Light on Caltrans Projects
