Updated: Altadena 'Bike Boulevard,' Eaton Canyon Bike Path in County Final Bike Plan Draft

County planners released the final draft of the county's bike plan for the next 20 years this week, and it includes a five-mile designated "bike boulevard" for Altadena and a new bike path of nearly 8 miles starting from Eaton Canyon that would complete a bike path that would run all the way down to Long Beach.

The plan includes improvements for unincorporated areas all over the county and would result in more than 60 miles of bike improvements in the West San Gabriel Valley alone, though over half of those would be bike routes, which involve adding road signs identifying an existing road as a preferred place for cyclists to ride.

The rest of the improvements would be striped bike lanes, the bike path, and Altadena's bike boulevard.

Though the plans could become official as soon as next month, don't expect the improvements anytime soon: the Bike Boulevard is slated for the second phase of the county's plan, meaning it would likely be completed some time between 2017 and 2027, according to Abu Yusuf, the county's Bike Plan Coordinator.

As far the Eaton Canyon path, the county would like to begin the design process within the next five years, but would then still need to do environmental review.  There is no set completion date for that project at this point, Yusuf said.

The County of Los Angeles Regional Planning Commission will hold a hearing on whether to approve the plan at 9 a.m. on November 16 in room 150 of the County Hall of Records at 320 W. Temple Street in Downtown Los Angeles.  The plan can be viewed on the county's website or to the right of this article.

Altadena 'Bike Boulevard' Proposal

The bike boulevard would run east to west in Altadena along the following streets: Harriet Street, then switch to Calveras Steet, and wind through Mendocino Street, Midwick Drive, Glen Canyon Road, and down Roosevelt Avenue (the proposed boulevard route is highlighted in purple on the map on right).

Those streets would continue to accomadate cars, but would have traffic calming measures designed to slow drivers down.

The illustrations on right show what the boulevard could look like: there could be intersections that only bikes could pass through, new stop signs on intersections connecting to the road to keep traffic on the boulevard from being interupted, and traffic circles and speed humps designed to slow cars down.

In short, the design would make it harder to drive on the streets, but much better for bike and pedestrian usage.

The Bike Boulevard's cost is listed at $630,000.

The Eaton Canyon Bike Path

The path would start from just east of the border of Altadena and Pasadena on New York Drive, and run south for 7.8 miles along the Eaton Wash through East Pasadena and San Gabriel to connect to the Rio Hondo bike path in El Monte.

That would mean a stand-alone bike path that would run from Eaton Canyon all the way down to Long Beach, a dream that local open space and recreation groups, including the Arroyo & Foothills Conservancy have advocated for years.

The project is number three on the list of county priorities for the West San Gabriel Valley, much higher than the Altadena Bike Boulevard, which is listed in two segments, both of which are 20 or lower on the list of priorities.

The bike path's cost is estimated at around $10 million, according to Yusuf.

Other Altadena Improvements

The plan designates 23 miles of Altadena roads as bike routes, which would mean increased signage designed to direct cyclists on to roads appropriate for biking.  A full list of those areas can be viewed starting on page 124 of the plan.

There would also be several new painted bike lanes in the city: 1.7 miles of new bike lane on Woodbury Road between Windsor and Santa Rosa; 0.7 miles of new bike lane on Washington Boulevard between Bellford and Altadena; 1 mile on Altadena Drive between Canyon Close and Washington.

In total, the county's proposals would transform more than 800 miles of road and trails countywide, at a cost of $327 million.

Editor's note: The original version of this story mistakenly said the bike boulevard would go down Coolidge Avenue rather than Roosevelt Avenue.  The original plan had it on Coolidge, but the latest draft switched that to Roosevelt.