Sign, sign, everywhere a sign...

Followup note: Please see Kyle Zimmeman's comment after this post. The signs have been moved. Further, it is a contractor, not county staff, who are setting these signs. Many thanks to Kyle for once again addressing this, and my apologies to county road crews for initially blaming them.

Sign, sign, everywhere a sign
Blockin' out the bike lane, breakin' my mind,
Dodge this, don't dodge that, dontcha hit the signs...

 (with apologies to the Five Man Electrical Band)

Jerry Merkey's email to Pajarito Riders, sent this morning, pointed out that once again, road work crews are blocking the bike lanes with signs. I don't have a problem when there is no choice in placement and a good faith effort is made to avoid impeding travel in the bike lane, but these don't seem like good examples.

Kyle Zimmerman, County Engineer and formerly Dept. of Public Works Director, once told me that the bike lanes are a "traveled portion of the street", not to be used as parking spaces, etc. So it surprises me that work crews continue to block the bike lanes with signs when it seems there should be an alternative. I am going to send Council a link to this post to ask them to PLEASE make sure our work crews (local or contractors) are trained to avoid the situations below.

Here, just East of the Roundabout, a road work sign has been placed a long way from the actual work. I don't know why this sign could not have been put somewhere else where it does not block the bike lane. Also, please note that the right forward foot of this sign is damaged and is projecting upward. It could easily catch someone's rotating pedal and cause a bad crash (although if you are that close, you might also hit your head).

Here, closer to the work zone, a sign is simply plopped right in the middle of the bike lane. Why?

While not sure death, this practice imposes an unnecessary hazard. If we build bike lanes, let's take them seriously.