Illinois Governor Quinn, along with
Illinois Transportation Secretary, Ann Schneider, announced today Illinois’
first bike transportation plan via press release and from his twitter
feed. The bike plan provides more than 200
recommendations and action items to enhance IDOT’s ability to provide safe and
cost-effective accommodations for cyclists across Illinois. The comprehensive
recommendations address a variety of topics including facility design and
maintenance, network gaps, grant funding programs, safety education and
enforcement, and internal governance and coordination. In addition, the plan
includes performance measures designed to evaluate progress towards implementation.
Although the
website isn’t very specific about different recommendations and
implementations, it did provide the following areas that the plan will address:
·
Bicycling related planning and
policy recommendations,
·
Bikeway safety, design and maintenance
recommendations,
·
Regional-scale bikeway network
recommendations,
·
Bikeway network implementation and
prioritization recommendations,
·
State bicycling performance
measures,
·
Education, outreach and enforcement
recommendations, and
·
Funding recommendations
Once area I do like and look forward
to seeing specific recommendations in education, outreach and enforcement. I
would hope this would include recommendations for safety education. Those of us
who live and work in Chicago, we know that the city is packed with vehicles and
bicyclists. I think a plan that would educate drivers and bicyclists to
coincide safely while honoring traffic codes would be incredibly fruitful for
everyone.
If you or someone you love has been
injured in a Chicago bike accident or Chicago car crash, then contact Chicago personal injury attorney, Aaron Bryant, for a free legal consultation at 312- 614-1076.