The City of Columbus opened a new protected bike lane that spans over two miles of Fourth Street July 27, making it the largest protected bike lane in the city, according to a Columbus press release.
The new bike lane sits along the curb on the west side of Fourth Street from Warren Street in the Italian Village to Hudson Street in the Old North. The $2.1 million lane is part of the city's Bike Plus Plan, a multi-year effort to redesign and expand Columbus' bike infrastructure to increase access and safety for residents.
“Columbus is a vibrant, growing city, and our transportation system is transforming to meet how people want and need to get around,” Mayor Andrew Ginther said in a prepared statement. “The 4th Street protected bike lane exemplifies
the progress we are making with new infrastructure that creates a more bikeable community and safe connections for people biking to jobs, schools, businesses and parks.”
The lane was made by swapping Fourth Street's previously unprotected bike lane with the route's street parking, putting the new bike lane along the curb and moving the parking spaces outside the lane to provide a protective barrier for bikers from traffic, according to a press release from Mayor Andrew Ginther's office.
The project also included a rework of East Fifth Avenue between High Street and Fifth Street to add a center-left turn lane and a travel lane to the road in both directions.
Other improvements the city made for the project include new pavement surfaces, bikeway pavement markings, roadway striping, signage, traffic signal adjustments and bollards along the lane. The new bike lane was paid for almost entirely by safety funding from the Ohio Department of Transportation, according to the press release.
Transportation and neighborhoods reporter Nathan Hart can be reached at NHart@dispatch.com, @NathanRHart on X and nathanhart.dispatch.com on Bluesky.
This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Columbus opens longest protected bike lane in the city
