Monterey approves two new street safety programs

The city of Monterey has approved two measures that encourage more people to use bikes. On Wednesday, NewsChannel 5 took a closer look at what will happen next.

With all the tourists visiting from all over California and the world, Monterey has its fair share of traffic congestion. But it’s definitely a bike culture, too.

“Well we’re definitely lucky that it’s a small enough town and small enough area where you can ride almost everywhere so it’s definitely really cool to see more involvement with that,” Daryn Annereau with Bay Bikes said.

The new measures will mean new bike paths along North Fremont Street, in an effort to get more people behind handlebars while staying safe.

“I think as more bicycles are out on the streets drivers will become more aware of them and used to them and vice versa people on their bikes will become more accustomed to riding next to cars and hopefully feel safer with our improvements, our signs, our striping on the street,” city planner Elizabeth Caraker said.

It is extremely important for the streets of Monterey to have that happy balance between all forms of transportation.

The $6.5 million being spent by the city is designed to help turn the streets of Monterey into what Caraker calls, ‘complete streets.’

“I mean a 100 percent of people are not going to get out of their cars and start riding their bikes. So we have to recognize that these travel corridors need to be shared by cars, transit, bicycles, and pedestrians, and that’s what we’ve heard the term complete streets for many years now, and we’re really focusing on designing our major corridors through Monterey as complete streets and North Fremont will be one of those once we implement this program,” Caraker said.

The measures also includes an educational program targeting kids and teens, promoting the safe use of bikes.