Reviewing the Updated Walk N Bike Plan

Written By Veronica Foster

By Veronica Foster, Communications + Advocacy Manager

7 min read The new Nashville Department of Transportation just released an update of Metro Nashville’s WalkNBike Plan. It does a good job of outlining the status of the original Plan’s goals and also provides readers with an overview on the state of walking and biking in Davidson County. The Plan could use some major upgrades in data visualization and explanation. This review has been written in effort to make the Plan more accessible to the public and call out needed improvements.

“The Nashville bicycle and pedestrian system will be a network of high-quality, comfortable, safe sidewalks and bikeways, connecting people to opportunity. The system, inclusive to users of all ages and abilities, will promote and encourage safety, health, education, and active transportation.”
— WalkNBike Vision Statement

Prioritizing Speedy Implementation and Data Visualization

The WalkNBike Plan 2022 has been updated from the 2017 Plan. The major thing to note is that this plan is an UPDATE, not a brand new plan, so it carries much of the same strategic visioning of the former plan and explains what has and has yet to be completed.  The Plan uses a lot of language that conveys its major priority to be speed. 3 of 12 of their Programmatic Priorities suggest goals to “deliver projects more quickly”, “implement a process for Rapid Delivery Projects”, and “assess capacity for faster project delivery”. The Plan also prioritizes a commitment to GIS data collection and a WalkNBike performance dashboard that are clearly necessary based on the mapping data throughout the report that significantly lacks in clarity.

The WalkNBike Plan does a good job of showcasing the current issues of walking and biking in Davidson County, citing crash metrics, sidewalk conditions, and survey results in clear percentages. I particularly appreciated the explanation of the sidewalk deficiencies that would be prioritized, in addition to the types of focus areas for project priorities, like sidewalks near places of public accommodation and transportation facilities.

The Plan also showcases vast surveying results collected all over Davidson County. The data outlines usage trends and community needs which will be a great baseline to compare against how community members perceive the outcomes of the Plan at its completion. For instance in the survey, 52% of the 3,057 respondents cited their community as very difficult or somewhat difficult to cycle in. Following the implementation of the new Bikeways in the next 2 years, it will be interesting to see whether or not their perceptions have changed! The survey also inquired about Scooter ridership, and stated that ridership has been up 8% since March 2020. It will be fascinating to evaluate if a diverse use of micromobility increases as Bikeway infrastructure continues to support their usage.

Clarity on Project Phases and Connections

The WalkNBike Plan states its Key Objectives are plan implementation and project delivery. I mentioned above that there is also a commitment to GIS data collection. This type of data visualization is key to transparency on project delivery within the community. The maps depicted in the Plan that show sidewalk and bikeway construction as well as pedestrian fatality data do not allow the reader to see specific roads and intersections by name. It would be ideal to see more zoomed in visuals as examples for priority areas. The digital Vision Zero Action Plan GIS map is excellent compared to the quality of the WalkNBike Plan’s maps. I hope these maps could become more integrated for a holistic view of sidewalk and bikeway projects overlaid on top of the dangerous street network data.

While there are also maps within the Plan that show accomplishments from the past 4 years, we don’t see maps for future Work Plans. Appendices C and D clearly outline the project timelines for Sidewalk and Bikeways throughout Davidson County, although for the eyes of the general community, it is difficult to parse where Work Plans are concentrated. A map would be preferred within the report, but the WalkNBike Digital Project Trackers clearly show maps of planned Sidewalk and Bikeway projects and they appear to be up-to-date. We love the digital trackers, but we would prefer if they more clearly displayed the connections that the upcoming projects are fulfilling. For instance, the trackers show pieces of bikeway and sidewalks, but they don’t have an “existing sidewalks/bikeways” overlay like the printed map below depicts.

By outlining the existing sidewalks and overlaying the repair and construction, this map clearly shows the city’s sidewalk gaps in general, but the digital tracker doesn’t have the “existing sidewalk” overlay.

Additionally, the matrices for the Work Plan are fairly confusing when trying to understand what the phases actually mean. The Key outlines “Right of Way”, “Design”, and “Construction” as phases, but is “Right of Way” about acquisition? Some places skip “Design” and others skip “Right of Way”, so to the general public, it isn’t clear whether the Work Plans are overly ambitious or fairly feasible as it doesn’t outline what goes into each phase. 

Excerpt of Sidewalk Work Plan demonstrating phases, current and future

Work Plan Key for phases that isn’t clear enough for community members

 
 

Reviewing Appendix B: Status of WalkNBike 2017 Action Items

Appendix A provides a shortlist of Major Studies & Plans with descriptions, which are helpful, but it would be more helpful if specific items referenced were linked within the document itself. While some important plans and documents are linked on the WalkNBike webpage, context linking within the document would be helpful. This chart is meant to evaluate the status of goals from the 2017 Plan, but there are several items that are no longer to be managed under this specific Plan. See below for helpful links. 

Here is an outline and links to items referenced in Appendix B:

Areas of Improvement

Traffic Calming and Speed Reduction

  • An Action Step of the 2017 Plan was to “conduct targeted enforcement of neighborhood speeding” and responds by saying that the Vision Zero Action Plan “directs Metro to identify strategies for enforcement that respect the concerns of the community and reconsider the existing Metro policy that restricts automated enforcement”. Is this a support for the recently passed policy that will implement License Plate Readers (LPRs) in Davidson County? LPRs that are used for automated enforcement are known to place a high burden on communities of color and people in poverty, and without regulation could result in discrimination. We cannot be in support of this as a solution to neighborhood speeding. 

  • Are reduction of speed limits effective? The Plan does not explain where and when the Slow Streets pilot programs were implemented, and whether or not they were effective. Did these pilots produce results? Are there other pilots underway? 

    • Here’s Walk Bike Nashville’s Slow Streets Study from 2020 that specifically reviewed Slow Streets’ barricades that reduced cut-through traffic, but did not evaluate speed limit reduction.

    • Speed limit reduction with signage is likely not enough to change habits. Without regular stop signs, roundabouts, speed humps or other street design elements that reduce driving speed, people will still drive well above the speed limit if they do not appear to be enforced. 

One example of a 2017 Action Step and their 2022 status (on the right)

Bike/Ped Access During Street Closures

  • The Plan states that this is being addressed as “NDOT continues to collaborate with partners such as Metro Parks to develop a program for ensuring that people walking and biking can access the active transportation network during development and active street closures”. What this doesn’t discuss is a partnership with TDOT to ensure safe pedestrian walkways during sidewalk closures on state roads like the pikes. Pikes (4-5 lanes of travel) are described in the Plan as the most dangerous for pedestrians and yet there isn’t a conversation about policy for construction along these roads.

    • The Vision Zero Action Plan explicitly says in C-1c. that they will “prioritize coordination between NDOT and TDOT” with respect to increased collaboration between agencies responsible for traffic safety, but it doesn’t state any explicit examples.

Transportation Demand Management

  • One of the 2017 Plan goals was to “work with developers of high-density residential complexes to offer driving alternatives”. Currently the Metro Traffic Impact Study only requires developers to “consider” relevant transportation demand management measures. This is not enough nor effective. Why just residential units? Downtown buildings are going up in the blink of an eye and they are still building major parking into their structures. The Amazon towers at the Nashville Yards that have just been released will include over 7,500 parking spaces. Measures need to be taken much faster for new developments.

Two of our staff, Eric Hoke and Melody Gibson, were on the WalkNBike Plan Steering Committee. Our Board Member, Tanisha Hall of Fairpointe Planning, was also a part of the consulting team for the Plan. It goes to show that no matter how close we are to a project, it is still important to review Metro plans and advocate for the implementation of infrastructure that will improve quality of life in our communities.

There were a few Action Steps where the Civic Design Center is specifically referenced as a partner, in terms of placemaking and tactical urbanism through our TURBO program. We are very excited to be involved in developing policies alongside NDOT that will bring actionable change! We are also hopeful for the new prioritization process for sidewalk and bikeway projects. The project timelines seem ambitious, so it is up to us and our fellow advocates to keep NDOT accountable on project timeline updates to be as transparent and accessible as possible.

This outlines the different types of sidewalk projects that can be implemented. Based on the level of complexity, it showcases why a particular sidewalk may take longer to complete. It is exciting that there is more education around why some projects are pushed through faster.

Veronica Foster
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