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U.S. Department of Transportation U.S. Department of Transportation Icon United States Department of Transportation United States Department of Transportation
FHWA Highway Safety Programs

Los Angeles, California – Seventh Street

ROAD DIET: KEY INGREDIENT IN LOS ANGELES' BICYCLE MASTER PLAN

Objective Features Results
  • Install bicycle lanes
  • Improve pedestrian safety
  • Increased bicycle usage
  • Urban environment
  • High density pedestrians
  • Several schools nearby
  • Bus routes
  • Community leader support
  • Bicycle activists support
  • Increased bicycle ridership

 

This image contains a diagram of a 2 mile segment of West Seventh Street, which carries and average daily traffic load of 16,000 vehicles per day. A photo in the upper right corner shows a bicyclist moving around a parked car and into a lane of moving traffic. The caption reads "Los Angeles has 463 miles of on-street bicycle lanes." SOURCE: Alliance of Biking and Walking. PHOTO: Jabin Botsford / Los Angeles Times.

Three images, the first two of the before and after road diet configurations. The before configuration was a four-lane roadway. The after configuration is a road diet with a two-way left turn lane, two travel lanes in each direction, and parking lanes on each side of the road separated from the travel lanes by dedicated bike lanes. The third image is a photo of the finished street with the installed road diet.

BACKGROUND

In 2011, the Los Angeles Department of Transportation (LADOT) completed a Road Diet on Seventh Street in order to install bicycle lanes along this east-west arterial just west of downtown Los Angeles from Bixel Street to Catalina Street. With traffic volumes of approximately 16,000 vehicles per day and a high number of pedestrians and bicyclists, this corridor is busy with several transportation modes.

This 2-mile stretch of Seventh Street contains 17 traffic signals and serves numerous metro bus routes. The land use is mainly multi-family residential and commercial, with several large parks along the corridor. A high school is located on the west end, and there are two middle schools nearby. The speed limit for the roadway is 30 mph except in areas where there are 25 mph school speed zones.

The City of Los Angeles developed a Bicycle Master Plan that provides direction for improving bicycle mobility and encouraging more bicycle ridership by expanding the existing bikeway network and improving connectivity. As a result of this Bicycle Master Plan, the installation of bicycle lanes is a major driving force for Road Diets in Los Angeles, but the overarching goal for the conversions is safety.

7th Street looking west at Bixel Avenue. Photo: Eric Widstrand
7th Street looking west at
Bixel Avenue		 7th Street looking west at Bixel Avenue from a different angle. Photo: Eric Widstrand
7th Street looking west at
Bixel Avenue		 7th Street looking west at Coronado. Photo: Eric Widstrand
7th Street looking west at
Coronado

 

OUTREACH

Prior to the implementation of the Road Diet, LADOT prepared a presentation that discussed expected benefits to safety, traffic calming, non-motorized accessibility, business access, and community health. LADOT discovered that emphasizing the safety benefits of Road Diets is important in gaining public acceptance.

Each corridor is unique, and LADOT found that working with their city council was essential to beginning a successful outreach process. The Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition and other bicycle activists and community leaders strongly supported the project and assisted in the community outreach.1

RESULTS

After the completion of the Seventh Street Road Diet, LADOT received positive feedback from users, and a before-and-after bicycle count conducted by the Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition showed that bicycle use in the corridor tripled once the Road Diet and new bicycle lanes were completed. LADOT also conducted some traffic analyses at several key intersections along the corridor and found that the results were satisfactory.

1Joe Linton, "Seventh Street Bike Lanes Installed," CICLAVIA, August 15, 2011. Accessed March 17, 2015. Available at: https://ciclavia.wordpress.com/2011/08/15/seventh-street-bike-lanes-installed/