The experiment moving the Valencia Street bike lanes to the center of the street was not a success, and SFMTA says they’ll be moving the bike lanes back to the curbside possibly as soon as January 2025.

The unconventional and somewhat confusing Valencia Street center-running bike lanes were installed last August, and in the year since, the city’s only center bike lanes have been blamed for numerous traffic collisions. The center bike lane design had its supporters, but businesses along the Valencia Corridor sure seemed to hate it, some placing signs in their windows reading “This bike lane is killing small businesses and our vibrant community.”

Bowing to the backlash, the SF Municipal Transit Agency (SFMTA) was considering moving the Valencia bike lanes back to the curbside just four months after they were moved to the center. And the SFMTA’s board of directors approved moving the bike lanes back to the curbside this past June. But at the time, the SFMTA stressed the earliest they could start moving the lanes back would be January 2025.

Yet they still appear to be on that schedule. The Examiner reports that SFMTA staff have released their new design for curbside bike lanes, and work could begin as soon as January. Though it would likely then take a couple months to complete the work, as it did in the summer of 2023.  

“As soon as the winter holidays are over, we want to get out there and start constructing the project,” SFMTA project manager Paul Stanis told the Examiner. “We’ve reached a very good place and we are very, very close to a final design.”

The bike lane is in the center of Valencia Street only between 15th and 23rd streets.

One conflict, though, is how the bike lanes would coexist with the 26 parklets that are still in front of Valencia Street small businesses on that stretch. The parklets could remain in the current spots on the curb and have the bike lane snake around them, or SFMTA could use the “floating parklet” model seen above where the bike lanes are in a cushion between the parklet and the sidewalk. That decision does not seem to have been finalized yet.    

In fact, none of this is finalized, other than the decision to move the lanes back to the curbside. The SFMTA board of directors still needs to vote to approve the new design, and that vote is not expected until November. In the meantime, they’re looking for your feedback, and will be hosting open houses to get people’ opinions on Monday, September 23 at the Valencia Gardens Community Room (390 Valencia Street, 4-6 pm) and on Wednesday, September 25 at City College San Francisco’s Mission Campus (1125 Valencia Street, 4-6 pm).

Related: Another Bicyclist Struck and Injured by Motorist In Controversial Valencia Bike Lane [SFist]

Image: @djbaskin via Twitter