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The western portion of the Lance Armstrong Bikeway (from Austin High to Shoal Creek) appears to be open. The ambience of car-choked Cesar Chavez can't compete with lovely Lady Bird Lake, but there is something nice about zipping along clear concrete instead of dodging the ladies who lope. The several shrimpy stop signs lead the lone biker to wonder "Are you small so they could make more of you? Does your dinkiness diminish my obligation to obey?"
The western terminus is a disappointment - unless you are going to Austin High, you are stuck riding alongside cars parked in the "bike lane" on Austin Drive and Veterans Drive. We'd love to see the trail extended on the route shown below, which would connect the LAB to the existing trails under MoPac that connect to West 5th Street and the Johnson Creek Greenbelt trails. There is already an old trail on the southern half of this extension, but it dead-ends at the train tracks. The intersection with 5th would be tricky - a ramp would have to be built to get down the concrete embankment - but it would make the LAB much more accessible to potential bike commuters living in Tarrytown and western Clarksville.
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I put my old digital camera in my laptop bag a month ago intending to make a photo-journal of the Lance Armstrong Stopway and still haven't done it.
Maybe it only stops to serve as a metaphor for the barriers you face in everyday life: Traffic jams, Republicans, long waits at Magnolia Cafe at 2:30 a.m., signs that say "bike lane ends"...or, an Austin specialty: Signs that say "Freeway ends."
Maybe it only stops to serve as a metaphor for the barriers you face in everyday life: Traffic jams, Republicans, long waits at Magnolia Cafe at 2:30 a.m., signs that say "bike lane ends"...or, an Austin specialty: Signs that say "Freeway ends."
I've been using the L.A. bikeway for a couple of months on my morning commute. I still find it to be easier to carefully dodge folks on the H&B trail than to go through the Austin High/Stephen F. Austin Dr. mess at the end of the bikeway. Between the parents, the high school kids, joggers and parallel parking it's a pretty treacherous stretch of road. The Lance A. bikeway also ends right where the school buses pull into Austin High. The fastest option to get over to the Mopac Pedestrian bridge/Deep Eddy trail after the L.A. bikeway ends is to ride across the campus, but the school admins blow their whistles and yell at you… It's not a good idea..
There’s a decent hill right there going up to the tracks on the ‘new trail we want’ segment on the diagram above, but it would still be more efficient to take that path. Prior to those fugly condos being built next to the Mean Eyed Cat that was the way I used to go, but you had to cross the tracks. It worked pretty well.
It's a nice bikeway but as far as commuting goes it's kind of a bikeway to nowhere, having to stop on both sides of Lamar sucks too. I have to admit that I really like those countdown timers at the crossings, those things should be everywhere!
kelsoATX, if you're fast enough to not like all the stops, you're fast enough to do just fine on W 5th (I used to use it all the time). Advantage: You can always get the right-of-way (no 2-way stops).
What people don't get about bike routes is evident here: you could conceivably be stuck for half an hour at one of the driveways leading into Austin High - you have a stop sign, they don't.