Protect the 11th Street NW Bike Lane

DDOT’s 11th Street NW Protected Bike Lane Project plan sets out to improve safety along a 2-mile stretch of 11th St from L Street NW to Monroe Street NW. This project has been delayed since 2022 when turnover at DDOT slowed progress on the project, but our safety needs haven’t been on hold. As reported by ANC 1B, between 2019 to 2024, there have been 49 driver injury crashes, 13 bicyclist injury crashes, and 8 pedestrian injury crashes on 11th Street between Florida Ave NW and S Street NW. Share your feedback on the proposed concepts with DDOT before they finalize the project’s design.

If you live in Wards 1 or 2 or if you use this corridor to get around, share your thoughts via email with DDOT and Councilmembers Brooke Pinto and Brianne Nadeau to let them know you support the project.

We prepared a template message for you to start with, but we encourage you to personalize your subject and your message to help it stand out.

SHARE YOUR SUPPORT FOR A SAFER 11th St NW

11th St NW already serves as a key north-south biking route, but it relies on painted bike lanes and shared lanes. Since sharrows and paint don’t make a street safe or create a low-stress environment to bike in, a different design and tradeoffs are needed. We support Alternatives 1 and 2 that both include protected bike lanes for users traveling North and South. We echo ANC 1B’s unanimous support for Alternative 2 because it includes protected bike lanes in both directions, delivering a low-stress biking experience that works for people of all ages and abilities, and helps address community concerns to retaining parking.

Safety for everyone traveling the corridor must be our top priority. Adding protections will provide a low stress route that is more inviting to Studies show that protected bike lanes can improve safety for all road users – drivers, pedestrians, and people on bikes. Additionally, transforming 11th St NW with protected bike lanes will multiply the network effect because it will fill a gap between existing protected bike infrastructure. We know that when there’s a gap in the network – when a bike lane ends suddenly or turns unprotected – many people won’t use ANY of what’s already there, since they don’t want to take a safe route that suddenly spits them out into an unsafe road. Let’s change that and make sure that 11th St NW can be a more welcoming, safer option that completes a noticeable gap in the low-stress network.

11th St NW is already a preferred route for many people traveling by bike – and by scooter, bus, and on foot. It’s a direct route with the easiest hill to tackle to get up the escarpment that runs along Florida Avenue.

DDOT listed 11th St NW as a priority bicycle network in moveDC since it plays a critical role in connecting other key elements of the low stress network. The project builds on the success of the second phase of the Crosstown Cycletrack, which runs along Kenyon Street to connect with 11th St, creating a more connected network, truly low-stress network. The route also connects many public facilities, including 10 schools and two major recreation facilities.

Alternatives for 11th St NW between Vermont Ave to Florida Ave NW:

Both Alternative 1 and 2 would make the route more comfortable for people of all skill and comfort levels by establishing protected bike lanes to separate people on bikes and scooters from drivers. Alternative 1 would establish protected bike lanes along each curb and would maintain two-way vehicle traffic, removing parking spots on both sides of the street. Alternative 2 would establish protected bike lanes along each curb and would implement one-way vehicle traffic while maintaining parking on one side.

Alternative 3 only includes a northbound protected bike lane, leaving those headed southbound to contend with a sharrow, while maintaining two-way vehicle traffic and one lane of parking. Alternative 3 fails to create a true link in the low stress network by failing to protect people biking and scooting southbound on 11th St NW, instead encouraging them to share the lane with car traffic. This option does not accommodate the needs of all riders, especially those who are not comfortable in direct proximity of vehicles and should be taken off the table.

We are encouraged by ANC 1B’s 11th Street Protected Bike Lane Project Resolution that was approved unanimously. We underline their requests for Alternate 2 and emphasize the following requests: to install concrete barriers between parking and the protected bike lane, to integrate and accommodate ADA parking spots with signage and placement, to replace daylighting at the 1000 block of V Street with a loading zone for MetroAccess and other ADA accessible vehicles, to install speed bumps and raised crosswalks between S St NW and Florida Ave NW, and to maximize safety and pick-up/drop-off zones for families at Meyer Elementary School.

ANCs 1A, 1B, and 2F hosted DDOT to discuss the plans to upgrade the non-protected bike lanes and sharrows on 11th Street NW to curbside protected bike lanes. Check out the presentations DDOT made to the ANCs. The project also integrates with the 11th St NW Bus Priority plan and the Near Northwest Safety and Mobility Study.

More about 11th St NW PBL

More about The DC Low Stress Network

Bike lanes are most effective when they connects to other bike lanes, protected bike lanes, even more so.

WABA works with teams of grassroots volunteers across the District to demand a network of low-stress places to bike. A network where you, your kids, nephews, nieces, or grandkids, can all get where you need to go safely, easily, happily on bikes.

More about Complete Streets

Complete Streets are streets designed to accommodate all users, and that prioritize historically underinvested modes of transportation like transit, walking, and biking. An incomplete street might lack adequate sidewalks, low-stress bike infrastructure, or safe and comfortable access to transit.

Effective Complete Streets policies change the way a jurisdiction plans and builds transportation infrastructure—sidewalks, low stress bike infrastructure, and transit should be included in any new or rebuilt street by default, rather than as an add-on when there's space or demand.

While most regional jurisdictions have a Complete Streets policy of some sort, they lack teeth and permit transportation departments to continue to build streets that put cars first and squeeze other modes into the margins.

More about Advocacy

WABA fights for a region where biking, walking and transit are the best ways to get around.

We educate policymakers and organize grassroots advocates for to speak up for safer places to bike and walk; and for laws and policies that protect people who are walking and biking, reduce dangerous driving, and facilitate changes to the built environment.