A protected bikeway now connects Lake Merritt bike lanes with the 19th Street BART station. Mayor Barbara Lee celebrated the project’s completion as one more step toward creating “a vibrant, resilient city.”

In addition to protected bike lanes, the project, known as the 19th Street BART to Lake Merritt Urban Greenway Project, added new pedestrian crossings, LED street lights and traffic signal upgrades. Those electrical upgrades required placing fiber optic cable under the road.

Josh Rowan, Oakland’s transportation director, said at a ribbon-cutting ceremony yesterday that the route of the bike path, which runs along 20th Street, also called Thomas L. Berkley Way, had a lot of messy cabling and underground infrastructure that delayed the build. 

“I think we found utilities that no one knew existed — it’s very complex,” he said. Rowan commended the skills of his staff who worked to complete it, more than a dozen of whom attended the ceremony.

In a statement after the event, Lee said the project showed a commitment to safety and green spaces. 


Oakland Department of Transportation Director Josh Rowan, flanked by city council members Carroll Fife and Charlene Wang, with BART director Victor Flores at left, celebrated the completion of the protected bike project. Credit: Jose Fermoso/The Oaklandside

“By connecting transit, local businesses, and natural spaces like Lake Merritt, we’re modernizing infrastructure to create a vibrant, resilient city where every resident and visitor can move around safely and comfortably,” she said. 

In order to build the protected three-block-long bike thread, the city took away a driving lane. Research has found that removing a driving lane can slow down drivers and reduce dangerous speeding.

District 3 council member Carroll Fife said at the ceremony that she was “deeply grateful” for the completion of the new lane, including for its safety benefits.

“I believe that infrastructure helps to address when people engage in bad behavior,” she said. 

District 2 council member Charlene Wang also showed up to express gratitude for the project, noting that it adds to a network of streetscape projects around the lake that have been built or are in process that will make it easier and safer to ride a bike around Oakland. 

“We are really creating a connected network and this is exactly what this city deserves,” she said. “We hear all the time that Lake Merritt is the crown jewel of Oakland.”

Victor Flores, who represents Oakland on BART’s board of directors, also spoke at the event. He said the new lanes were an important development for hundreds of BART staff who work at the agency’s nearby headquarters at 2150 Webster Street, especially those like himself who use bikes to get around. 

“I can’t tell you how many times I’ve almost been hit by vehicles and trucks in unprotected bike lanes,” he said. “So to see this project bring safety, not only for myself but for others, to protect us from the dangers of traffic, brings joy to my heart.”

The bikeway is the same height as the sidewalk in some parts and surrounded by a wide asphalt strip, a design known as “at-grade” in city planning circles that is unusual in Oakland but common along wide avenues in cities around the world, such as Madrid. Rowan told The Oaklandside that at-grade bike lanes are easier to build when there’s more road and sidewalk space to work with. 

“This is my preference: Big wide sidewalk, at-grade path,” he said. “It’s very pleasant.”

Bike East Bay advocate Robert Prinz said at the ceremony that his group first submitted letters of support to the city to build a protected bike lane on this road a decade ago and that the city’s Bicycle and Pedestrian Advisory Committee’s infrastructure group then helped shape some of the details. The project was paid for in part by Active Transportation funding approved in 2016.

Prinz called on local officials to continue to find funding to develop similar projects across the city. 

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