{"id":414473,"date":"2026-07-27T23:03:36","date_gmt":"2026-07-27T23:03:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/414473\/"},"modified":"2026-07-27T23:03:36","modified_gmt":"2026-07-27T23:03:36","slug":"oaklands-franklin-street-protected-bike-lane-nears-completion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/414473\/","title":{"rendered":"Oakland’s Franklin Street Protected Bike Lane Nears Completion"},"content":{"rendered":"

The city of Oakland is nearly finished constructing a half-mile curb-and-parking protected bike lane on Franklin Street. \u201cThe Franklin facility is being implemented as part of a routine paving project, similar to the ones on 7th Street by Laney and 11th Street between Clay and Broadway,\u201d explained Bike East Bay\u2019s Robert Prinz.<\/p>\n

Prinz shot this video of the entire facility:<\/p>\n

Oakland did something all cities should make the norm: this wasn\u2019t the result of a giant, multi-decade planning effort<\/a>. As Prinz explained, It was just part of a routine paving project.<\/p>\n

\"\"Protected daylighting zones help make intersections safer. Photo: Streetsblog\/Rudick<\/p>\n

Originally, Oakland had applied for a grant to do a two-way, protected bike lane on Franklin. When they didn\u2019t get it, the city decided to move ahead anyway with a simpler, one-way design, using simple curbs, and just attach it to planned paving. But it\u2019s also much more than the plastic-post-and-paint one often sees<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cI wouldn\u2019t call these projects quick builds since they use more permanent materials, but they also don\u2019t include the bells and whistles of major grant-funded projects like landscaping, signal\/electrical\/utility updates, curb line changes, etc.,\u201d said Prinz. \u201cThey\u2019re more in the middle somewhere, maybe something like \u2018robust routine bikeway upgrades.’\u201d<\/p>\n

More from the city\u2019s project page<\/a>:<\/p>\n

This separated bike lane will connect bike lanes on 11th Street with separated bike lane projects currently under construction on 14th Street and 20th street. This project will also upgrade curb ramps along the corridor to meet accessibility requirements.<\/p>\n

So why is the protected bike lane only starting at 11th? The project page said the city will instead \u201c\u2026install angled parking on Franklin Street from 7th to 10th Streets to provide more parking supply in Chinatown.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe part of Franklin Street south of 11th Street did get a road diet via the addition of angled car parking,\u201d explained Prinz. \u201cBut due to Chinatown politics, there are no plans for any bikeway yet in that area between Broadway and Harrison, and from 7th to 11th Streets.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"A protective island forcing a driver to take the turn slowly onto Franklin. Photo: Streetsblog\/Rudick<\/p>\n

In Streetsblog\u2019s view, that\u2019s just lame. Someone\u2019s going to get hurt or killed in the future because the city and its leadership didn\u2019t want to deal with any political blowback<\/a>. Furthermore, if a city can manage to put down little curbs, they could also put in large planters and sections of concrete or granite block<\/a>, especially near intersections where there won\u2019t be parked cars to do the job, to really prevent reckless drivers from entering the space and endangering people on bikes.<\/p>\n

That said, it\u2019s promising to see a city bundling a much improved facility with paving. All cities need to make this the norm. Meanwhile, it already connects with intersecting bike facilities at 14th and 19th. That links it up with two BART stations in Oakland. And, one hopes, more connections will come.<\/p>\n

\"\"The northern end of the project loses the protection as it joins Broadway at 22nd. The hope is that eventually there will be a protected facility on 22nd that extends to the protected bike lanes on Telegraph: Photo: Streetsblog\/Rudick<\/p>\n

\u201cThere is still an interest in making the connection via 22nd to Telegraph,\u201d said Prinz. \u201cThis is why the end of the Franklin bikeway orients toward 22nd and not right or left onto Broadway, as the intent is to connect it with the Telegraph protected bikeway<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The city of Oakland is nearly finished constructing a half-mile curb-and-parking protected bike lane on Franklin Street. \u201cThe…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":414474,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[109921,101,103,102,104,106,105],"class_list":["post-414473","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-francisco","tag-promoted","tag-san-francisco","tag-san-francisco-headlines","tag-san-francisco-news","tag-sf","tag-sf-headlines","tag-sf-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/414473","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=414473"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/414473\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/414474"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=414473"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=414473"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=414473"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}