What does that bicycle symbol on some streets in Wichita Falls mean?
So, what exactly do those decals of a bicycle on some Wichita Falls streets mean?
The emblems have been there for a while, but some motorists say they’re still confused by them.
City Transportation Director John Burrus said the white outline of a bicycle denotes shared lanes — as in a road shared by both vehicle drivers and bicycle riders.
“It’s to let drivers know they share the road with bicycles,” Burrus said.
He noted that Wichita Falls had a high number of accidents and two fatalities involving bicycles over the past year.
The emblems do not mean that motorists can’t drive in the marked lanes. They’re just there to make drivers aware that Wichita Falls is a “Bicycle Friendly” community, as recognized by the League of American Bicyclists.
Drivers will find about 18 miles of the shared lanes along the length of Midwestern Parkway/Call Field Road from U.S. Highway 281 to Fairway Boulevard and the length of Fairway from Seymour Highway to Lake Wichita.
The city has also embarked on creating some dedicated bicycle lanes. Read that – “No cars.” These will be where the roadway has enough room to create bike-only lanes.
Burrus said the city will bid the work for those streets in the next couple of weeks. The streets that will have the dedicated bicycle-only lanes are:
Old Seymour Road from Avenue K to McNiel Avenue
Ninth Street from Brook Avenue to Kemp Boulevard
Stonelake Drive from Bartley Drive to Rathegeber Road
The city already has a couple of streets with dedicated bike lanes. Those are City View Drive between Iowa Park Road and U.S. Highway 287 and parts of Martin Luther King Boulevard.
How can you tell a shared lane from a dedicated bike lane? The dedicated lanes will be separated from vehicle traffic by a solid white line. The shared lanes are not. The dedicated lanes will also have signage.
Burrus said more streets will probably be added in the future to those with dedicated bicycle lanes.
Funding for creating the shared and the dedicated lanes comes from the city's Type B Sales Tax Corporation, which fosters economic development by funding public improvements.
Wichita Falls has become increasingly recognized as a bicycle community since the inception of the nationally known Hotter ‘N Hell Hundred bicycle race in 1982.
The paved Circle Trail that encompasses most of the city was constructed to accommodate cyclists as well as people on foot.
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This article originally appeared on Wichita Falls Times Record News: There's a bicycle symbol on some streets in Wichita Falls.
