Brownstown race registrations; City mobility planning; Streetcars on hold; New bridges to be wider; Floyd at Teva Games
*Again, as if we needed more proof of the emerging popularity of bicycling racing in Lancaster County, two categories for beginner racers in the upcoming Brownstown Road Race were filled almost immediately Monday evening.
Two of the three races for Category 5 racers for the Saturday, June 30 race were closed within a half-hour of the opening of online registration at 7 p.m. Those races have the largest fields, with 50 and 52 riders respectively.
Registration is at: http://www.bikereg.com/events/register.asp?eventid=3830
* Lancaster Mayor Rick Gray unveiled a strategic plan for the city last week that includes a call for increased mobility for pedestrians and encourages the use of alternative transportation, such as bicycles.
Gray said he hopes to encourage the use of bicycles, motorcycles and scooters for commuters through establishment of designated parking areas in the city’s parking garages. He acknowledged that a study of bike lanes in the city, announced last year, has been put on hold after the city failed to receive a federal grant. City staff members are looking for other sources of funding, he said.
* A plan to install rails on city streets for a downtown streetcar line has also been put on hold for at least a year - also because a hoped for federal grant failed to materialize. The tracks would have been level with the street surface, but grooves along the rails could be a concern for bicycle riders, planners acknowledged.
*Initial plans for a new Lititz Pike bridge over the Amtrak rails call for five-foot shoulders, state Transportation Department planners showed at a recent public meeting.
The addition of shoulders will provide space for bicyclists now riding in the traffic lane against an outside wall of steel. The bridge design, with the shoulders, is similar to that now being constructed on the Dillerville Road bridge. Unlike the Fruitville Pike bridge, completed four years ago, the plans do not call for a designated bike lane.
The 75-year-old Lititz Pike bridge is slated to be replaced in 2011.
* Floyd Landis had a lackluster showing in his first race in nearly a year. Landis, a Lancaster County native, finished eighth in a road hill climb at the Teva Mountain Games in Vail, Colo. on Sunday. The day before he finished 49th in the Ultimate Mountain Challenge mountain bike race, 25 minutes back from the winner.
It was Landis’ first time at the start line since winning last summer’s Tour de France, and the subsequent suspension from allegations that he took artificial testosterone to boost his performance in order to win the three-week race.
Landis still faces a two-year ban from professional cycling and being stripped of his tour title by arbiters who heard his case last month.
