BRT in Progress

Here are my first photos of the BRT as it is being built.

From Battleground Rail Trail

This view is from about 50 yards south of Total Wine looking north. The trail will connect to the sidewalk just before the driveway for Total Wine/CVS. This looks to be a crash waiting to happen. In fact when I headed through the driveway intersection I had a ROW conflict with a right turning pickup. Fortunately we were both alert to the potential for problems and no harm done.

From Battleground Rail Trail

This shot was taken from the same location as the first but looking south. The crushed stone bed looks reasonably wide.

From Battleground Rail Trail

This view is from Martinsville Rd looking north. Hopefully that speed bump is not part of the design.

From Battleground Rail Trail

This shot was taken from Isaac Pl and Martinsville Rd. It illustrates two things:

1. Looking over the hood of the second car you see the beings of the next section of trail.


2. Due to the high traffic volume I had to shoot the shot with cars in the picture. Combine this with the 30-40 yard offset between trail segments and we have a significant conflict point. No pedestrian facilities means all trail users will be using the road to get between the trail segments.

From Battleground Rail Trail

This next segments have much work to be done at this point. Here is the segment that curves around the Toyota lot to begin running parallel to Patriot Way.

From Battleground Rail Trail

Same location as the last shot but looking west now.

I hope the designers have thought about the conflict zones I have highlighted here. It seem to me the money being spent to tunnel under Cone would have been better spent tunneling under Martinsville or Pisgah Church. On Cone a crossing pedestrian or cyclist only needs to negotiate with traffic from one direction at a time. They get to change their focus once the median is reached. Martinsville affords no such luxury and I have yet to figure out how the Pisgah Church crossing is expected to work but unless those high speed corners are squared back off I expect it can't help but be dangerous.

On Yer Bike!