City of Columbia removing bike lanes from Farrow Road shortly after putting them in

Bike lanes along a prominent Columbia road are being removed after community backlash.

Plans to complete bike lanes along a 7-mile stretch of Farrow Road are being scrapped after what Columbia City Manager Teresa Wilson says was a “significant amount of feedback provided by residents from the communities in the area.”

The bike lanes on Farrow Road ran from Columbia College Drive to E. Campanella Drive along U.S. 555 near the Greenview and North Main Street communities.

Studies to complete the bike lanes were done about eight months ago, according to Scott Nuelken, president of the Cola Town Bike Collective. Nuelken has a deep knowledge of biking and bicycle plans for Columbia. Other studies to make sure the bike lanes would work were conducted in recent months, with paint for new lanes going down about a month ago, Nuelken said.

“Everything was done aboveboard,” Nuelken said of the process to get the bike lanes.

Miscommunication about the bike lanes going in and drivers’ confusion doomed the project, Nuelken believes.

The bike lanes were created during a resurfacing project on Farrow Road. The road had four northbound and southbound lanes with a central turning lane. It went to two lanes going in each direction with buffer zones and bike lanes on both sides of the road. About two weeks ago the finalization of the bike lanes, which would have included additional signage and road markings, was put on hold, according to Nuelken.

The city announced Friday that it would be removing the lanes.

“A decision was made to move forward with a lane reversal and return that section of Farrow Road back to its original state,” Wilson said. “We are taking this action in order to be responsive to our citizens and move forward based on information received during the recent public meetings.”

The bike lanes were part of the city’s pedestrian and bicycle master plan, which was finalized in 2013. The plan recommended a number of bicycle and walking projects around Columbia to kick-start a network of accessible transit, sidewalk, greenway, bicycling and other infrastructure improvements. Bike lanes were meant to go into low-income areas first as part of the master plan, Nuelken said.

The removal of the bike lanes will begin Tuesday, July 17, according to the city. The previous lane configuration will be restored. The road will have to be torn up and repaved. The construction is expected to take seven to 10 days.

The city’s announcement did not indicate how much reverting the road back to its original state will cost or how the work will be paid for.

Nuelken believes the removal of the bike lanes is a blow to the future of biking or other infrastructure improvements in Columbia.

”Now we’ve set a precedent that if a bike lane annoys you, you can contact the city and they’ll remove it,” he said. “That’s going to make getting bike lanes nearly impossible.”

This story was originally published July 14, 2018 at 1:24 PM.