Save the West Bayou Bike Lanes
Mayor-President Joel Robideaux
The bike lanes on West Bayou Parkway, which form part of the Mickey Shunick bike loop, represent a major step forward for Lafayette. The loop is the first of its kind in our city, connecting our homes, businesses, parks, schools, and university—tying where we live to where we work, where we relax to where we learn and innovate. And in the process, it makes West Bayou Parkway safer. Today, traffic is moving at a more neighborhood friendly speed.
Currently, there is a small opposition working behind the scenes to remove the bike lanes, which would threaten the loop and diminish the connectivity we fought hard to create. This opposition has submitted a signed petition to Mayor-President Robideaux to remove these bike lanes. Thriving cities across America are adding bike lanes, not removing them. Conceding to these demands would be a serious mistake, the very opposite of progress.
Please sign this petition to support Lafayette and keep the bike lanes on West Bayou Parkway. We need to protect our streets. We need your voice. We need to continue moving Lafayette forward.
About us: Forward Lafayette is about making Lafayette a great city for our families, businesses, and educational institutions, improving Lafayette's economic competitiveness in an age of limited resources.Sponsored by
To:
Mayor-President Joel Robideaux
From:
[Your Name]
We, the undersigned, are a group of citizens uniting to protect the existing bike lanes on West Bayou Parkway. Those bike lanes are a vital part of the Mickey Shunick Memorial Bike Loop. The loop itself is part of a growing network of bike and pedestrian friendly infrastructure across our community. These “complete streets” are assets that enhance the health, mobility, connectivity, and quality of life for current and prospective residents of Lafayette.
Every segment of the interconnected trail of bike lanes offers a recreational outlet for cyclists and runners, an alternative transportation option for students, and a navigable route through the city’s core for bike commuters. The West Bayou Parkway bike lanes are themselves an amenity enjoyed by families and individuals of all age groups. Since their installation, traffic is moving at a more neighborhood-friendly speed, making West Bayou safer for drivers and pedestrians alike.
We are proud to belong to a community that rallied behind the implementation of complete streets during the creation of PlanLafayette in 2014, and we know that safe, bikeable streets like West Bayou Parkway help Lafayette stay economically competitive with cities across the country, each of which is pursuing quality of life improvements.
Through PlanLafayette, our community has already vetted and approved of this approach. Erasing the bike lanes would be erasing the progress Lafayette has made. Less than a year ago, we decided to move forward and invest our tax dollars on West Bayou Parkway and other complete streets projects. To restripe would be to regress.