If you are new to bicycling or driving  in Long Beach you may encounter a few features with which are unfamiliar to you.  These features include green sharrows, bike boulevards and cycle tracks or separate bike lanes. Over the next several years you will see more and more of these features throughout the US…but for now…Long Beach is one of the few places they are found.

One of the features you will find in Long Beach is what are know at the Green Sharrows. If you go down 2nd street in the Belmont Shore area of Long Beach you will see a 3 foot wide green stripe with bike markings known as sharrows painted down the middle of the outside lane.  The purpose of the green paint and the sharrows is to indicate to both bicyclists and motorists that this is a shared lane for both bicyclists and drivers.

For drivers what is key is recognizing that bicyclists do have the right to use the full travel lane.  Because of the relatively slow speed of the traffic on 2nd street bicyclists can often move at the same speed as traffic.  When this is the case bikes and cars move in unison.  If traffic is slightly faster, as a driver you can simply move into the 2nd lane of traffic, pass the bicyclist then move back into the other travel lane.

For bicyclists the green paint and the sharrows indicate where you should be positioning yourself in the lane.  The safest place for you to ride is on the green paint. This keeps you out of the door zone, where you won’t be hit by an opening door of a parked car…and where you will be visible to drivers as they approach from a side street or pull out of a parking spot.  And don’t worry…as drivers approach you from behind they will simple move into the other lane and go safely past you.