A rendering shows the proposed concept to do away with the shared bus lane and convert it into a bike-only lane.
A state plan to convert a portion of Ocean City’s bus lane into a dedicated bike lane has been scrapped.
Mayor Rick Meehan announced Tuesday that the Maryland State Highway Administration (SHA) will no longer be moving forward with a pilot project along Philadelphia Avenue this summer. The decision comes less than a month after the City Council issued a letter of opposition regarding the conversion plans.
“All of their intentions were good, there’s no question about it,” Meehan said in a transportation committee meeting this week. “What they were trying to do was figure out ways to make Coastal Highway as safe as possible. I think they recognized some of our immediate concerns.”
Earlier this year, officials with SHA announced they would spend the summer months testing a dedicated bike path on the existing bus lane between 17th and 26th streets. As proposed, the agency would have moved municipal buses into the slow lane of the highway, where they would pick up riders from a “floating” bus stop located between the slow lane and a dedicated bike pathway.
From the outset, the agency made it clear the goal of the project would be to improve bicycle and pedestrian safety along the roadway. From 2018 to 2023, for example, the agency recorded 49 crashes involving pedestrians, 38 crashes involving bicyclists and four fatalities along the portions of the highway being studied.
However, city officials continued to share their opposition, arguing the conversion project posed safety risks to bicyclists and pedestrians, as well as to motorists and bus users. Last month, during a biannual meeting with SHA representatives, the City Council voted unanimously to issue a letter of opposition to the agency.