INDIANAPOLIS — Two Indianapolis City-County Councilors hope a federal grant could bridge the gap between two trails on different sides of two busy roads.
86th St. currently divides the Monon Trail in the Nora area and 82nd St. will break up what will eventually be an expansion of the Nickel Plate Trail in Castleton. Both streets are busy with cars. 86th St. has four lanes of traffic and 82nd St. has six.
”Generally terrifying,” said Jim Coby. “It’s always busy and you can’t always rely on everyone to stop.”
Coby is on the Monon Trail almost every day and knows the dangers at the 86th St. crossing.
”Those flowers, those bikes,” Coby said, talking about memorials along the Monon. “They’re not out there for decoration. They are symbolic of someone’s life lost.”
Others we talked to agreed, where the Monon crosses 86th St. is dangerous. Connie Szabo Schmucker of Bicycle Garage Indy said they had a traffic study done on the intersection two years ago.
”A lot of it has to do with all the turning traffic,” Schmucker said. “You have people going in and out of the strip malls on either side of the road and then you have 35,000 cars a day that are crossing that intersection.”
There are No Turn on Red signs at the intersection but people we talked to said the rule gets broken all the time.
”Because people don’t pay attention,” said cyclist Marcell Watson. “People don’t pay attention, that’s the issue.”
City-County Council democrats Nick Roberts and Brienne Delaney are working with DPW to apply for a federal grant from the Active Transportation Infrastructure Investment Program.
The grant money would go toward pedestrian bridges across 86th St. and 82nd St. The money would also be used for expanding the Pacers Bikeshare system to the Castleton area and north on the Monon and multi-use paths along 86th and 82nd.
Everyone we spoke with said a pedestrian bridge would go a long way to improving safety at the 86th St. intersection. That’s something Schmucker has been fighting for for nearly three years now, ever since fellow Bicycle Garage employee Frank Radaker was hit and killed crossing the intersection.
”That’s why we’re involved,” she said. “That’s been my focus for the last two-and-half years is to make that intersection better so nobody else gets hurt, injured or killed.”
Schmucker said she knows of at least three people who have been injured so far this year crossing 86th St. She and others are doing work on their own to improve the area, as well.
They’re working on a tactical urbanism project to make minor changes to the intersection in hopes of making it safer. Schmucker said they plan to extend the curbs to give people more room as they wait for the light and add crosswalks to the north and south sides of the street.
The tactical urbanism project is a temporary way for citizens to make approved changes to their neighborhoods. The citizens gather data and then report it back to Indy DPW in hopes a permanent plan to alter the area can be created.
Schmucker said they’re interested to see if they make the crosswalks and other infrastructure at the crossing more visible if it will make drivers more alert to the people crossing there.
Councilors Roberts and Delaney are looking for public letters on why pedestrian bridges at 86th St and the Monon and 82nd St. and the future Nickel Plate trail would be necessary.
The letters could be submitted with the federal grant application. If you would like to submit a letter you can email [email protected] and [email protected]. Letters need to be submitted by June 13.
