I used to commute by bicycle, not every day, but more than occasionally. When we moved to Evans in 2001, there were no stop lights or stop signs on Washington Road from Ronald Reagan Drive by the Government Center, which at the time lacked both the new courthouse and library, all the way out to William Few Parkway. I think it was also a 2-lane road the whole way, one traffic lane in each direction, with no center turn lane, or as they’re colloquially known around here, ‘suicide lanes.’ There were also many hundreds fewer homes off of Hardy McManus Road, William Few Parkway, and Riverwood Parkway. My own neighborhood was barely half its current size.
Though the roads were smaller, they were also a lot less crowded. On my way to work, I could easily turn left across Washington Road from Halali Farm, ride a third of a mile to a right on Blanchard Road, and hardly ever see a car. Hereford Farm, another rural two-lane road, took me most of the rest of the way to work, again without much traffic.
These days, despite a traffic light at Gibbs and Washington Roads, the widening of Washington Road to 4 travel lanes, and the very recent addition of a traffic light at Halali Farm and Washington, it’s very difficult to turn left across Washington Road from Blanchard Road, there’s no more shoulder than their was 9 years ago, and still no bike lane or bike path. Hereford Farm Rd now seems like the main construction artery used to bring cement and dump trucks from the western parts of the County in to Evans, and it is no longer safe for bicycles.
There are some bicycle lanes in the County these days, but they start so far in towards Martinez that they leave all the neighborhoods I mentioned above completely unserved by any sort of bicycle infrastructure for at least 2.5 miles of rural style 2-lane road with narrow or even soft shoulders.
I want to make a map to show all of this, but so far I haven’t found the data. Ideally, I’d show travel lanes, shoulder width, and rush hour traffic density along the roads, plus population density of the areas served by the roads.
Any ideas how I can get that data or the equivalent and make a map out of it? The Columbia County, GA GIS web site doesn’t seem to provide the data.
