Letter to the Editor

As a resident of West Ashley (Byrnes Downs) I must say I’m very excited that we’re going to be converting a lane on the Legare Bridge for the use of bicyclists and pedestrians! This is a great example of forward-thinking leadership in the Charleston area and a great example of different entities (Advocacy groups, City, County, and SCDOT) working together.
Currently, I’m the President of the Ashley Bridge District Board and we have supported the idea of a bicycle and pedestrian connection over the Ashley River for many years. Now our position is backed up by a Memorandum of Agreement between Charleston County, the City of Charleston, and the SC Department of Transportation SCDOT). We have been waiting a long time for this! The traffic studies done to determine the feasibility of reallocating a lane for pedestrians and bicyclists have shown changes to our commutes of only a few seconds. This is due, in part, to the improvements being made on the peninsula side of the bridge that will shorten vehicle queues and facilitate movements onto Lockwood and Bee Streets.
The City of Charleston’s studies predict 1,500 people a day might use this connection. The connection over the Ravenel Bridge has surpassed everyone’s expectations and those trips are mainly recreation and leisure related. I drive the Legare Bridge every day and I think this is an awesome idea whose time has come. The benefits of this new connection are manifold. This improvement will allow people who work downtown (especially places like MUSC, Roper or the VA) to bicycle to work, which in turn takes traffic off the road and reduces parking demand. People are already biking over the bridge for work – but now they can do it safely!
There is also a sizeable group of Jewish residents in West Ashley who will use the new connection to walk safely to synagogue and back on the Sabbath.
The new connection will also allow people to come over the bridge (either way) for either leisure or recreational reasons. This might include going to a local restaurant, shopping on King Street (and enjoying Second Sunday) or going to the Farmers Market on Saturday morning.
For me, a bike ride to the Farmers Market will only be about 13 minutes. This also provides a safe way for people on the peninsula to enjoy West Ashley. This includes College of Charleston and Citadel students who may want to shop at our West Ashley grocery stores (Earthfare or Harris Teeter) or use our library.
I’m also a landscape architect and urban designer and my team, the Urban Edge Studio, did the master plan for the West Ashley Greenway a few years ago. The Greenway runs through several neighborhoods and thousands of residents will now have a safe and convenient way to get over the bridge. I truly believe the full potential of the Greenway will not be realized until people can safely bicycle or walk over the Ashley River Bridge. Let’s realize that potential!
However, as a West Ashley resident and a former recipient of your paper’s Westie Award (2011) I was very disappointed to see the negativity of James David Altman’s recent journalistic endeavor in your paper (April 2, 2014 “A Busy Month for West Ashley Comes to a Close.” The column showed both a total lack of research and an understanding of the issues.
So many good things are happening in West Ashley and this sort of attitude is simply not constructive or beneficial. His opinions certainly do not reflect mine or the opinions of any other West Ashley resident I know. So, in closing, I would like to thank those “intellectual giants” (minus the sarcasm) that made the bike lane possible. Colleen Condon, Mayor Joe Riley, Mike Seekings, Kathleen Wilson, and others who supported this endeavor are true visionaries. Also, I would like to thank the kind folks at Charleston Moves who give freely of their time to make this community a better place to live.
 
— Bill Eubanks, West Ashley resident