How D.C.’s Mandatory Bike-Lane Law Happened – Bloomberg
D.C.’s New Vision Zero Law Could Be a Boon for Bike Lanes
Modeled on a Cambridge ordinance that mandates protected bicycle infrastructure citywide, the District’s approach to taming traffic deaths is being closely watched.
In September 2020, Washington, D.C., lawmakers unanimously passed the Vision Zero Enhancement Omnibus Amendment Act of 2019, a bill that scales up a novel approach to building protected bike lanes that was first taken in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in 2019. The law, which went into effect at the end of December, promises to change the underlying DNA of the District’s streets with an ambitious, conditional if/then statement: If a road segment undergoing construction has been pre-identified as a candidate for a protected bike lane, bus-only lane or private-vehicle-free corridor, then it must be rebuilt with that new feature.
