City Council mulls bike lanes near Railroad Square

<p>Santa Rosa's plan to install bike lanes along residential streets near the future SMART station is irking West End residents who worry they'll lose precious parking. </p><p>Residents of the neighborhood north of Railroad Square say they support creating non-vehicular links to the future station, but they believe bike lanes like those on busier streets don't make sense there.</p><p>“We just feel that putting bike lanes on a neighborhood street is just too extreme,” said resident Allen Thomas. </p><p>A city report showed that 71 parallel parking spaces would be lost, city planner Fabian Favila said. However, the same study showed that 83 new diagonal spaces would eventually be created, for a net gain of 12 spaces. </p><p>But Thomas said neighbors worry the diagonal parking won't pan out because of safety issues from cars backing out into cyclists, and that the neighborhood will be stuck with a net loss of parking. </p><p>The debate surrounds the Draft 2010 Bicycle and Pedestrian Master Plan, which gets its final public hearing before the City Council Tuesday at 5 p.m.</p>