Living in Lowertown, I have need to frequent my favorite shops/businesses on Grand Ave. Of course, this entails a good workout biking up the Grand Avenue hill. My preference, though, is to turn left and bike on Lincoln Ave (one block south and parallel to Grand) instead of the busy Grand or Summit Avenues.
I enjoy biking on Lincoln. It’s quiet and the canopy of the tall boulevard trees makes it a cool, delightful ride.
I feel like such a scofflaw, though. One block before every major street/avenue (Dale, Lexington, Hamline and Snelling), Grand turns into a one-way on either side of that bisecting street/avenue. No driver or walker there has ever confronted me on this, but I still feel sheepish about biking the wrong way down a one-way street, even if there’s hardly any traffic and it’s for only one block at a time.
If Public Works could put a “Bicycles Exempt” sticker on the ‘Do Not Enter’ signposts before all these intersections, I would be able to bike with a clear conscience and it would be a small step towards making St. Paul a more bike-friendly city.
