GIS Data Automation Project Prioritizes Bike Plan Upgrades, Construction

The Houston Bike Plan’s long-term vision creates a network of close to 1,800 miles of high-comfort bicycle facilities. To focus building and upgrading bike lanes in areas of the most need and highest demand, the PD Transportation and Geographic Information Systems teams collaborated with the Bicycle Advisory Committee to create and refine a prioritization methodology. BAC members were asked to give feedback. GIS staff refined the spatial and statistical analysis on weighted factors to create a priority list for future bicycle facilities.

“Working with the transportation team to get the criteria, GIS team members Andrew Sauls and Curtis Klinge have taken the spatial requirements for prioritizing the building of bike lanes, and created an automated GIS data model that crunches the line locations, overlays them with all the necessary criteria, sets the appropriate weights given from the bike committee, and generates a priority scale numeric value for each trail that is instantly mappable,” said Geographic Information Officer Larry Nierth. 

“Their automation takes less than 30 minutes to run and can be rerun anytime," Nierth said.

 For more project details, read the bike prioritization report.

Buffalo Bayou East Connections

Greater East End and Fifth Ward neighborhoods have long been separated from Buffalo Bayou due to lack of access to the waterfront.  Additionally, these neighborhoods have had very limited connectivity to each other. The Buffalo Bayou East Master Plan calls for an extensive network of trails, on-street bikeways, “green fingers,” and multi-modal transportation to provide vital linkages.  To begin implementing this critical connectivity, BBP has brought together a multitude of public and private stakeholders to develop a comprehensive transportation plan, Connecting Buffalo Bayou East.  Working with Goodman Corporation, the group has identified synergistic projects and strategic funding approaches. One such project, the realignment of Navigation Boulevard, recently was submitted by Congresswoman Sylvia Garcia to the federal Transportation & Infrastructure (T&I) Committee for discretionary funding.  The Committee recently selected the project for the requested funding of $10 million and it has been incorporated into the latest draft of the Surface Transportation Bill which has been marked up and awaiting action by the Senate.  The project will convert underutilized vehicular lanes into a separated bicycle/pedestrian corridor with expanded green space – all of which will link to public transportation, BBP’s affordable housing project at Lockwood Drive, employment centers and neighborhood services. BBP’s partner is the East End District, the official federal funding applicant.