The City of West Hollywood is seeking community feedback about potential long-term visions for Fountain Avenue. The City will hold a virtual community workshopon Thursday, October 20, 2022, from 6:30 p.m. to 8 p.m. on the Zoom platform. Written comments can also be provided through the City’s online survey between now and October 21, 2022. More details are available on the City’s website calendar at https://w.eho.city/fountain. Sorry, there are no polls available at the moment.
Existing conditions on Fountain Avenue include narrow sidewalks, above-ground utilities, and a lack of trees and shade. Additionally, inconsistent roadway widths and peak-hour parking restrictions contribute to unpredictable driving conditions and safety issues for all roadway users.
The City of West Hollywood is considering critical changes to Fountain Avenue that reduce the potential for excessive speeding and that improve safety for all users. Proposed improvements include widening sidewalks, planting street trees where possible, and installing bike lanes. Data shows that 64% of the traffic on Fountain Avenue within West Hollywood does not have an origin or destination in West Hollywood, meaning that the street is used mainly by commuters as pass-through traffic. This presents an opportunity to develop a future Fountain Avenue that is more local community-serving, safer for everyone, and more accessible for people who are walking, biking, and in wheelchairs.
Two options under consideration would enhance safety for all roadway users and increase the experience of comfort for people walking, using wheelchairs, and biking by installing either standard or protected bike lanes. Both options would include wider ADA-compliant sidewalks, new street trees and landscaping, and the removal of peak-hour (morning and evening rush-hour) parking restrictions. To make room for these improvements, one auto lane in each direction would be re-purposed, reducing automobile capacity and on-street parking would be reduced by between 12% and 50% depending on the option selected.
Residents, businesses, and community members from throughout the City of West Hollywood – as well as stakeholders along Fountain Avenue – are encouraged to fill-out the City’s online survey by October 21, 2022 and attend the virtual Zoom platform community meeting on October 20, 2022 to share preferences and priorities for an improved Fountain Avenue.
After the completion of the survey and virtual community workshop, City staff will return to the City Council with recommendations for an initial pilot program to evaluate proposed improvements informed by technical analysis and feedback from the public. Ultimately, any long-term proposals for future interventions would build off of safety-oriented actions that the City has already implemented to improve Fountain Avenue.
During the past several years, the City has implemented a series of short-term safety improvements to Fountain Avenue to begin to address these conditions such as high visibility crosswalks with refuge islands and bright yellow paddle signs as well as bulb-outs at intersection corners to reduce crossing distances. On March 1, 2021, the West Hollywood City Council directed staff to study the feasibility of installing protected bike lanes on Fountain Avenue.
For additional information, please contact Bob Cheung or David Fenn, City of West Hollywood Senior Planners in the City’s Long Range Planning Division, at bcheung@weho.org or dfenn@weho.org. For people who are Deaf or hard of hearing please call TTY (323) 848-6496.
I am all for it if they rename it Betty Davis Boulevard or Avenue!!
West Hollywood and its streets belong to local residents, not commuters! I hope they choose the design with the most traffic restrictive on the table. People treat Fountain like an East West Freeway 24/7. Stop signs, red lights mean zilch to most of these pass throughs.
God forbid you try to walk or take a run on Fountain…say a prayer both ways.
Sunset Blvd.,Fountain Ave. and Santa Monica Blvd. all existed before the city of West Hollywood was founded in 1984.The city is now paying for all the faults and mistakes that were made by the county and the surrounding Los Angeles proper.Traffic planning was not the top thing in the 1940s and 1950s. West Hollywood is trying to correct all the deficiencies such as encouraging bike riding with their lanes on Fountain Ave. and asking for a new MTA rail route,but it is turning into a big heavy lift.The city is very densely populated and it is getting hard to plan… Read more »
Install speed bumps form La Cienega to La Brea and ban yes “BAN” LOL bike riding and scootering on Fountain all together. Also the bike line system doesn’t work, take Santa Monica Blvd has a bike line and half the riders don’t use it and ride on the sidewalk like they own it. Listen i love riding bike but I ride on the bike path in Santa Monica
This posting reads like a one-sided press release from city hall. Wish this site was more forthcoming with the “contributor” byline as many read like opinion pieces.
This sounds like a lot of work just to accommodate the 12 bike riders in Weho.
Fountain has one lane of traffic feeding into it at one end (La Cienega) and is reduced back down to one lane of traffic once you cross La Brea – and in that WeHo portion we see high car speeds, higher collisions, higher fatalities, and damages to vehicles parked on Fountain. Why must WeHo residents endure the burden of these high speeds, high collisions, fatalities, and parked vehicles being damaged on a street that is mostly used (64% have no origin or destination in WeHo) by commuters? If you slow Fountain down, the people most likely to divert their use… Read more »
You cited some stats that I’m not sure even exists.
Thank you, Josh. I completely agree with your assessment and the stats are true. I lived on Fountain Ave for twenty-three years. Its time.
Some of us have to get to work.
SPOT ON! It is a death trap for locals. West Hollywood is not a Freeway for LA and Beverly Hills. LA County should have built a East West traffic tunnel decades ago.
Why is every “improvement” to streets a plan that increases traffic congestion. It’s already been proven that taking away lanes doesn’t improve anything. The only real solution to Fountain is to eliminate parking altogether on Fountain, making the former parking into bike lanes with slightly widened sidewalks — makes driving safer, makes biking safer, makes walking/wheelchairs safer
Good idea. Although I don’t know where all those cars would park if you eliminated parking.
They would park on side-streets and take away parking that is already in short supply for the people who live on those streets.
Would left turns be made unlawful? Has anyone thought about how left turns would tie up traffic?
Cars pay for registration. Time to make cyclists pay it too. We all use the tax dollar streets!
This question isn’t clear.
Two lanes total or two lanes in EACH direction? (4 total)
I say eliminate parking in certain spots and keep the car traffic moving!
Yup
The sidewalks are too narrow on Fountain Ave. They really need to be widened.It will make it easy to get by another pedestrian and for wheelchairs to move safely.
If nothing else is done,at least do the widening.
Yeah!!! We scooters need more room on that sidewalk too!
Typical City Staff crap:”do you want option A, which stinks, or option B, which stinks more?”
Ya. Right?!