A new version of Google Street View allows views of the same location at different times, very helpful in tracing the history of road projects.
The view below of Massachusetts Avenue eastbound, just east of Harrison Avenue in Boston, Massachusetts is from August of 2009. Through travel lanes shift from left to right following a bus stop and before the start of a left-turn lane.
Massachusetts Avenue eastbound east of Harrison Avenue, 2009
The Google Street View in the image below is from July, 2011, showing a a recently-installed bike lane. The bike lane stripes follow the taper into the curb of the previous gore (no-drive zone). A very similar photo was posted by DotBikes (bicycling advocacy organization for the Dorchester section of Boston).
Vanishing bike lane at Massachusetts Avenue east of Harrison Avenue
The Street View photo below is from a little farther along the street and was taken in November, 2011, several months after the installation. The sign on the second lamppost reads “left lane must turn left” but for the Google camera and for drivers who sit high in the cabs of their vehicles, a solar panel for a Hubway kiosk obscures the sign.
Signage following installation
The next year, the Hubway installation had been pulled a few feet farther from the sign, and in 2013 it had been moved somewhere else entirely.
The tapered bike lane is still there three years later in thsi view from May, 2014. The closer view shows the intent of the design better, with the dashed line as the bike lane tapers out: motorists merge right into the right-hand lane, pushing bicyclists to the curb. Bicyclists then ride along next to the curb, however, the curb lane is not wide enough for side-by-side lane sharing.
Bike lane as of 2014.
A little farther along, there is as of May 2014 a “share the road” sign, followed by a shared-lane marking placed close to the right side of the lane.
Share-the-road sign and SLM near right side of travel lane
The design intent is quite clear here: where the bike lane ends, bicyclists should move over to the curb so motorists can overtake them in a lane which is too narrow for asafe overtaking. This installation promotes unsafe edge riding, iironically through use of the shared-lane marking and share-the-road sign which are meant to promote bicyclists’ riding cenetered in the lane.
A better installation here would simply terminate the bike lane and place shared-lane markings in the center of the right-hand lane after the bike lane ends. It’s also fair to ask why the sidewalks here have to be so unnecessarily wide. If you look back at the photos, you’ll see vehicles parked on the sidewalk including one large truck unloading. The sidewalk is so wide that these are no impediment to pedestrians.