L.A. City Council members Hugo Soto-Martinez and Nithya Raman announced on Thursday morning that new bike lanes, bus lanes, wider sidewalks, and other safety improvements such as crosswalks, will be coming to Hollywood Boulevard by early 2025.

New dedicated bike lanes will be created along a 3.6-mile stretch of Hollywood Boulevard between La Brea Avenue and Fountain Avenue in Silver Lake and create bus-only lanes from Orange Drive to Gower Street. A center left turn lane will be added along most of Hollywood Boulevard to reduce delays from traffic backing up.

“With the rollout of the ‘Access to Hollywood’ project, which combined bus and bike lanes in central Hollywood, and the Hollywood Boulevard Safety and Mobility Project, we are delivering the kind of transformative investments that Angelenos have been asking for, helping us improve transit travel times and creating a safer environment for all, whether they are walking, biking, or driving,” said Raman.

The project includes sidewalk widening that will add 2,230 square feet of new space for pedestrians and more opportunities for outdoor dining. Three new crosswalks with flashing beacons that stop traffic when activated by pedestrians will be installed at Hollywood Boulevard and Rodney Drive, and Hollywood Boulevard and Hobart and Winona Boulevards.

“This project is about making our community safer and transforming how residents, workers, and visitors use Hollywood Boulevard,” Soto-Martinez said. “We know that if people come here, they will eat here, they will shop here and they will spend their money here. By building Hollywood around people instead of cars, we can revitalize this iconic destination.”

The project will be funded by $8 million from the Bureau of Engineering and Metro. The street improvement project is part of a larger effort to revitalize Hollywood.

“Hollywood Boulevard should be one of the most beautiful, innovative, creative, and dynamic streets in the entire world. We can’t get there without the public sector and its vast resources,” said Hollywood Chamber of Commerce president and CEO Steve Nissen. “These represent the first really big steps to revitalizing Hollywood Boulevard. We also can’t get there without the private sector that builds the buildings and the businesses and the venues that bring millions of people to Hollywood. We will be there to work with the public sector to revitalize Hollywood Boulevard, to turn these big initial steps into giant leaps forward in the future for Hollywood.”

Thursday’s announcement followed the recent passage of Measure HLA which mandates the city to carry out ‘Mobility Plan 2035,’ an initiative created by former L.A. Mayor Eric Garcetti that prioritizes safer streets.

Photo by ViewApart on iStockphoto.com

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