There’s a new bike lane proposal in Coral Gables. Residents are furious again.

Bike lanes are a tough sell in Coral Gables. That’s putting it lightly.

In 2004, the city known for its more than 38,000 trees approved its first bicycle master plan, but the plan’s initiatives “basically withered on the vine,” said Assistant City Manager Ed Santamaria.

A decade later, the city tried again. A recycled version of the first plan was passed in 2014, calling for 27 miles of new bike lanes, sidewalks and crosswalks.

Since then, it’s mostly been more of the same: City officials bring a proposal, neighbors are outraged, and the City Commission scraps the idea. That’s what happened in 2018 with an effort to add bike lanes on Riviera Drive after residents voiced their opposition at a commission meeting.

“There’s very little really safe bike infrastructure in the city right now,” Robert Ruano, the chair of nonprofit Bike Walk Coral Gables, told the Miami Herald. “To actually increase people using [the road] for biking, you have to make it safer for them.”

Now, there’s a new proposal on the table: to add bike lanes and extended sidewalks along a 2.3-mile stretch of Alhambra Circle from Coral Way to the University of Miami.

Judging by the initial response of many residents — including fear that it could mean the loss of trees — this plan could have the same fate as its predecessors.

“It is evident that there is a concerted agenda by certain city staff members and special interest bicycle groups to forge ahead with bicycle lanes throughout the city despite the position of our residents and our elected officials,” Silvia Pinera-Vazquez, an attorney who lives on Alhambra Circle, wrote in a Dec. 6 letter to city officials.

Four days later, Pinera-Vazquez addressed the City Commission at a meeting where about 50 residents showed up to voice their opposition, even though a vote on the item wasn’t on the agenda and is likely still months away.

Vice Mayor Vince Lago said the commission’s decision to scrap the Riviera Drive project “set a precedent” that will make it hard not to side with dissenting homeowners again.

“It puts me in a tough position not to side with the residents,” Lago said, adding that he has not yet decided whether he will ultimately vote for the Alhambra Circle plan.

In 2015, Coral Gables received a $597,000 grant from the Florida Department of Transportation to make the Alhambra Circle project a reality. City administrators say the road is a key link between residential neighborhoods, the city’s downtown, the University of Miami, and the Underline, a 10-mile-long park for walkers and bikers in its first phase of construction beneath the elevated Metrorail tracks.

“The objective is to provide a street that creates a safe space for all users of the right of way — young and old alike, driving, biking, walking,” said Santamaria, the assistant city manager.

But the homeowners on Alhambra Circle say they knew nothing about the grant until recently. They also feel they were left out of the conversation about the 2014 master plan, which included the Alhambra Circle construction. Now, they say, the project is being sprung on them without their input.

Instead, they say, officials have heeded the calls of advocates for the bike lanes — the “special interest” groups that Pinera-Vazquez cites — including the nonprofit Bike Walk Coral Gables and Mack Cycle bike shop in neighboring South Miami.

Homeowners also cite a host of concerns about what bike lanes might mean for their way of life.

Pinera-Vazquez argues in her letter that narrowing Alhambra Circle to create the lanes would only make it more dangerous for drivers. Plus, she notes that Southwest 57th Avenue, a more urban road that runs parallel to Alhambra Circle, already has bike lanes.

Ruano countered that point by saying Alhambra Circle is a safer option, given that 57th Avenue is a straightaway where cars travel at faster speeds.

But perhaps most importantly, the residents of Alhambra Circle worry that new bike lanes will mean the loss of trees and, thereby, the loss of the canopy that is in many ways the city’s lifeblood.

“The master plan says a bike path for Alhambra Circle. It doesn’t say eviscerate Alhambra Circle by killing the trees, killing the canopy,” Marvin Ross Friedman, a longtime resident of the street, told the Miami Herald. “It is a devastating insult to the spirit and the poetry that is Coral Gables.”

Pinera-Vazquez wrote in her letter that there is “no question” many trees would need to be killed or pruned, “leading to their eventual slow death.” She said she counted 374 trees along Alhambra Circle and believes at least half would be damaged, given that there isn’t currently enough swale between the road and the sidewalk to accommodate new bike lanes and old trees.

“The result will be a concrete jungle with no shade or greenery,” she wrote. “Our objection is not based on a ‘not in my backyard’ mentality; rather our position is based on substance, data and facts.”

It’s not yet clear how many trees would actually be chopped down to make the plan a reality. There haven’t been formal studies on the potential impact, and multiple approaches are still being considered. A fact sheet on the city website shows two possible designs: one with a shared space for cyclists and pedestrians separated from the road by grass, and another with a bike lane directly adjacent to the road.

Santamaria said the city has five arborists on staff whose goal is to preserve all of the trees on Alhambra Circle, “provided that they are healthy and sound.” But he said he couldn’t necessarily commit to saving every one.

“It’s impossible for me to tell you that every tree will be saved,” Santamaria said. “But I can tell you that it is our aim to ensure that we minimize impact on any trees.”

He also responded to criticism that residents have been left out of the planning process, pointing to a town hall meeting in September and a five-hour walk-through along the street in October. Another community meeting is set for Jan. 25.

“Any time you’re proposing to make changes to the streets in front of someone’s house, there’s going to be opposition,” Santamaria said. “We are handling it in a way that’s fully transparent, that’s not beholden to any special interests, and that’s taking heed of residents’ voices.”

In the city planning industry, the backlash to bike lanes is known as “bikelash,” Santamaria said — though he perhaps underplayed the unique zeal it takes on in his community.

“This happens in many communities where bike lanes are produced or proposed for undertaking,” he said.

Ultimately, the City Commission will decide whether the project should go forward or whether the city needs to give its grant money back to the state.

At the Dec. 10 commission meeting, Mayor Raul Valdes-Fauli said he opposes the project.

“As I have announced in the past, I am against forcing bicycle paths [and] sidewalks down people’s throats,” he said.

But the mayor also expressed frustration at residents’ eagerness to address the matter in December, rather than later in 2020 when the project is expected to come up for a vote.

“I’m opposed to it, but this is not the time to discuss it and you’re not gonna force us to discuss it today,” Valdes-Fauli told Pinera-Vazquez.

Lago, the vice mayor, told the Herald that when a large tree that provides significant shade is at risk, “you’re going to find me hard-pressed to not side with the tree.”

“I’m going to side with a tree probably 99.9% of the time,” he said.

There were several residents at the meeting who support the bike lanes, too. Among them was Kenneth Garcia, who lives on Alhambra Circle near downtown Coral Gables and said he bikes to work in South Miami each day.

“Bike lanes on Alhambra and sidewalks are something that many residents have been fighting to get for many years,” Garcia told the Herald.

While Garcia was speaking to a reporter just outside the City Commission chambers, an opponent of the proposal — Eugene Clasby, an English professor at the University of Miami and a 50-year resident of Alhambra Circle — overheard Garcia and cut in.

“You think tearing up the street is good?” Clasby said.

Garcia responded: “I love our trees in this city. I absolutely want to protect them ... [but] I put my life in drivers’ hands because I don’t have a safe place to be.”

Clasby answered: “The problem is traffic. Until we solve the problem of traffic, none of these bike lanes will provide safety for anyone.”

The conversation went back and forth for a few minutes before Clasby walked away. The pair agreed that saving trees was a worthy goal, but they otherwise found little common ground.