COEUR d'ALENE - With McEuen Park opening soon and a host of new community events coming this summer, John Kelly wants to make sure cyclists and pedestrians are safe - especially downtown.

Kelly, who founded BikeCDA, will approach the city this week to propose the concept of on-street bicycle parking and proper lane striping.

"With more and more events planned and a brand-new park opening up this summer, we will have a lot more pedestrians and bike traffic downtown," he said, adding now is the time to deal with that.

He is presenting the concept to the city's pedestrian and bicycle committee at noon Thursday.

"I have already approached the city's parking commission and the downtown association's safety committee," he said. "The parking commission didn't have it on the agenda so they didn't take formal action, but they wanted to get it on the record that they like the idea."

Kelly said he wants to propose two pilot projects for on-street parking downtown.

"Basically if you take one parking spot and cordon that off, you can park 10 to 15 bikes in that space," he said.

The concept is called a bike corral and Kelly would like to see one put up on Sherman Avenue in front of San Francisco Sourdough, and the other in front of Calypso's on Lakeside Avenue.

He said the corrals would be seasonal and likely be taken out in October before snow flies.

Kelly, who is also a Coeur d'Alene Police officer, said in the summer there are places around town were the sidewalk actually gets blocked by parked bicycles.

"I have pictures at Capone's where the bicycles get stacked up so bad that they block the flow of pedestrians," he said. "There is actually a city ordinance prohibiting that."

The pilot project would allow the city to gauge the bicycle community's interest in using them.

"It's almost like a living laboratory thing," he said, adding that they could be done in an artful way.

"My preference would be to turn them into absolute visions of art," he said. "With a new park and all the art downtown, I wouldn't expect anything less."

Kelly said Coeur d'Alene is in the infancy of becoming a bicycling community, and it is getting better all the time.

He would like to see proper striping for bike lanes citywide. While much of the city has bike lane striping, Kelly said it needs to be consistent with national engineering standards.

BikeCDA would like to see 5-foot-wide bike lanes, and where the streets can accommodate them, he would like to see 6-foot lanes.

Directional arrows and bicycle icons should be consistent as well, he said. It's as much about education as it is about safety.

"When I am on duty I can see what happens with the narrow bike lanes," he said, adding there have been five bike and pedestrian accidents with motor vehicles already this year.

"It is generally because the bikes and pedestrians are going the wrong way," he said. "When you go into a Starbucks or McDonald's you see they have arrows pointing customers in the right direction, this is no different."

He said proper striping certainly educates the bicyclist, but it also educates drivers on the road.

"It sends a message that bikes belong on the road too," he said, adding the Centennial Trail has a 15 mph speed limit, so athletes have to use the street to train faster.

Kelly said improving the bicycling atmosphere and infrastructure in Coeur d'Alene will likely result in a positive economic impact as well. He points to an economic impact study the Oregon Tourism Commission recently released.

In that study, the commission found cycling has a nearly $1 billion economic impact on the state, largely because it is becoming more popular there as planners and engineers build safer infrastructure to accommodate it.

"There seems to be a connection between healthy vibrant economies and improved bike infrastructure," he said. "Portland is a good example of that."

In about a month, the street crews will be out striping the city and Kelly is hoping the city will at least consider his proposal.

"They are going to put paint down regardless. We just want to make sure they do it right," he said. "I feel this year, things may be done right."