Ninth Street SE is a main street through the southeast of the City of Roanoke. At its northern end it is offset a half block so that it effectively terminates at Tazewell Ave SE. It is currently a four lane road in the northern part, expanding to five lanes at Jamison and Bullitt Avenues. South of Highland Ave SE it is a two lane road until it ends at Riverland Road SE.

Somewhat recently, Ninth Street SE was repaved from Riverland Road to the bridge that crosses over train tracks. Bike lanes extend from River Ave SE to the end of the bridge, which is just before the Boys & Girls Club. As of now, those bike lanes are the only bike infrastructure on Ninth Street and in the entirety of southeast Roanoke, other than the Roanoke River Greenway (and maybe the Garden City Greenway, but that feels separate).

Ninth Street has a lot of potential to be better for bicycling. It is currently identified on the 2012 Roanoke Bicycle Plan as a vision project. While widths vary along the road, the two lane portions are generally between 40 and 50 feet wide, with limited parking demand, which provides a lot of potential space for bike lanes. There are many natural places that people might want to bike to that are on or adjacent to Ninth Street such as Morningside Park (which has mountain bike trails), Belmont Park and Belmont Library, and many businesses.

With the width between Morgan and River Ave there is the potential to try different improvements. In these mockups a center turn lane provides access to the Boys and Girls Club and businesses nearby, and near River Ave provides access to the Roanoke River Greenway and the Viscose factory site. Alternatively, the width could be used to create a two-way Greenway-like connection to Morningside Park so that more people can easily access the mountain bike trails there.