A bike box in Portland. Photo by Beach650.

Bike boxes allow a bicyclist to wait in front of cars at a light, making them more visible, especially to turning traffic which might otherwise hit them with a “right hook”. DC plans bike boxes at 16th and U and possibly a few other places, similar to the ones in Portland. But DDOT can’t repaint every intersection where bike boxes could improve safety. With a minor law change, however, DC could create a de facto bike box at nearly every intersection in DC by letting bicyclists wait in crosswalks without blocking pedestrians.

Many cyclists in the area already treat crosswalks as de facto bike boxes. When there are no or few pedestrians, waiting in the crosswalk provides the visibility and doesn’t interfere with anyone crossing on foot. However, that appears illegal under this section of the vehicle code:

2405.1 No person shall stop, stand, or park a vehicle in any of the following places, except when necessary to avoid conflict with other traffic, in compliance with law, or at the direction of a police officer or traffic control device: (b) On a crosswalk;

Or this:
2201.11 No driver shall enter an intersection or marked crosswalk, unless the movement can be made such that the vehicle can completely clear the intersection without obstructing the passage of other vehicles or pedestrians, notwithstanding any official traffic control device indication to proceed.
The second section specifically applies to a “driver,” and does allow for the fact that while you’re in the crosswalk you might not obstruct pedestrians. Still, I wouldn’t want to try to explain to a judge why those don’t apply to me on a bicycle.

DC could formally decriminalize this behavior and change the law to something like this:

A person operating a bicycle may, after coming upon a red light where no bike box is present and coming to a stop, move ahead of the stop line and into the crosswalk so long as there are no pedestrians in the crosswalk. Should a pedestrian enter the crosswalk, the cyclist must move the bicycle so as not to obstruct their path.
This would give cyclists legal permission to do what bike boxes would let them do eventually. Passing such a law could create 4 or more interim “bike boxes” at every one of the District’s 4 million intersections 1,600 signalized intersections, while still protecting pedestrians’ right-of-way. Police could enforce crosswalk-blocking when a cyclist actually blocks some pedestrians, rather than the times he or she blocks nobody while just trying to avoid serious injury or death from the dangerous right hook. Update by David: The original 4 million intersections number came from a misreading of the Metcaffeination data. According to DDOT, there are about 1,600 signalized intersections. Many have more than two intersecting roads, so the actual number of bike boxes is actually much higher than 6,400.