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It is neighbouring a high school that has much of its catchment a long walk, but reasonable bike ride, away. Also, Strasburg is set to be connected southwards soon, and the added vehicle traffic means a better bike solution is good to get in place now.
The regional budget is out in a survey, and it's kind of the opposite of Kitchener's in terms of cycling.

It mentions active transportation in one of the survey questions (https://www.engagewr.ca/2019-budget),
where it asks if $0.44 increase in the active transportation budget is good value (for the record, the Cycle WR pledge was $13 from the region--I don't know what the current budget is...). I didn't know how to answer that, it's better than 0, but, like, barely.

And frankly, I cannot even find mention of active transportation whatsoever the budget issue papers (https://www.regionofwaterloo.ca/en/regio...Papers.pdf)  or the full budget (https://www.regionofwaterloo.ca/en/regio...t_Book.pdf) although I think that's because the region doesn't bother to split it out.

This is a lack of leadership and care from the region council and staff.  It's so frustrating, because Kitchener seems poised to do great things, but I have serious doubts whether they will succeed with dangerous roads crisscrossing the city that they cannot fix.

It's incredibly disappointing to see the region, fail--again--to address these issues.  A governments priorities are found in the budget, and there is no priority here.

As a more general point, I found the Kitchener budget presentation to be far easier to follow and understand than the Region's...hell, like I said, I cannot even find reference to one of the things they asked in the survey, I have no idea what they intend to spend the ~250k they're proposing for active transportation region wide on.
Studs are heavy and slow, that's for sure... nice to have if you end up in icy spots often though. I was out near the covered bridge and found some icy gravel roads where the sun doesn't shine but usually I just stick to plowed roads in the winter and don't really need studs. I think I'd like a fat bike but I don't wanna carry it up to the second storey and I already have too many bikes anyway.

On my ride today I saw a man parked in the bike lanes over the expressway on Lexington... gave him a WTF jesture but he was too busy looking at his phone to care. Otherwise it was awesome to be riding in the dry sunshine.
Definitely not for everyone, but for the type of trails that I ride on, is exactly what I was looking for.
Just wanted to update folks on some cycling infra news last week and this week:

First, Region staff presented to ATAC this week, and I'm very happy to announce that after a great deal of advocacy, and after evaluating all the data that staff collected (from video of the Uptown bike lanes themselves, and from the public opinion survey), staff acknowledge that there is an issue with vehicle incursions into the uptown bike lanes.

They are recommending installation of metal bollards in both the existing segment and Phase 2, and an evaluation of the need for phase 3. I still do not understand their obsession with roll curbs, but I'm not going to dwell on that, I think this is a huge win for the cycling community. The study will be made public, for all to read, and to learn from (like, maybe one day, we can learn that roll curbs aren't effective in preventing vehicle incursions...for bike lanes, for sidewalks, for LRT tracks etc....one day).

Second, there was a presentation about the Iron Horse Trail project, staff and a consultant have evaluated all of the IHT crossings and have proposed improved treatments at all of them, I've never seen a comprehensive look at all trail crossings before, this is very exciting, hopefully this leads to a situation where these things are look at by default, instead of after years of complaints after the fact. I suspect most have heard this news as it was posted in the trails forum and dtkmelissa posted details of all the crossings.

But it does lead to the last piece of news. I'm sure everyone has heard of the budget proposal issued by the CoK transportation staff, suggesting (for one year anyway) significant investments in cycling infra. This includes a dutch roundabout, pilot segregated cycle lanes, Iron Horse Trail improvements, etc. What you may not have heard, is that there is, and this shouldn't be surprising, some push back on this budget proposal. I will be going to council to speak in favour of the proposal on Monday, and anyone who is interested and wishes to support this proposal (and has the time), can join in council, or even present themselves, councillors do listen to people when they show up en masse. If you don't have the time, it's totally understandable, it takes only a few minutes to drop your councillor (or others) an email to ask them to support this proposal, which is still effective.
When is the meeting? If it's tomorrow night, I will unfortunately be out of town.
(01-20-2019, 08:28 PM)tomh009 Wrote: [ -> ]When is the meeting? If it's tomorrow night, I will unfortunately be out of town.

Yes it is, and sorry, I should probably have included some information.

The meeting is tomorrow (Monday) at 7 PM at City of Kitchener City Hall Council Cambers.

CycleWR gave some details here on how to delegate (speak): http://cyclewr.ca/2019/01/18/how-to-show...er-budget/
Thanks danbrotherson! Hmm, maybe I can make it tomorrow night to Kitchener Council.
Hope we can get a bunch of people to go. I'd do it but I won't be here ...
This is really exciting. Finally some really big steps forward!
As promised, I am sharing the link to the recent PIC for upcoming Iron Horse Trail improvements. It includes the presentation boards presented at the open house, with crossing options being considered. https://www.kitchener.ca/en/things-to-do...provements
(01-20-2019, 07:28 PM)danbrotherston Wrote: [ -> ]But it does lead to the last piece of news.  I'm sure everyone has heard of the budget proposal issued by the CoK transportation staff, suggesting (for one year anyway) significant investments in cycling infra.  This includes a dutch roundabout, pilot segregated cycle lanes, Iron Horse Trail improvements, etc.  What you may not have heard, is that there is, and this shouldn't be surprising, some push back on this budget proposal. I will be going to council to speak in favour of the proposal on Monday, and anyone who is interested and wishes to support this proposal (and has the time), can join in council, or even present themselves, councillors do listen to people when they show up en masse. If you don't have the time, it's totally understandable, it takes only a few minutes to drop your councillor (or others) an email to ask them to support this proposal, which is still effective.

That's discouraging. I registered on Friday to speak as well. I echo Dan's point that if you can't make it tonight, please email your councillor and the mayor to share your thoughts on the proposed budget.
(01-21-2019, 10:15 AM)dtkmelissa Wrote: [ -> ]As promised, I am sharing the link to the recent PIC for upcoming Iron Horse Trail improvements. It includes the presentation boards presented at the open house, with crossing options being considered. https://www.kitchener.ca/en/things-to-do...provements

Thanks for posting this Melissa.

I really hope this gets approved, to not would be really short sighted, and send the wrong message in terms of the long term viability of non-car transport in our Region.  

I also think that if one City does this, the rest might be more apt to follow suit.
(01-21-2019, 10:19 AM)dtkmelissa Wrote: [ -> ]
(01-20-2019, 07:28 PM)danbrotherston Wrote: [ -> ]But it does lead to the last piece of news.  I'm sure everyone has heard of the budget proposal issued by the CoK transportation staff, suggesting (for one year anyway) significant investments in cycling infra.  This includes a dutch roundabout, pilot segregated cycle lanes, Iron Horse Trail improvements, etc.  What you may not have heard, is that there is, and this shouldn't be surprising, some push back on this budget proposal. I will be going to council to speak in favour of the proposal on Monday, and anyone who is interested and wishes to support this proposal (and has the time), can join in council, or even present themselves, councillors do listen to people when they show up en masse. If you don't have the time, it's totally understandable, it takes only a few minutes to drop your councillor (or others) an email to ask them to support this proposal, which is still effective.

That's discouraging. I registered on Friday to speak as well. I echo Dan's point that if you can't make it tonight, please email your councillor and the mayor to share your thoughts on the proposed budget.

What's Debbie Chapman's view on this? Is she supportive?