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(07-13-2016, 12:04 PM)Canard Wrote: [ -> ]I would love to ride on the sidewalk. I'd feel safer. But I can't because it's against the law, so I don't do it. This is why I don't ride Victoria or Weber and will take side roads around them.

I think this comment was pre-empted by clasher’s a bit when he points out that the demographics of many cyclists do not allow them the luxury of opting for less direct but safer or more comfortable routes. For people cycling recreationally, the comfort of a route is the most important factor, and they might not mind going out of their way and taking more time to seek safer alternatives. If someone is biking to his or her job, though, he might need to take the most direct route possible- and, if safe infrastructure is not provided on that route, riding on the sidewalk might be the only practical alternative.

As an aside, I have to say that, when confronted with people biking on the sidewalk, my attitude in the moment is a lot closer to yours. Your comment about Victoria reminded me that, on Saturday, I was at Descendants, and was annoyed to see a few different young male (I say this to illustrate my own prejudice) patrons arrive on bicycle, sure enough biking on the sidewalk. And my thought was that, if they don’t like riding on the sidewalk, they should leave their bikes at home. But that’s not entirely fair, and I don’t know their circumstances. And, when I see someone on a weekday morning biking on Victoria, who’s to say that he or she really can’t spare twenty (as an example) minutes extra to try to take some other route to his job?
I recently began biking to work from a new location:
River Rd, Ottawa, Weber up to past Northfield, it's not a route for the weary, bike lanes come and go, garbage and destroyed sections of the road along the edge of the street or where the bike lane is located make it less than optimal, but for me it is the most direct route until the Laurel Trail is back in working order.
(07-13-2016, 02:01 PM)MidTowner Wrote: [ -> ]As an aside, I have to say that, when confronted with people biking on the sidewalk, my attitude in the moment is a lot closer to yours. Your comment about Victoria reminded me that, on Saturday, I was at Descendants, and was annoyed to see a few different young male (I say this to illustrate my own prejudice) patrons arrive on bicycle, sure enough biking on the sidewalk. And my thought was that, if they don’t like riding on the sidewalk, they should leave their bikes at home. But that’s not entirely fair, and I don’t know their circumstances. And, when I see someone on a weekday morning biking on Victoria, who’s to say that he or she really can’t spare twenty (as an example) minutes extra to try to take some other route to his job?

Yes, we all make trade-offs. Weber is just faster than, say, Iron Horse, even if it's more challenging to ride (not a good thing). That factors into my calculations even when I'm not biking to work. I think people will take the most direct route that they perceive as being safe enough.
(06-09-2016, 09:05 AM)MidTowner Wrote: [ -> ]“Total to date” was the wrong term for them to use (there isn’t even an ‘as at’ date on the sign). They just mean “Total.”

But very interesting! Three hundred users a day is nothing to sneeze at, and if we assume that some people only bike or walk to their jobs (or elsewhere) some days of the week, that’s a lot of people that trail is serving. It would be really neat to see daily and hourly breakdowns of the counts, to better see how many are commuters and other types of users there are.

(07-13-2016, 12:50 PM)Canard Wrote: [ -> ]I just don't even want to deal with the anxiety of dealing with confrontation if someone were to come up and say "Why are you riding on this" and have to explain it's a MUT.  I'll ride for 20 minutes extra just to avoid it.

Has that ever happened?  Unless a cyclist were to give a pedestrian a "close shave" (or worse), I'm not sure how it would come up.
(07-13-2016, 03:00 PM)panamaniac Wrote: [ -> ]
(07-13-2016, 12:50 PM)Canard Wrote: [ -> ]I just don't even want to deal with the anxiety of dealing with confrontation if someone were to come up and say "Why are you riding on this" and have to explain it's a MUT.  I'll ride for 20 minutes extra just to avoid it.

Has that ever happened?  Unless a cyclist were to give a pedestrian a "close shave" (or worse), I'm not sure how it would come up.

I have definitely received dirty looks while riding on the Weber St. MUT, but that one is concrete and for all intents and purposes appears to be a sidewalk, even though its actually a MUT.

I'd be surprised if you had the same problem on an asphalt trail....well surprised isn't the right word, more disappointed.
(07-13-2016, 12:50 PM)Canard Wrote: [ -> ]I just don't even want to deal with the anxiety of dealing with confrontation if someone were to come up and say "Why are you riding on this" and have to explain it's a MUT.  I'll ride for 20 minutes extra just to avoid it.

Oh man, I understand this anxiety.

This year I decided to start biking the sidewalk on Lexington for about 500m, to get across the expressway. It bugs me and I feel bad every time I come across a pedestrian, and inside my own head I've had a lot of conversations with people about what I'm doing.

But then I remember that I've biked across that overpass in traffic over 1000 times since 2008. I think of all the close calls, the blow-by's, the squeeze outs, the close tailings, the surprise crosswinds and of course the Death Threat of 2014. I remember Lexington as the barrier to friends' cycling, and how it stops me cycling later in the season because now it's dark, too. I think about just how ridiculous it is to share arterial road space when traffic is routinely speeding 20+ above the limit and no accommodation has been made for a person on a bike.

And so I bike on the sidewalk.

Irony: I have to share the sidewalk with more people on bike than on foot.
(07-13-2016, 03:49 PM)zanate Wrote: [ -> ]
(07-13-2016, 12:50 PM)Canard Wrote: [ -> ]I just don't even want to deal with the anxiety of dealing with confrontation if someone were to come up and say "Why are you riding on this" and have to explain it's a MUT.  I'll ride for 20 minutes extra just to avoid it.

Oh man, I understand this anxiety.

This year I decided to start biking the sidewalk on Lexington for about 500m, to get across the expressway. It bugs me and I feel bad every time I come across a pedestrian, and inside my own head I've had a lot of conversations with people about what I'm doing.

But then I remember that I've biked across that overpass in traffic over 1000 times since 2008. I think of all the close calls, the blow-by's, the squeeze outs, the close tailings, the surprise crosswinds and of course the Death Threat of 2014. I remember Lexington as the barrier to friends' cycling, and how it stops me cycling later in the season because now it's dark, too. I think about just how ridiculous it is to share arterial road space when traffic is routinely speeding 20+ above the limit and no accommodation has been made for a person on a bike.

And so I bike on the sidewalk.

Irony: I have to share the sidewalk with more people on bike than on foot.

This is an example where fear of pedestrian-cyclist collision is more important to the region than fear of cyclist-car collisions.

By the way, in many jurisdictions cyclists are sent to the sidewalk on bridges, since bridges tend to have narrower lanes.
I read these cyclist-car posts always feeling a bit mystified, and wondering how I survived biking on city streets as a child.  On a stretch like Lexington over the expressway, I can see logic in going up onto the sidewalk, although I'd suggest walking the bike across if there were any pedestrian along the stretch.  I'm always hyper-vigilant when driving around bicyclists, but I gather not everyone is so careful.  I guess the new "one metre rule" is not going to make much difference.
(07-13-2016, 04:22 PM)panamaniac Wrote: [ -> ]I'm always hyper-vigilant when driving around bicyclists, but I gather not everyone is so careful.  I guess the new "one metre rule" is not going to make much difference.

As with any law, without enforcement there won't be much change. Courteous drivers already gave a wide berth around cyclists before it became the law. Less courteous drivers continue to drive too close. I've not heard of any police enforcement of the one metre rule.
(07-13-2016, 04:10 PM)BuildingScout Wrote: [ -> ]...

By the way, in many jurisdictions cyclists are sent to the sidewalk on bridges, since bridges tend to have narrower lanes.

Or at least are much more expensive to widen for bike lanes.  The cheap option is to merge with the sidewalk (or otherwise narrow the bike lane) for a small segment while still keeping it separate from cars, which I actually find reasonable, pedestrians/cyclists are *more* able to deal with a constriction point than cars.  That being said, the frequency of these constructions very very quickly results in a drop in quality of the infrastructure.

An interesting note, this is also an issue in the Netherlands, many of their bridges are older and also haven't been widened when bike infrastructure was added.  There were several ways I saw it dealt with:

Once, we (cyclists) were directed to merge with traffic to move over the bridge, this was the most intimidating moment of cycling in the Netherlands, but still, probably less uncomfortable than the average bike lane ending here.  There were no sidewalks on this bridge (pedestrians, in theory would also walk in the traffic lanes)

Several times we merged with the sidewalk, as suggested here, and faced a relative choke point, this was a pretty low traffic area for pedestrians though.

We cycled over this bridge: https://bicycledutch.wordpress.com/2011/...therlands/  Which had the vehicle portion narrowed (and successfully kept narrow) by 33% to make room for full bike lanes.  It is a very busy cycle route today.  Worth noting about this instance is the LRT/Tram is forced to "merge" with traffic in this instance, outside the bridge, there are two lanes and a ROW for a tram in each direction, on the bridge there is only two motor vehicle lanes, so the trams are merged into the middle lanes.  I imagine they have some signal priority.  https://bicycledutch.wordpress.com/2011/...therlands/

Fourth and most shocking example, was where a new cycle path had been built along a road with a two lane bridge.  The bridge was converted into one lane with traffic signals co-ordinating alternating directions of traffic, while the cycle lane enjoyed free flowing traffic over the other lane.  This was not even a busy cycle route (at least at the time we were on it) nor in a built up area.

https://www.google.ca/maps/@51.7950233,5...312!8i6656

We saw another example of this, but somewhat less shocking:

https://www.google.ca/maps/@52.7694605,5...312!8i6656

Generally though, bridges are a constriction point, using sidewalks are probably fine on bridge.

Other constriction points like town centres, not so much though, because often they are also busy with pedestrian traffic.
(07-13-2016, 04:29 PM)timc Wrote: [ -> ]
(07-13-2016, 04:22 PM)panamaniac Wrote: [ -> ]I'm always hyper-vigilant when driving around bicyclists, but I gather not everyone is so careful.  I guess the new "one metre rule" is not going to make much difference.

As with any law, without enforcement there won't be much change. Courteous drivers already gave a wide berth around cyclists before it became the law. Less courteous drivers continue to drive too close. I've not heard of any police enforcement of the one metre rule.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/one...-1.3650574

Ottawa did start enforcing it.  The comments from the public were predictable.  Apparently "giving warnings and education" instead of ticket is a "cash-grab"...and of course, driving safely around cyclists is "absurd and ridiculous".

But I was happy to see Ottawa Police make a strong on point statement.  You give cyclists one meter space when passing, cross the centre line if you need to do so, and if you cannot do so safely, you wait behind.  They were very clear.
(07-13-2016, 04:22 PM)panamaniac Wrote: [ -> ]I read these cyclist-car posts always feeling a bit mystified, and wondering how I survived biking on city streets as a child.  On a stretch like Lexington over the expressway, I can see logic in going up onto the sidewalk, although I'd suggest walking the bike across if there were any pedestrian along the stretch.  I'm always hyper-vigilant when driving around bicyclists, but I gather not everyone is so careful.  I guess the new "one metre rule" is not going to make much difference.

You would be right on all counts.  What I will point out, is I don't know what your neighbourhood looked like when you were a child (or even when that was) or where you went on your bike, but there's a big difference between riding your bike to the park in an older neighbourhood, and riding along Lexington to get to work.  There's a reason that some people consider riding bikes a children's recreation activity, and not a serious way of getting around.

Generally when it comes to Lexington, while it could easily be the best way across the highway, I avoid it now.  King St.'s MUT is much to me, even if it is much farther.
I just came back from a ride in the Milton area, and I actually noticed how courteous drivers were toward me there, despite fairly heavy traffic on Derry Road and Guelph Line. I remember thinking that the 1 metre rule seems to have made a difference. There are a lot of blind hills and curves on those roads and I had absolutely no one try to squeeze by me and a number of people patiently wait behind me for a safer spot to pass. I wonder, though, if it's simply that drivers are used to cyclists on those roads and make accommodations for them. Yes, infrastructure is much better in the Netherlands, but drivers also have to contend with more cyclists, which is going to alter their behaviour. Look at how differently drivers act on King Street in downtown Kitchener versus King Street in Uptown Waterloo. Some of that is due to the built form of the road, but it also has to do with the volume of pedestrian traffic in downtown Kitchener and how much more unpredictable it is.

We end up with a chicken and egg scenario. Drivers aren't used to cyclists, because there aren't many, so they don't alter their behaviour to accommodate them. Cyclists don't ride because drivers don't acknowledge them and bike infrastructure is scarce and poorly maintained (guess how many pot holes get fixed on the shoulder of the road). Bike infrastructure doesn't get built or properly maintained because there are insufficient cyclists to justify the cost and drivers get outraged at devoting road space to non-existent users.

I'm not sure how you break the deadlock. There seems to be some progress, but I think a comprehensive cycling strategy is necessary; one that includes cycling considerations at every level from maintenance, to planning, to design and construction (couldn't they turn the sewer grates 90 degrees so the holes aren't parallel to the direction bikes travel!?) It's obvious the planners and roadway engineers have never actually used a bike on the road before, so it might be helpful for the MTO to publish guidelines for building cycling infrastructure that take into consideration some of those details that are lost in municipal road departments.
The sidewalk situation came to a head for me tonight, as I strolled out of Vincenzos and stood on the sidewalk, waiting for a car to finish a 3-point turn, before I crossed. Not expecting a collision, I was staring at the street, when a young girl came whizzing by me, telling me to "f-off" and get out of her "f-ing way", while she was riding on the sidewalk. It all happened so quickly, I was stunned and simply watched her ride down the sidewalk on Caroline. I continued my way down the Iron Horse Trail and low and behold, she was coming back down on Park, on the sidewalk. With a little time to think I, probably louder than I should have, told her to get off the sidewalk, there was a bike lane on the road. I was told to "f-off" again. She did then go into the bike lane, however on the wrong side of the road. No helmet either. No grandiose analogy here, just an anecdote.
I really think it's folks like these that education would go a long way with.

I just assumed mandatory bike education was happening in schools still. I'm dating myself, but I remember very vividly when I was in elementary school in the late 80's/early 90's that we had the OPP come in and one day every year, they'd set out pylons in the yard and we'd get called out one-by-one (class at a time) and get our refresher course about the rules of the road. And I grew up in a village of 600 with a tiny school! We'd bike around the course and get pointers and tips on what we were doing right, and wrong. Drilled it right into our brains from an early age.

Operation Lifesaver was another one, even though we only had one train crossing way out on the edge of the village. Still, to this day, I have the utmost respect for railways and absolutely refuse to take my foot off the brake until the lights are out, arms are fully up and I've looked both ways down the tracks (no matter how annoyed the folks behind me get).