Cycling in Waterloo Region

[danbrotherston]

I wish they would experiment with the Copenhagen-style of bike line here in Waterloo Region. It has a number of advantages: being inside the parking lane (and also typically having a reasonable buffer between parked cars and the bike lane) reduces the risk of dooring, being inside of the parking lane and having a curb in other situations reduces the chances of vehicles parking in the bike lane, and being inside the parking lane provides separation from car traffic making the lane feel safer. I can see having a curb potentially making snow clearing more difficult, but even without a curb, positioning it so that street parking is to the left of the bike lane instead of to the right would still be an improvement in a lot of situations.

I believe the King St. streetscape project includes bike lanes of this type.  Also, sans the car parking, portions of Manitou are also getting segregated lanes, and they are planned for several other roads in the region.  It seems we are starting to dabble with them, but they still could use work, we still need to more reliably make the right choice on bike lanes, and there is still zero provision for bikes at intersections.