Cycling in Waterloo Region

[Canard]

The paved section of track has never officially been branded as the actual Spur Line Trail, as far as I know? Although, as I type this, now I’m wondering if the photo I posted of the bike trail sign is supposed to legitimize using it...? It’s very unclear.

[ijmorlan]

The paved section of track has never officially been branded as the actual Spur Line Trail, as far as I know? Although, as I type this, now I’m wondering if the photo I posted of the bike trail sign is supposed to legitimize using it...? It’s very unclear.

East of King it is part of the Laurel trail, and has been so for at least 20 years. West of King the Laurel trail runs, and has for at least 20 years, run roughly alongside the line all the way through to the park. However, from Erb and Caroline to King it is not clear to me exactly which bit of pavement is meant to be the trail. Actually I’m not convinced the designers really took into account the fact that there “is” a trail there at all.

I think the City still believes it is a trail, which is supported by the fact that they installed that sign (which I like too — I’ve long thought that bicycle routes should have names and be signed like automotive roads).

So it’s a muddle. But the bottom line is that swing-arm gates are not appropriate for this location.

[Canard]

Okay, but hang on. It’s fine to claim it was the trail. You can’t automatically assume it still is now that construction is complete. Your assumption that the pavement is a trail is just as harmful as a motorist assuming it’s a road built for them - no different.

Until it’s actually explicitly said somewhere that “yes, this is the trail - feel free to ride your bike here” I absolutely won’t. It’s not really safe - you’re riding parallel to the rails, which is dumb. I just jog over to between the LRT stop and Waterloo Town Square.

[ijmorlan]

Okay, but hang on. It’s fine to claim it was the trail. You can’t automatically assume it still is now that construction is complete. Your assumption that the pavement is a trail is just as harmful as a motorist assuming it’s a road built for them - no different.

Until it’s actually explicitly said somewhere that “yes, this is the trail - feel free to ride your bike here” I absolutely won’t. It’s not really safe - you’re riding parallel to the rails, which is dumb. I just jog over to between the LRT stop and Waterloo Town Square.

East of King it’s clear: there is a sign that clearly indicates that bicycle and pedestrian traffic is expected to share the space with freight trains. Also the City now does snow clearance as they do for the rest of the Laurel trail and Spur Line trail. So that space is definitely a trail, as far as I can tell.

West of King, it’s not clear, and it’s unclear in a way which suggests it was not clear to the designers, who didn’t care enough to check. Personally I do bicycle along the freight tracks because the only hazard is freight trains, which don’t come when I use the trail and would be obvious in plenty of time even if they did come, but I agree that it’s a weird setup. One thing I realized after a while is that the space between the rails should be depressed so that instead of two bicycle-wheel-grabbing flangeways there should be a single depressed space, similar to what was done on some parts of King St. with the LRT track. Also there are “do not enter” signs explicitly telling motorists not to enter. Now I suppose you could argue those apply to bicycles as well, but that’s pretty questionable because there are all sorts of places bicycles are OK and motor vehicles aren’t. Only if it’s clearly a road and the “do not enter” is saying that it is a one-way road going the other way is it clear that it applies to bicycles as well.

I disagree that a bicycle and a motor vehicle assuming something about the status of a route is the same. Everything done in a motor vehicle is more serious than the same action done on a bicycle, whether it’s driving carelessly in a pedestrian area, parking somewhere inappropriate, or using a route that isn’t really intended to be a route. Not to say that bicyclists should get a free pass to do whatever they want, but I just don’t see who is harmed or even inconvenienced by bicycles using the paved section of freight track.

[Canard]

Fair enough. We can agree to disagree. I’ll reach out to some people and see if I can get some clarification on the design intent.

[ijmorlan]

Fair enough. We can agree to disagree. I’ll reach out to some people and see if I can get some clarification on the design intent.

Well, it’s not just me. What’s the police response and penalty for a car driver driving crazily all over the sidewalk compared to the same for a cyclist? Very different, partially because the car driver is — in fact — causing enormously more danger for those around. It really doesn’t make any sense at all to claim that they are the same act. And it’s a fact, not an opinion, that there are many places bicycles are permitted that motor vehicles are not.

I would be interested to hear what the design intent actually is. It’s a very strange configuration.

I have no objection to you avoiding the area, for any reason whatsoever. But when you make it sound like other people shouldn’t go there, I will explain why I think it’s perfectly fine for them to do so.

[Canard]

In other news, I pointed out that folks are still parking in the new bike lanes in UpTown this morning:

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Doing great! Only about 10 cars parked in the <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/bikeWR?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#bikeWR</a> lanes this morning in <a href="https://twitter.com/UpTownWaterloo?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@UpTownWaterloo</a> . Cc: <a href="https://twitter.com/citywaterloo?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@citywaterloo</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/DaveJaworsky?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@DaveJaworsky</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/RegionWaterloo?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@RegionWaterloo</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/WRPSToday?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@WRPSToday</a> <a href="https://t.co/lORWTMQFBv">pic.twitter.com/lORWTMQFBv</a></p>&mdash; ? Iain Hendry ? (@Canardiain) <a href="https://twitter.com/Canardiain/status/944945953567584257?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 24, 2017</a></blockquote>

Diane Freeman retweets a lot of my stuff (?!) so I asked her if she could help take care of it.  Her response:

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">You bet! Once it is fully finished and signed <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/zerotolerance?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#zerotolerance</a>. UpTown has been so devastated by the construction that By-law is being kind for the holiday shoppers.</p>&mdash; Diane Freeman (@DianeLFreeman) <a href="https://twitter.com/DianeLFreeman/status/945025460538191872?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 24, 2017</a></blockquote>

...I don't even know what to say.

[Canard]

I can’t shake this. I’ve been thinking - how many parking spaces are in the Waterloo Town Square (North and South) lots? Plus the parking garage? Plus the lot off Regina? It must be several hundred. Maybe 20 cars can jam into the “spots” on the bike lane. So she’s literally saying (in subsequent replies) that like, I should proudly “give up” the bike lanes for the “devastated” businesses, so an additional 1% of cars can park there.

She’s missing the point too about this “bylaw being nice” thing - those same customers will come back in a few months, remember they parked there, and will do it again. And again. And the bad habits are reenforced. It’s the same problem with not ticketing vehicles parked on tbe LRT Rapidway.

In happier news, I put fenders on my bike and bought a mechanical chain cleaning device from MEC. Between the two items it’s be best $100 I’ve ever spent on bike gear.

[danbrotherston]

Does this apply to all bylaw violations?

Definitely pointless political pandering.

[Canard]

She probably noticed I’m from Kitchener and realized she’s didnt need to appease me (for that very reason).

Didn’t she recently go on the radio promoting (winter) cycling?!

Edit: she did! http://www.cbc.ca/player/play/1117387843613

[Pheidippides]

Anyone have access to a sidewalk plow? It would be a fun tactical urbanism experiment to wait until the road ploughs are done with the roads then run a sidewalk plough down all the bike lanes with the blade pushing the snow back into the road...boom instant snow-jersey barrier and protected lane that no car can park in. :-)

[KevinL]

Don't underestimate the ability of an SUV to barrel right over that sort of windrow...

[ijmorlan]

Diane Freeman retweets a lot of my stuff (?!) so I asked her if she could help take care of it.  Her response:

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">You bet! Once it is fully finished and signed <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/zerotolerance?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#zerotolerance</a>. UpTown has been so devastated by the construction that By-law is being kind for the holiday shoppers.</p>&mdash; Diane Freeman (@DianeLFreeman) <a href="https://twitter.com/DianeLFreeman/status/945025460538191872?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 24, 2017</a></blockquote>

...I don't even know what to say.

Kind to a small number of automobile drivers, not so kind to cyclists. Admittedly the number of cyclists is probably also small, but one parking user of the space uses much more space for much more time than a single bicycling user of the space.

I was thinking about this in the context of the Toronto King St. pilot project. It occurred to me that removing parking seems like a big move, but that is only because it is such an inefficient use of space. Moving back to Uptown, how many parking spaces have (supposedly, pending enforcement) been removed? I believe I recall that it was under 30 or so. So assuming people tend to park for a couple of hours each during a 12-hour portion of the day, we’ve removed maybe 200 people from parking each day. What would 200 bicycle riders per day look like? Not even noticeable — so one rider every few minutes are getting more use out of the former parking spaces than the people parking were.

[ijmorlan]

She’s missing the point too about this “bylaw being nice” thing - those same customers will come back in a few months, remember they parked there, and will do it again. And again. And the bad habits are reenforced. It’s the same problem with not ticketing vehicles parked on tbe LRT Rapidway.

Totally agree. Now that they’ve permitted bad habits to start, I won’t be surprised if they have to tow, probably a lot, to fix it. When the University of Waterloo changed the de facto rules for the road connecting the Math and Computer loading dock to Ring Road to match the de jure rules by enforcing the No Parking, it took months of several-times-daily towing to really stop the parking along there. I remember watching one tow truck after another take the cars away one at a time, not just once but on several occasions.

[timc]

Totally agree. Now that they’ve permitted bad habits to start, I won’t be surprised if they have to tow, probably a lot, to fix it. When the University of Waterloo changed the de facto rules for the road connecting the Math and Computer loading dock to Ring Road to match the de jure rules by enforcing the No Parking, it took months of several-times-daily towing to really stop the parking along there. I remember watching one tow truck after another take the cars away one at a time, not just once but on several occasions.

When did they start enforcing that? I can remember getting a ticket for parking there about 20 years ago. So did they stop and then restart enforcing it in the meantime, or are you talking about long ago?