Winter Walking and Cycling

[danbrotherston]

I read the study and had the same conclusion that he did. Too small of a sample size and streets chosen arbitrarily. To do this study properly you have to choose streets city wide and with a much larger sample size. I’m not saying that there is not a problem but I would like to see if there is a larger concentration in one area over another part of the city. I could easily choose the same number of streets in my neighbourhood where you would probably see 95%+ of home owners are clearing their sidewalks promptly. Our neighbourhood sidewalks are cleared promptly by its residents and usually well before the streets are cleared. If we left side walk clearing up to the city we would most likely have a similar clearing schedule as to our streets. People would either wait for the city to clear the sidewalks making them all impassible or would more likely do the clearing themselves.

While 95% is far better than the study found, it would still only allow traveling an average of 400 meters before reaching an uncleared sidewalk.

And if you include curb cuts which are cleared much more poorly than sidewalks, it's probably worse.

I realize this is a number you pulled out of nowhere, but it is enlightening to see how only a small number of property owners failing in their duty to clear sidewalks results in very frequent obstructions.

The thing which bothers me is the idea that sidewalks which are 95% cleared are passable.  To many people, they aren't.

Also, if we left sidewalk clearing up to city schedules, your residential street which probably sees little traffic would be cleared eventually, but the main routes to UW and Laurier: Columbia, University, and King which see thousands (maybe tens of thousands) of people use them daily would be cleared the morning before classes, instead of only 95% clear after 2-3 days.