Cycling in Waterloo Region

[ZEBuilder]

Clearly it's been a while since I've gone down Duke between Cedar and Frederick, I didn't know about this new MUT! Pavement markings are nearly complete, just missing the centreline at the Frederick end. The bike signal at Scott St is also still bagged. A little disappointed to not see continuous sidewalks/MUT, but otherwise it's quite nice.

This one is only a cycle track, not a MUT (sidewalk is for pedestrians) and is nominally part of the downtown grid. Though in reality we'll have to wait and see if it actually ever connects to the rest...

Speaking of bicycle signals, I'm pretty the signal at Weber and Victoria is still bagged after what feels like more than 2 years. Other bicycle lights have been installed and turned on in that time so I wonder what the issue is.

I can't say for certain as to the reason but having worked with traffic signal cabinets and controllers they are very likely part of if not the entire issue. At every intersection there will be a traffic cabinet, generally a large grey box mounted on a pole or a stand alone pad, the Region has been wrapping them in blue with their logo recently. These cabinets control the entire signal operation for an intersection. Inside of the cabinet you have the signal controller, conflict monitor/MMU, load switches, detection equipment etc. All the brains of the intersection are running through the cabinet. The issue with cabinets is depending on the age you run into issues with the current complexity of intersections.

In the past before intersections got complicated you would typically have a TS1 cabinet and would be fine. A TS1 cabinet has the ability to run 8 separate phase thru and left turn (LT) movements on all four legs of an intersection (Northbound thru, Southbound thru, Westbound thru, Eastbound thru, and NBLT, SBLT, WBLT, EBLT). This works fine at your simple intersections and still does. Where you run into problems with a TS1 cabinet is you cannot have more movements than the 8 mentioned, so if you want a dedicated right turn (RT) movement that only triggers when there is a car in the RT lane you will need a ninth phase which a TS1 cabinet does not have the room for. If you want to have bike signals that trigger when there is a bike again you need another phase which isn't included in the TS1 cabinet.

Now most municipalities are implementing TS2 cabinets at intersections which have the capability to run 16 separate phases. You have your standard 8 phases that were mentioned but you can now add NB, SB, EB, WB bike signals (depending on the configuration this can be either 2 or 4 phases), you can then have dedicated RT phasing if you so desire, dedicated pedestrian phasing, so the flexibility increases with a TS2.

The Region has been installing TS2 cabinets in various locations as they've been implementing LPI (leading pedestrian interval) which requires a TS2 to run, this allows pedestrians to start crossing at intersections before traffic gets a green (generally 3 seconds, can be longer if volume justifies). So the Region has TS2 cabinets, so I would hope Weber and Victoria is TS2 but there's no way of telling without opening it, cabinets useful life is generally 20 years and with the Weber and Victoria cabinet being installed right after the grade separation (a decade ago) it definitely could be a TS1 cabinet which would inhibit the bike signal from operating.

Detection is another issue that could be prohibiting the signal from being turned on but it is generally way easier to fix so hopefully that is the issue. From experience replacing a cabinet is a gigantic pain since you have to take the intersection offline to rewire everything into the new cabinet, think cops directing traffic for a day. If the cabinet is the issue (hopefully it isn't) it would not surprise me if the Region is waiting to change the cabinet until they redo Victoria from King to Weber for the transit hub. Especially since they're going to require a phase upgrade anyway for TSP and bike along Victoria. However hopefully it's a detection issue though, those are miles cheaper and easier to deal with generally.