Cycling in Waterloo Region

[dtkvictim]

Saw (or rather, heard) a cyclist get hit by a taxi at the Gaukel to Victoria Park crossing the other night. I was a few blocks down Joseph so I didn't see how it happened, and I'm not prepared to blame either party, but I would suggest the current infrastructure might be to blame. Right now the stop sign for cars is on the left side, near the park entrance, and not very visible for cars approaching it around a bend. I've personally seen a higher number of cars run this stop sign than can be blamed on just a few exceptionally bad drivers (I cross here almost every day, and it happens a lot...).

I hope the signage will be improved here, but it's a shame to see happen in a place that should be friendly to cyclists and pedestrians (a pedestrian street, segregated bike lane, and a park).

The signage suggests it will be a L2 PXO but probably one without a flashing beacon. 

The stop sign may be not visible but it's pretty clearly an intersection and it was a stop before. I don't give drivers much credibility for missing it. They should do better but yes, a large number run it. Of course, a large number ran it before also.

This would have been a good place for a raised crossing IMO. I think the number of cars running it has gotten significantly worse. I also wouldn't depend on people knowing it used to be a stop. Here is the current view approaching drivers have


Sure, there is a "Stop for pedestrians" sign, but honestly I think only like 5% of the driving population actually registers these. The higher than 5% compliance is just people "being polite" and letting you cross.

[ijmorlan]

The signage suggests it will be a L2 PXO but probably one without a flashing beacon. 

The stop sign may be not visible but it's pretty clearly an intersection and it was a stop before. I don't give drivers much credibility for missing it. They should do better but yes, a large number run it. Of course, a large number ran it before also.

This would have been a good place for a raised crossing IMO. I think the number of cars running it has gotten significantly worse. I also wouldn't depend on people knowing it used to be a stop. Here is the current view approaching drivers have

[…]

Sure, there is a "Stop for pedestrians" sign, but honestly I think only like 5% of the driving population actually registers these. The higher than 5% compliance is just people "being polite" and letting you cross.

Based on this picture, I think there should be a stop sign mounted on the median. The one that is there to the left is only visible when much closer to the intersection.

Agreed, a raised crossing would be sensible here. Much harder to miss (and for anybody really ignoring it, possibly a fairly unpleasant experience).

[danbrotherston]

This would have been a good place for a raised crossing IMO. I think the number of cars running it has gotten significantly worse. I also wouldn't depend on people knowing it used to be a stop. Here is the current view approaching drivers have

[…]

Sure, there is a "Stop for pedestrians" sign, but honestly I think only like 5% of the driving population actually registers these. The higher than 5% compliance is just people "being polite" and letting you cross.

Based on this picture, I think there should be a stop sign mounted on the median. The one that is there to the left is only visible when much closer to the intersection.

Agreed, a raised crossing would be sensible here. Much harder to miss (and for anybody really ignoring it, possibly a fairly unpleasant experience).

Raised crossings are a good option, but even without them, our current designs are poor (even the brand new ones from the Province). In Quebec, they have crossing markings that seem much more effective, despite being far less elaborate:

https://www.google.com/maps/@46.1185424,...312!8i6656

[tomh009]

This would have been a good place for a raised crossing IMO. I think the number of cars running it has gotten significantly worse. I also wouldn't depend on people knowing it used to be a stop. Here is the current view approaching drivers have

[…]

Sure, there is a "Stop for pedestrians" sign, but honestly I think only like 5% of the driving population actually registers these. The higher than 5% compliance is just people "being polite" and letting you cross.

Based on this picture, I think there should be a stop sign mounted on the median. The one that is there to the left is only visible when much closer to the intersection.

Agreed, a raised crossing would be sensible here. Much harder to miss (and for anybody really ignoring it, possibly a fairly unpleasant experience).

I suspect they didn't mount one in the median because the PX signage is planned (but delayed?) so we have a barely-visible temporary sign instead.

[dtkvictim]

Bike lane markings in at least from Queen to Water, didn't check any further. As of Friday some activity has started again at the Water intersection, some machines and quite a few pallets of some sort of interlocking stones or something. No idea what they might be for, maybe a retaining wall for whatever they are doing to the house on the corner?

[tomh009]

Bike lane markings in at least from Queen to Water, didn't check any further. As of Friday some activity has started again at the Water intersection, some machines and quite a few pallets of some sort of interlocking stones or something. No idea what they might be for, maybe a retaining wall for whatever they are doing to the house on the corner?

Yes, a retaining wall is in progress.

[Bytor]

We drove through Preston for the first time in a long time yesterday, and we saw that the lines that all final even painted and everything. Oh my goodness, what a horrible example of bike Lanes! The bike lanes were the buffer between traffic and parking spots, instead of the other way around, which is like one of the stupidest choices that could have been made. Was this a regional project, or a city project?

[tomh009]

The Preston bike lanes also appear to be very popular for use as parking.

[danbrotherston]

Yuuuup.

Bike lanes begin and end at random.

[robd]

The bike lanes are bad, but the MUP on Fountain/king is worse. A couple of randomly placed signs, nothing to denote the end of them or the need to cross at King and Fountain, and no way to safely enter or exit without walking.

[danbrotherston]

Yeah, that's frustrating...but pretty typical for the region. It's not a funding issue with the region, it's a priority issue. They build bike infra where it's easy and there are no compromises, but the very second that it would take even an inch of space from cars then bike infra goes away. Regional engineers and council publicly state that bike infra is a "nice to have recreational facility that must not obstruct the REAL purpose of regional roads which is to move motor vehicles for real people doing real work."

[timc]

We drove through Preston for the first time in a long time yesterday, and we saw that the lines that all final even painted and everything. Oh my goodness, what a horrible example of bike Lanes! The bike lanes were the buffer between traffic and parking spots, instead of the other way around, which is like one of the stupidest choices that could have been made. Was this a regional project, or a city project?

The same situation exists on Margaret Avenue in Kitchener. I’m not even sure it is the stupidest thing to do. If the bike lane is between parking and the curb, there is no escape from the door zone. With parking on the right, one can give an extra wide berth to avoid doors. And since the parking is very under-utilized on Margaret, you can usually just ride through the parking space.

[plam]

We drove through Preston for the first time in a long time yesterday, and we saw that the lines that all final even painted and everything. Oh my goodness, what a horrible example of bike Lanes! The bike lanes were the buffer between traffic and parking spots, instead of the other way around, which is like one of the stupidest choices that could have been made. Was this a regional project, or a city project?

The same situation exists on Margaret Avenue in Kitchener. I’m not even sure it is the stupidest thing to do. If the bike lane is between parking and the curb, there is no escape from the door zone. With parking on the right, one can give an extra wide berth to avoid doors. And since the parking is very under-utilized on Margaret, you can usually just ride through the parking space.

Yeah, there might be other issues, but the ideal placement of bike lanes vs parking is not at all clear.

[jamincan]

I think a passengers is more likely to open their door without checking, increasing risk of the right-side door zone compared to the left. On the other hand, most cars don't have passengers at all, so the overall risk of being doored might still be lower. The truth is that there are so many variables to consider in assessing road safety that I don't really think you can properly say one is safer than the other without actual testing in similar conditions. There is woefully little good data on that front, unfortunately, since such tests would be necessarily very expensive to do, and divorced from the context of the test, it is questionable how applicable the results might be in another location.

[danbrotherston]

I think a passengers is more likely to open their door without checking, increasing risk of the right-side door zone compared to the left. On the other hand, most cars don't have passengers at all, so the overall risk of being doored might still be lower. The truth is that there are so many variables to consider in assessing road safety that I don't really think you can properly say one is safer than the other without actual testing in similar conditions. There is woefully little good data on that front, unfortunately, since such tests would be necessarily very expensive to do, and divorced from the context of the test, it is questionable how applicable the results might be in another location.

There is one very big difference that you're missing. If a driver opens their door and hits a cyclist that cyclist falls into the path of cars. This is a frequent cause of death for cyclists.

If a passenger opens their door, a cyclist is likely to be injured, possibly seriously, but death is highly unlikely as they can't fall into the path of cars.