So I checked out the Central Valley Greenway today, riding from Lakewood bikeroute to the New West Quay and back.
Events:
I don't think I've ever seen so many people on bikes at any one time (in this country, at least), the route was packed; nice to see how many people showed up to check it out. I didn't stop very long for the celebration at Sperling, there were quite a few people though. There were the usual politician speeches, andthe free barbeque had a huge line, so I didn't bother getting anything, but I did stop at the VACC tent and pick up a nice fold up map of all City of Vancouver bike routes, characterized by type (thanks Richard and company!). I know all of the routes I frequently use pretty well, but it could come in handy when I'm going somewhere I haven't been before. There's also a larger CVG map that has some blurbs about various bits along the route, and it shows some of the intersecting bike routes.
The Route:
I remember when I first rode the would-be CVG several years ago, with some organized event that started at Trout Lake and ended at Hume Park. At the time, the route was crap (to put it politely), and you had to dismount to make it through huge patches of mud, and climb up a sandbank. What we have now is an infinite improvement on that, and is now one of the better cycle routes. However, there are certain things that I would like to highlight.
- The Broadway and Victoria crossing is a bit weird. Going Westbound, you've got the bikebox, so it's fairly obvious you cross Broadway first. Going Eastbound, I'm still not quite sure what route you're "supposed" to take, there is a thick dashed line crossing Broadway just West of Victoria, but I've never seen anyone use it.
- I haven't done the Clark-Science World part yet, but it does seem a bit weird that the intersection at Clark and Great Northern Way encourages you to go to the south side of GNW, when you'll just need to cross over again. Although, both sides of the road seem to have bike paths. This little area has a hell of a lot of bike routes within a couple blocks, so it's a bit easy to follow the wrong one if you're not paying attention.
- It would be nice if the Clark to Slocan section had a seperate bike route, if only for consistency with the part East of Slocan (Slocan to Victoria is 80% there already). If you're coming in from the East of Slocan, where you have a ped/cycle shared trail, it's not immediately obvious if you're supposed to use the wide sidewalk or use the road.
- Slocan to Gilmore is basically a paved path under the SkyTrain guideway. Overall, it's pretty solid, though it could use some more landscaping (which I assume it still in the works, it's already progressed from last time I did the trail a few weeks ago). It would be nice if they planted ivy along the fence separating it from the railway; it would make for a more pleasant ride, and the ivy would block some of the thorny bushes on the railway ROW from poking through the fence to scratch your legs. In the Burnaby (Boundary-Gilmore section), they've elected to go with brickwok between the paths on either side of the guideway, rather than vegetation like the Vancouver side. Not really sure what prompted the switch, but the caution signs should hopefully prevent anyone from using it and ploughing into the guideway. The Burnaby section also isn't entirely clear on how the trail is supposed to be divided up. The path on the North side of the guideway is significantly wider than the path on the South side of the guideway, so people going Eastbound seem to sometimes go on the right side of the Northern path, and sometimes on the Southern path.
- Better sigage is needed once you arrive at Gilmore, to tell you to turn right. Also, the crossing at the railway tracks here seems to be needlessly annoying, I have no idea why those metal bars are there.
- The tight turn just east of Gilmore onto that tiny steep bridge is an accident just waiting to happen. Theres a bunch of preloading on the site for what I would assume is a proper, full width bridge with good sightlines, hopefuly that gets built eventually, but the preload has been there for years.
- The trail narrows a bit too much as it passes under Willingdon. I dont know what they didnt simply start the Willingdon lane taper later, to allow a wider bikepath as it goes under the Willingdon flyover. It's a bit close for comfort to have people going two ways on here at the same time, if they're travelling fast.
- The section along Still Creek Ave (just past the Costco, IIRC) is pretty annoying. There's a zillion driveways, most of which are for big vehicles, so it's easy to get stopped for a while. Also, some of these vehicles seem to like parking in the bike lane. The CVG map that was handed out says the Gilmore-Douglas section is an intrim route; not sure where the permanent route is though, or when it will be complete.
- Douglas and Still Creek intersection could use a light signal button on the NorthEast corner.
- Douglas to Sperling is a pretty decent gravel trail throug parkland. Personally, I prefer pavement, but it's not the end of the world. Lots of lights around here too.
- Sperling has the bridge, which I hate to say, seems somewhat pointless for people heading East, since you need to cross over Winston again about a block later. Nice Bridge though. They should make it clearer to go over the bridge, it seems like it could be pretty easy to go the wrong way on the South Side of the bridge, and end up South of Burnaby Lake.
- Winston is your standard bike shoulder. Nothing really wrong with it, but kinda bland. Although it's not as nice as biking through the park, I'm glad they went with it. A trail through the park would really only be useful to recreational users, hopefully having it along Winston will pick up a few commuter users.
- Right where Winston turns into Government, there's some clearing and grubbing going on, presumably for an off street path. It does look like it will be kinda narrow though, and could use an extra metre width.
- The map says the turnoff from Cariboo, that goes past the trailer park (you just follow an unmarked quiet road for this part) is a temporary route. Not sure when/where a permanent route will be made.
- The entrance and exit to that park that follows the Brunette river leaves much to be desired. You have to slow right down to pass them. Some posts would be nice.
- The bit along North Road from the park exit until you get the light to go to Hume Park sucks. Super narrow sidewalk, and not even any Sharrows along the road. I hope there's a long term plan for this part.
- Not sure what's going on with the detour from Columbia for one block (from Cumberland to Debeck). Hopefully this isn't permanent. Either way, on the way back, I just used the sidewalk for one block.
- The paved path along Columbia from Cumberland to about Elliot is pretty nice, although I'm not sure why they elevated it significantly above the road along part of the area where they re-aligned the road when they did the SkyTrain tunnel. The path is also quite wide here, it could afford to lose a 1/2 metre to vegetation on the side closest to the road. Other parts of the path, more to the North, could use an extra 1/2 metre.
- The on street bike lanes from Elliot to New West Station are actually really nice, and the large amount of stall parking to the right (rather than parallel) mean you dont have idiot drivers that don't check their mirrors before they open their door right into the bike lane path.
Overall, it's a great ride, but there is still room for improvement.
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