Cycling in Canada

[mike474]

Originally Posted by softee

Bike to work stats don't take into account how many people use their bikes to simply get around town on a regular basis. Downtown Toronto is full of people just riding around for the sheer joy of cycling and showing off how cool and unique their ride is.

So is every other city unless there's some systemic reason why there are more casual cyclists per capita in Toronto than elsewhere. Bike to work stats are as good as anything.

[softee]

Downtown Toronto is swarming with hipsters. Bikes and hipsters go hand in hand - or rather... foot to pedal.

[mike474]

The same thing could be argued for other cities. Can anyone objecitvely argue that there are more hipsters per capita in Toronto than Montreal or Vancouver? So unless the Torontonian hipsters are unemployed at a rate that is statistically significant to other cities I reiterate the fact that the Statcan stat is as good as any.

[rousseau]

Originally Posted by mike474

Can anyone objecitvely argue that there are more hipsters per capita in Toronto than Montreal or Vancouver?

Not objectively, but subjectively my sense is that there are more hipster-types in Toronto than Montreal.

(I've waited over three years for the opportunity to make this riposte. Three long years. But the festering indignation combined with the anticipation of eventual release was worth it. Oh gawd, was it worth it! I'd better go change my shorts...

...okay, I'm back and feeling fresh.)

I just got back from an afternoon of riding my bike in Toronto. And had a really terrific time (my wife went shopping while I was on the bike--she had a terrific time, too). But having now cycled for fun in both Montreal and Toronto, I feel I may say without reservation that while it's pretty great in Toronto, the experience in Montreal is ultimately superior.

I'm talking strictly as a cycling tourist on a road bike, though. I can't speak for commuting by bike or daily use otherwise, and mountain-biking is for 14-year-olds who enjoy breaking their bones and posting the crashes on Youtube, so that's not relevant to the two-wheeled non-motorized urban milieu.

Montreal's curb-separated bike lanes through downtown, the wonderful path along the Lachine Canal and the easy link-up to the Route Verte are a joy. Whoever oversaw/oversees the whole thing are geniuses who started out by thinking "what would a cyclist want?" and then went and got the authority to actually get it done. It doesn't feel like a second thought the way that a grudging bit of paint alongside the doors of parked cars does.

In the summer there's an impromptu bike repair shop nearby the Atwater Market footbridge where you can get a Gatorade and a flat tire fixed. When I stopped for a drink there this past summer I got compliments on how awesome my bike was. So I told the employee to take it out for a spin, and when he came back he gushed appreciatively about it for quite a while afterwards. It's that kind of bike. And it's that kind of vibe in Montreal. If you don't have your own, I would strongly urge anyone planning a summertime trip to Montreal to make good use of the Bixi bikes. Riding them in Montreal is a total pleasure.

Which is not to say that it's not fun riding in Toronto. Because it is, except that it's a bit more treacherous. I did a couple laps in High Park, then went on the lakeside pathway through Harbourfront to the Don Valley, which I then went up all the way over to Dawes Road. I came back to downtown on the Danforth, then availed myself of the new bike lane on Sherbourne. Eventually I came right back into downtown and went here and there, hither and yon.

You really, really have to be aware of the streetcar tracks in Toronto. You just really do. The same goes for potential door prizes from the cars parked at the side of the street. Not to mention the cars passing you a little too close for comfort. Riding in Toronto can feel like a game, and that makes it fun in an adrenaline-spiking way. Today I raced the traffic westbound on the Danforth and got through lights that lots of cars weren't able to. I could sense them stewing behind their steering wheels at the fattish man on the awesome road bike blowing by them at 40 km/h. Victory was mine today. And tomorrow? I could get hit and become a paraplegic. There are no guarantees.

See how Blade-Runneresque Toronto can be? Who says it's generic and uninspiring? People are dying every day in that city. Though, truth be told, not on bikes. Biking is one of the safest forms of transportation there is. It's not really that dangerous in Toronto. It's what you make of it. Riding at a comfortable speed and paying attention like you would anywhere else is the key. Me, I was going for the endorphins today. But you shouldn't do as I do; you should do as I say. I say, ride safely, kids.

You know what Toronto needs? Toronto needs a Montreal-style curb-separated bike lane all the way across the city on Danforth and Bloor. All the way across. Just take one lane against the sidewalk, put a two-foot-wide raised curb between it and vehicular traffic, and dedicate it as a two-way bike highway with a broken line down the middle. You'll lose automobile parking on one side of the street, but it'll be worth it. And that's just for starters. Put the same dedicated curb-separated lane all the way down Yonge. And Queen. And University.

You think Ford would agree with me? I don't live in Toronto, but should I call him anyway?

[MexiQuebecois]

Originally Posted by rousseau

You think Ford would agree with me? I don't live in Toronto, but should I call him anyway?

Let's ask him:

• Video Link

I recently started commuting by bike between work and school. They're fairly close to each other; it takes me 10 - 15 mins to get to either one, but I've really gotten into it. I bought a shitty Wal-Mart bike for the task, but next year I might just invest in a good bike.

Cycling is fun.

[niwell]

Originally Posted by rousseau

You really, really have to be aware of the streetcar tracks in Toronto. You just really do. The same goes for potential door prizes from the cars parked at the side of the street. Not to mention the cars passing you a little too close for comfort. Riding in Toronto can feel like a game, and that makes it fun in an adrenaline-spiking way.

Quoted for truth. 2 years ago I got caught on a streetcar track and slammed my face on concrete - $1500 later I am have a fake tooth.

And last night my roommate and I were biking home from the bar. Not usually the best idea but we do it more often then not. ~8km ride from the west end to east. About 200m from the house I guess I wasn't paying attention and got caught on a streetcar track again. Landed on the side of my face pretty hard. Got to take the first ambulance ride of my life and also got stitches for the first time (2 under my nose). My face is swollen and numb and I look like I have been in a fight. My favourite shirt is also covered in blood (no rips though!). Thankfully no broken bones, teeth or a concussion.

I biked back to the west end to look at a potential new apartment already today...


To be honest I actually avoid some of the streets with bike lanes including the separated one on Sherbourne. There are always far more bikers on these streets that I end up stuck behind and having to pass.

[rousseau]

Blimey, niwell, I hope you were drinking lemonade last night. Ride safe, and get yourself a new shirt.

[rousseau]

Originally Posted by MexiQuebecois

I bought a shitty Wal-Mart bike for the task, but next year I might just invest in a good bike.

Cycling is fun.

Yer damn right cycling is fun. But here's an idea: this is the right time to buy a bike because there are sales and people are willing to let used bikes go for cheaper than spring. Which stands to reason.

Go the "Grand Montreal" section of kijiji.ca, click on "velos" and "de route," and then click on "prix" so that they start from the cheapest. Skip through the first few pages until you get to $100 or $200 and start looking from there.

Use the reference function on the site to save fifteen or twenty bikes you find appealing. Do you have a friend who's a bit knowledgeable about bikes? Ask him/her for opinions on them. And there must be some cool repair guys in Montreal working out of smaller shops or their homes, right? Find them and give them your business to fix the bike up right.

You'll save money, you'll reuse stuff that was otherwise going to rot away or get thrown away, you'll have a bike that hopefully won't be too attractive to thieves, and best of all, you'll have a groovy and unique bike.

Or you could just go to a more established shop and spend $1,000 or more on a new bike. Which is a viable option, too. It's up to you.

[rousseau]

Two recent observations.

Having been a daily recreational cyclist for ten years now, I've really noticed a change in driver behaviour since the the new 1-metre clearance law in Ontario was put into place. At least in the urban and rural areas where I live.

Many commented that vehicles would have no choice but to cross the centre dividing line to give cyclists a wide enough berth.

Police say that's exactly what drivers should do when it's warranted and safe, just as they do on rural roads to pass slower vehicles.

"[Drivers are] able to cross that yellow line … when it's safe to do so," Ottawa police spokesman Const. Chuck Benoit said in an interview this week.

But what about when there's oncoming traffic in the opposing lane?

"The motorist has to stay behind the cyclist until it's safe to [pass]," Benoit said.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa...vice-1.3650574

Emphasis added. The imbeciles have flooded the comments section on this story, as they do with every news story or opinion article about cycling, with the typical nonsense that imbeciles who drive cars tend to believe, which is disheartening, but there's nothing like a bit of official encouragement to get people to change the way they drive.

So I'm noticing that I'm being given more space on rural two-lane roadways with an 80 km/h limit (I do try to stay off these kinds of roads as much as I can, but they're unavoidable for certain routes). Which is good. What isn't good is that instead of slowing down and waiting when there's oncoming traffic, what they do is maintain their speed and get right over so that they're touching or even over the centre line(s), forcing oncoming cars to move over to avoid a head-on collision.

That's a recipe for disaster. Though I can understand the impatience with having to slow down. The other day I was in my car on some nice rural roads west of Waterloo that were dotted with individual cyclists, to the point where I couldn't drive at speed (80+ km/h) for more than a few moments without having to slow down, wait until the cyclist I was behind crested the hill, ascertain that there was no oncoming traffic, and then go into the oncoming lane to pass said hill-climbing cyclist. This happened over and over again.

A country drive that thirty years ago would have consisted simply of cruising at 80+ km/h because the paucity of cyclists meant the concept of "sharing the road" hadn't been invented yet? That's a thing of the past. Now drivers are confronted with all kinds of people on bikes, and I can tell it pains them to have to slow down. So they tend not to, and they swerve into the oncoming lane. Even on hilly roads where you wouldn't, by law, be allowed to pass a car.

It remains to be seen how this plays out. But my hope is that the brute force of unyielding logic combined with increasing cycling rates will eventually bring driving conventions more in line with the courtesies that drivers show cyclists in most countries in Europe.

The other day I did a fun ride along the Martin Goodman Trail along the lake shore in Toronto. It was very enjoyable, but it pains me to admit that a lot of lycra-clad roadies on their racing bikes are assholes. I say this as a fully paid-up and devoted member of the clan, but I hadn't really noticed the aggression before (clearly because I don't ride in the city very much).

Said trail is a multi-use path. This means that everyone is on it, from cyclists of every stripe to walkers, joggers and roller-bladers. But the same road cyclists who whine about sharing the road out on the highways have no qualms about not sharing the MUP, and that's maddening. The Martin Goodman Trail is not an appropriate venue for a training ride for groups of road cyclists at high speeds. Fer crissakes. I mean, I know fully well that the whole point of road bikes is that they're fast, and I love going fast, but I came across group after group of menacing roadies weaving around walkers and joggers, just generally making the experience unpleasant and dangerous.

If you're charging along the MGT at a dangerous pace and shouting at families with toddlers up ahead to "get out of the way!"...you just might be an asshole.

I'm convinced that MUPs need speed limits. At least, some of the busier sections do. Probably 25 km/h. Which, again, is painful for me to admit, because east of Queen's Quay where there are fewer pedestrians I couldn't help but crank it up to 40+ km/h. But I have to be honest and face reality.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by rousseau

Two recent observations.

Having been a daily recreational cyclist for ten years now, I've really noticed a change in driver behaviour since the the new 1-metre clearance law in Ontario was put into place. At least in the urban and rural areas where I live.



Emphasis added. The imbeciles have flooded the comments section on this story, as they do with every news story or opinion article about cycling, with the typical nonsense that imbeciles who drive cars tend to believe, which is disheartening, but there's nothing like a bit of official encouragement to get people to change the way they drive.

So I'm noticing that I'm being given more space on rural two-lane roadways with an 80 km/h limit (I do try to stay off these kinds of roads as much as I can, but they're unavoidable for certain routes). Which is good. What isn't good is that instead of slowing down and waiting when there's oncoming traffic, what they do is maintain their speed and get right over so that they're touching or even over the centre line(s), forcing oncoming cars to move over to avoid a head-on collision.

That's a recipe for disaster. Though I can understand the impatience with having to slow down. The other day I was in my car on some nice rural roads west of Waterloo that were dotted with individual cyclists, to the point where I couldn't drive at speed (80+ km/h) for more than a few moments without having to slow down, wait until the cyclist I was behind crested the hill, ascertain that there was no oncoming traffic, and then go into the oncoming lane to pass said hill-climbing cyclist. This happened over and over again.

A country drive that thirty years ago would have consisted simply of cruising at 80+ km/h because the paucity of cyclists meant the concept of "sharing the road" hadn't been invented yet? That's a thing of the past. Now drivers are confronted with all kinds of people on bikes, and I can tell it pains them to have to slow down. So they tend not to, and they swerve into the oncoming lane. Even on hilly roads where you wouldn't, by law, be allowed to pass a car.

It remains to be seen how this plays out. But my hope is that the brute force of unyielding logic combined with increasing cycling rates will eventually bring driving conventions more in line with the courtesies that drivers show cyclists in most countries in Europe.

The other day I did a fun ride along the Martin Goodman Trail along the lake shore in Toronto. It was very enjoyable, but it pains me to admit that a lot of lycra-clad roadies on their racing bikes are assholes. I say this as a fully paid-up and devoted member of the clan, but I hadn't really noticed the aggression before (clearly because I don't ride in the city very much).

Said trail is a multi-use path. This means that everyone is on it, from cyclists of every stripe to walkers, joggers and roller-bladers. But the same road cyclists who whine about sharing the road out on the highways have no qualms about not sharing the MUP, and that's maddening. The Martin Goodman Trail is not an appropriate venue for a training ride for groups of road cyclists at high speeds. Fer crissakes. I mean, I know fully well that the whole point of road bikes is that they're fast, and I love going fast, but I came across group after group of menacing roadies weaving around walkers and joggers, just generally making the experience unpleasant and dangerous.

If you're charging along the MGT at a dangerous pace and shouting at families with toddlers up ahead to "get out of the way!"...you just might be an asshole.

I'm convinced that MUPs need speed limits. At least, some of the busier sections do. Probably 25 km/h. Which, again, is painful for me to admit, because east of Queen's Quay where there are fewer pedestrians I couldn't help but crank it up to 40+ km/h. But I have to be honest and face reality.


Why wear lycra

As a fairly regular bike commuter and a recreational cyclist - I hear you.

A pox on both their houses, I say.

A question for rousseau and any other cyclists: do you still bike on the road if there is a designated bike path right adjacent to it? I notice many cyclists will do this.

[rousseau]

Originally Posted by Acajack

As a fairly regular bike commuter and a recreational cyclist - I hear you.

A pox on both their houses, I say.

A question for rousseau and any other cyclists: do you still bike on the road if there is a designated bike path right adjacent to it? I notice many cyclists will do this.

I don't regularly encounter this situation myself, but there have been times when cycling in other cities that I've jumped onto the road because the bike path was too full of slower riders and pedestrians. Actually, I recall that I've done this when riding in Montreal.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by rousseau

I don't regularly encounter this situation myself, but there have been times when cycling in other cities that I've jumped onto the road because the bike path was too full of slower riders and pedestrians. Actually, I recall that I've done this when riding in Montreal.

OK. Here in Ottawa-Gatineau we have a lot of bike paths that run more or less parallel to major roads, usually separated from the roadway by greenspace.

Even when the paths are deserted, some cyclists insist on cycling on the roadway with the cars.

I think that in some cases it might be that the path is in bad shape, but in most I suspect it's a cyclist's affirmation thing, about how a bike is a legitimate vehicle that's entitled to road space, blablabla...

[eemy]

Originally Posted by Acajack

As a fairly regular bike commuter and a recreational cyclist - I hear you.

A pox on both their houses, I say.

A question for rousseau and any other cyclists: do you still bike on the road if there is a designated bike path right adjacent to it? I notice many cyclists will do this.

I don't cycle on MUPs because I don't like to go slow and it's not really possible to share a MUP with slower users with headphones and what not when I'm going 30+ kph.

[whatnext]

There's a brilliant take down today of the current Canadian urban planner mania for bike lanes, from a cyclist:


....Bike lanes done right are a masterpiece of 21st-century design: a stylish and efficient way to move thousands of people quickly, quietly and cleanly. And many cities do indeed have the density and population for such a plan to make sense. But for God’s sake, do your homework first.

Analyze the traffic patterns. Survey your citizens. Figure out if, trip for trip, it’s worth the trade-off in road space. Study the success of bike lane projects in similar places. Streamline the bike infrastructure you already have. Keep in mind your limitations: even the bike-fetishizing hipster mecca of Portland, only counts seven per cent of its commuters getting to work on bikes.

And, most critically, find out if your citizens actually enjoy cycling as much as you think they should. The last thing Canada needs is another empty bike lane.

http://news.nationalpost.com/full-co...body-else-uses

[Mikemike]

^Not brilliant.

As a year-round cyclist in Edmonton who has taken almost the exact same route as the author logged, and for a work meeting too, I feel like I have the right to comment.

Whether recreational paths are well used or well maintained or not has next to no bearing on whether bike lanes are needed. There are lots of people who would never consider making a transportation trip on a ravine path that requires conquering 200' of elevation gain at the end who would use a bike lane on level ground if it were protected from cars.

Bike lanes are not useful when they are half-assed. Most of the few lanes we have are stubs, or obstructed or poorly maintained. Possible our best route is too narrow, shared with (hordes of) pedestrians, and now even worse with the addition of a poorly fence. Whether people are willing to use those routes isn't strongly correlated with whether people would be willing to use a properly designed, protected and maintained network.

And bike lanes aren't for him or for me. My normal pace is 30km/hr and I'll boot along a 4-lane arterial in the lane at 40 if I have to, at least for a little while until repeated accelerations from lights wear me out. We need bike lanes for everyone else who doesn't bike. the people for whom the bike isn't the favoured mode if only because it fails to offer protection from idiot drivers.

[whatnext]

Originally Posted by Mikemike

^Not brilliant.

As a year-round cyclist in Edmonton who has taken almost the exact same route as the author logged, and for a work meeting too, I feel like I have the right to comment.

Whether recreational paths are well used or well maintained or not has next to no bearing on whether bike lanes are needed. There are lots of people who would never consider making a transportation trip on a ravine path that requires conquering 200' of elevation gain at the end who would use a bike lane on level ground if it were protected from cars.

Bike lanes are not useful when they are half-assed. Most of the few lanes we have are stubs, or obstructed or poorly maintained. Possible our best route is too narrow, shared with (hordes of) pedestrians, and now even worse with the addition of a poorly fence. Whether people are willing to use those routes isn't strongly correlated with whether people would be willing to use a properly designed, protected and maintained network.

And bike lanes aren't for him or for me. My normal pace is 30km/hr and I'll boot along a 4-lane arterial in the lane at 40 if I have to, at least for a little while until repeated accelerations from lights wear me out. We need bike lanes for everyone else who doesn't bike. the people for whom the bike isn't the favoured mode if only because it fails to offer protection from idiot drivers.

A bike lane that is not well used is a bike lane that is not needed.

Taxpayer pockets are finite. What the author is pointing out is that squandering dollars on a bike lane where there is likely to be minimal use is wasteful.

[rousseau]

Toronto is in desperate need of several hundred km or more of proper, curb-separated bike lines just to bring it up to a bare modicum of bike-friendliness. The new ones just recently put in on Bloor were years overdue.


New Bloor bike lanes in Toronto must pass ‘rigorous’ tests

The idea that Canadian cities are putting in too many bike lanes is bat-shit crazy.

[whatnext]

Originally Posted by rousseau

Toronto is in desperate need of several hundred km or more of proper, curb-separated bike lines just to bring it up to a bare modicum of bike-friendliness. The new ones just recently put in on Bloor were years overdue.


New Bloor bike lanes in Toronto must pass ‘rigorous’ tests

The idea that Canadian cities are putting in too many bike lanes is bat-shit crazy.

Again, go back and read the article.

The problem is every dewy eyed graduate fresh from urban planning school emerges with words "bike lane" implanted from aging lycra-clad profs desperate to demonstrate that they're still vital. As the author points out, there are places where the investment can be warranted, and other places where it makes no economic sense and caters to just a handful of hardcore devotees (such as himself).

[Mikemike]

If you were at all informed on the issue you might be aware that the lycra crowd aren't actually who bike lanes are designed for, in fact many lycra people don't want them, afraid that using lanes will cramp their style.

I've biked in a few cities, and in general an unused bike lane is a shitty bike lane, one that doesn't go anywhere, offers no protection from traffic and poorly maintained (full of gravel). His stat on how many people prefer cycling, which he uses as an arguement against bike lanes, has 8.7% of people in edmonton preferring bikes- that's like 6x more than the percentage of people who actually do bike commute here. And, as he fails to understand, people's preferred mode of transportation is not independent of actual conditions using that mode where they live. Maybe if we had excellent bike lanes/cycle tracks etc and calmer car traffic we would have 10% biking their commutes and 30% preferring it.

[eemy]

I'm one of those lycra-clad weirdos desperately grasping at my youth and vitality. I love bike lanes in the city (I never ride on multi-use paths, though - they're practically dangerous to run on, let alone cycle on), but they are so often ill-conceived and poorly implemented as to effectively useless.

There is a suburban arterial road near my house (Lackner Blvd in Kitchener, north of Ebydale) that is nowhere close to occupying the full ROW. Over a 2.3 km section heading northbound, the bike lane repeatedly starts and ends so that it is in five separate segments no longer than 500m (all but one are less than 200m long). What is the point? It is actually less safe in this configuration than it is with no lanes at all. What is even more galling is that the paved roadway has plenty of room to accommodate bike lanes the entire length of the road.

The other major problem is that there is often little consideration about how bike infrastructure fits together at a network level so that key corridors might have great bike infrastructure except for a few places where the built environment is downright hostile toward cyclists which effectively negates the benefit of the corridor entirely.

I tend to stick to riding in the country anyway and avoid the traffic.