Cycling and Active Transportation in Edmonton

[thommyjo]

Boy... sexist too! You know modern women are very likely to have careers and many men are so-called "house-husbands".

Lol. You sure love to be selective in your hate.

It’s literally a central part of urban planning conversations buddy. The sexism is designing cities around male commuting patterns from the 80s and not recognizing that many of our city users aren’t 9-5 employees…and yes…a higher proportion of those are women. That’s just a fact man haha. Show me a data point that more women work FT than men and I’ll retract the comment, but it’s very well known that women are still on average stay at home parents more than men.

And therefore, to not account for their needs and lived experiences of moving around a city…that’s the real sexism. You’re saying we should ignore women’s needs I guess?

Public transit services in Canadian cities not meeting many women’s travel needs: report

The first report of its kind in Canada suggests that public transit service models and planning aren’t meeting the needs of many women riders, and that gender-based data would help make services more equitable.

www.ualberta.ca

 

[TAS]

Lol. You sure love to be selective in your hate.

It’s literally a central part of urban planning conversations buddy. The sexism is designing cities around male commuting patterns from the 80s and not recognizing that many of our city users aren’t 9-5 employees…and yes…a higher proportion of those are women. That’s just a fact man haha. Show me a data point that more women work FT than men and I’ll retract the comment, but it’s very well known that women are still on average stay at home parents more than men.

And therefore, to not account for their needs and lived experiences of moving around a city…that’s the real sexism. You’re saying we should ignore women’s needs I guess?

Public transit services in Canadian cities not meeting many women’s travel needs: report

The first report of its kind in Canada suggests that public transit service models and planning aren’t meeting the needs of many women riders, and that gender-based data would help make services more equitable.

www.ualberta.ca

From the link in the above post:

"The report showed that women had distinct patterns of behaviour on transit: off-peak and midday travel, short stops on trips to and from work, short-distance trips and a higher frequency of trips. This wasn’t served effectively by the standard transit services and planning."

 

[itom987]

This comments shows a lack of experience about the very topic you’re sharing a lot of opinions on right now.

Also, transportation isn’t just about commuting. A ton of trips, especially for women who are more likely to trip chain and have more local trips related to schools/kids/shopping/friends, are done within 3-5kms of their home. These are very bikeable. Our new suburbs have decent MUPs as a staple now along collectors which is a good first step. Better traffic calming or bike lanes are need between residential streets and those MUPs though. And better intersections are key as many outside the henday are 6-10 lanes wide and have no signage or markings for bikes, so things like right turns on red or left turns become very dangerous for pedestrians and bikers…especially if travelling over 15km/hr on a bike.

The idea the travelling to the henday is a hike is both funny and somewhat true/false. I can bike from 170st to a new home in rosenthal or Edgemont in about 15mins. That’s not that crazy. The fact that you mention that though also shows how silly our sprawl has gotten.

With ebikes, these distances are especially manageable. You could commute from outside the henday to downtown in 30-40mins, which isn’t very different than the time in a car.

All district connectors need to be bike lanes though. Not shared use. Shared use should only be used for local/residential routes. Especially when many of the SUPs are bidirectional because the parallel option is still a sidewalk, you can’t be sharing those easily. 102ave in glenora is a constant problem.

You claim that I have a lack of experience on this subject in spite of me being older than you? LOL Look in the mirror.
I live in the very suburbs you are talking about and those MUPs mindlessly meander around ponds and parks. They were never designed to efficiently go from point A to point B. Those trails are designed for dog walkers, fitness nuts and leisure.
In spite of those paths you still have an easier time commuting in older neighbourhoods that have none. Traffic calming will end up doing more harm than good. Safety begins with you, look both ways, observe the traffic etc. Making it to the bottom of 170th street from Rosenthal/Edgemont in 15 minutes is not impossible, but there is nothing at the southern point of 170th street, you still have a ways to go before reaching anything of substance. I have rode my bike from the Hamptons to downtown and back it takes 1 1/2 hour to reach downtown. I was exhausted at the end of the 3 hour trip, and I am not the kind of cyclist that wears ridiculous cloths and rides as if doing the Tour de France. Of course, ebikes improves things but majority will never be in the mood to race all the time. Sidewalks need to be widened to allow people to pass, painting lanes on the sidewalks is also possible but we gotta not talk about that or all hell will break loose! Gotta keep bashing the car!

 

[thommyjo]

You claim that I have a lack of experience on this subject in spite of me being older than you? LOL Look in the mirror.
I live in the very suburbs you are talking about and those MUPs mindlessly meander around ponds and parks. They were never designed to efficiently go from point A to point B. Those trails are designed for dog walkers, fitness nuts and leisure.
In spite of those paths you still have an easier time commuting in older neighbourhoods that have none. Traffic calming will end up doing more harm than good. Safety begins with you, look both ways, observe the traffic etc. Making it to the bottom of 170th street from Rosenthal/Edgemont in 15 minutes is not impossible, but there is nothing at the southern point of 170th street, you still have a ways to go before reaching anything of substance. I have rode my bike from the Hamptons to downtown and back it takes 1 1/2 hour to reach downtown. I was exhausted at the end of the 3 hour trip, and I am not the kind of cyclist that wears ridiculous cloths and rides as if doing the Tour de France. Of course, ebikes improves things but majority will never be in the mood to race all the time. Sidewalks need to be widened to allow people to pass, painting lanes on the sidewalks is also possible but we gotta not talk about that or all hell will break loose! Gotta keep bashing the car!

Pretty bad at biking if it takes you 90mins to do what google says is 55mins. And google paces are often below avg for biking, especially e-bikes.

It’s 17kms. So you were basically riding 10km/hr? That’s basically a jogging pace.

17-22km/hr would be normal biking for many, 25-30 for road bikes or e-bikes. Or 40mins.

“bashing the car”? Lol. 12,000kms of car lanes and less than 100kms of bike lanes in this city. Until we see hundreds of kms of bike lanes in each quadrant of our city, we are no where close to “favouring bikes” over cars, no matter what nickel and his “common sense” crowd cries victim on…

You’re missing the forest for the trees. We need good bike infrastructure everywhere in our city because it enables a plethora of trip types to switch modes. Kids going to school and friends’ houses. Families heading to rec centres and to eat out. Older couples enjoying an evening ride to get ice cream or twenty somethings grabbing drinks at a bar. Commuting is a big part of transportation planning, but there’s so much more to see bike lanes as useful for. I do 5-8 trips a week by bike that aren’t work related, and still own a vehicle for a number of other trips. The future is multi-modal. So let’s stop spending the majority of our budget on car infrastructure. (Our LRT spending has been a bright spot in this the last decade in terms of shifting priorities).

 

[archited]

Older couples enjoying an evening ride to get ice cream or twenty somethings grabbing drinks at a bar.

Dumb-da-dumb-dumb

 

[Airboy]

Pretty bad at biking if it takes you 90mins to do what google says is 55mins. And google paces are often below avg for biking, especially e-bikes.

It’s 17kms. So you were basically riding 10km/hr? That’s basically a jogging pace.

17-22km/hr would be normal biking for many, 25-30 for road bikes or e-bikes. Or 40mins.

“bashing the car”? Lol. 12,000kms of car lanes and less than 100kms of bike lanes in this city. Until we see hundreds of kms of bike lanes in each quadrant of our city, we are no where close to “favouring bikes” over cars, no matter what nickel and his “common sense” crowd cries victim on…

You’re missing the forest for the trees. We need good bike infrastructure everywhere in our city because it enables a plethora of trip types to switch modes. Kids going to school and friends’ houses. Families heading to rec centres and to eat out. Older couples enjoying an evening ride to get ice cream or twenty somethings grabbing drinks at a bar. Commuting is a big part of transportation planning, but there’s so much more to see bike lanes as useful for. I do 5-8 trips a week by bike that aren’t work related, and still own a vehicle for a number of other trips. The future is multi-modal. So let’s stop spending the majority of our budget on car infrastructure. (Our LRT spending has been a bright spot in this the last decade in terms of shifting priorities).

When my commute is 22 km on way. I have never been able to get it below 50 min. That is because of all of the lights along my route. 137ave, Yellowhead. 127st, 118 ave 111 and 107 ave, 116 st and the 105-105 bottle neck. I pretty much keep up with some ebikes but the lights are what kills a fast commute. the Gaurneaban and 102 ave are just as slow.

 

[thommyjo]

Dumb-da-dumb-dumb

You mean dumbz da dumbz dumbz?

 

[Romanov]

When my commute is 22 km on way. I have never been able to get it below 50 min. That is because of all of the lights along my route. 137ave, Yellowhead. 127st, 118 ave 111 and 107 ave, 116 st and the 105-105 bottle neck. I pretty much keep up with some ebikes but the lights are what kills a fast commute. the Gaurneaban and 102 ave are just as slow.

I always wondered about why they call it the oliverbahn and garneaubahn. You are able to go much faster on periphery routes like 121 Street or 105 Ave. Still fun names though

 

[itom987]

thommyjo, I did that bike ride 10 years ago and I was exploring the city as I went, not in a hurry to get anywhere 'running' on a bike has never been my thing.
Biking underpasses (preferably the scramble kind) at intersections will solve a lot of the travel time problems related to biking and walking and give those transportation modes a solid advantage over the car.
If there are 12,000 kms of car lanes then there are 24,000+ kms of bike ridable surfaces... and you want moar!

 

[TAS]

If there are 12,000 kms of car lanes then there are 24,000+ kms of bike ridable surfaces... and you want moar!

How much do you suggest that sidewalks need to be widened to safely and efficiently allow for a mix of active transportation uses?

Many sidewalks run right along the street - so are you thinking they get widened to take over some of the street/parking space or widened on the other side to potentially take some of where front lawns are located?
In some core neighbourhoods, there are boulevards in between the sidewalks and the street but big trees are located with very little space to expand the sidewalk so just trying to envision how that would work.

And if 24,000kms of sidewalks are expanded for multi-use, what do you expect that to cost?

 

[BrettB]

 

[dkazzed]

I assume car lanes does not mean roads ie. 1 km of road with two lanes in each direction is 4 km of car lanes.

I wonder if we need to rethink where cyclists are supposed to ride. Children should be on sidewalks but they can sometimes go fast enough to pose a hazard to pedestrians. Adults riding at jogging speeds don't pose a hazard to pedestrians and could be on the sidewalk. Everyone riding at a normal speed are too fast for sidewalks and too slow for arterials. With all the groups I've talked about so far, they can all ride on SUPs. Experienced road bikers can be too fast for busy SUPs and should sometimes be on the road and that's where the marked bike lanes come in handy. We're legislated by black & white laws when perhaps there should be a little bit of grey.

 

[itom987]

Thank you for posting that video BrettB. The video fails to mention that only one or two roads out of 10 experience traffic jams. I also want to point out that we will never be free from traffic jams regardless of the transportation modes we use. A good example of what I am talking about is surprise surprise, West Edmonton Mall! On the busiest day of the year, you will find it impossible to get anywhere in a hurry within the mall. TAS, improvements should be made where time savings will be realized, for the most part we can use the existing infrastructure, short cuts can be made to reduce travel distance over/under passes can be made to remove traffic lights and save time. Painting lanes on a sidewalk is incredibly cheap! We should be looking at 1950s 'highway' network for bicycles and pedestrians. Bicycling as a transportation mode has to be taken seriously.

We need to see this:
Buying groceries

Making deliveries

Soccer Mom

It has to be a transportation mode that is used by people from all walks of life, every. single. day. Rain or shine, hot or cold. Going to the Prom, going to your next hockey practice, delivering goods, shopping, visiting friends, everything.
It is very obvious that we are not there yet, not even close. Ebikes can make it happen but it will take time. If you want to win people over you need to find ways to cut travel time and make the bicycle cool and convenient for the public to buy in. But suffocating the automobile (reducing speed limits traffic calming, unnecessary road diets etc.) is NOT the way to go because it can backfire and produce unintended consequences.

Build a network using existing infrastructure to start and expand when the demand for more is there.
It will literally be a repeat of what happened in the video BrettB posted above but for the bicycle instead of the car. At least this time we will have another viable option to choose from.

I worry that city administration will end up doing what they have been doing for the last couple of years, just on a larger scale and like automotive road network, leave maintenance out of the equation.

One more thing, you guys need to look more towards cities in Asia for examples of successful bike networks because you won't find the first two images above in North America or Europe.

 

[thommyjo]

Thank you for posting that video BrettB. The video fails to mention that only one or two roads out of 10 experience traffic jams. I also want to point out that we will never be free from traffic jams regardless of the transportation modes we use. A good example of what I am talking about is surprise surprise, West Edmonton Mall! On the busiest day of the year, you will find it impossible to get anywhere in a hurry within the mall. TAS, improvements should be made where time savings will be realized, for the most part we can use the existing infrastructure, short cuts can be made to reduce travel distance over/under passes can be made to remove traffic lights and save time. Painting lanes on a sidewalk is incredibly cheap! We should be looking at 1950s 'highway' network for bicycles and pedestrians. Bicycling as a transportation mode has to be taken seriously.

We need to see this:
Buying groceries

Making deliveries

Soccer Mom

It has to be a transportation mode that is used by people from all walks of life, every. single. day. Rain or shine, hot or cold. Going to the Prom, going to your next hockey practice, delivering goods, shopping, visiting friends, everything.
It is very obvious that we are not there yet, not even close. Ebikes can make it happen but it will take time. If you want to win people over you need to find ways to cut travel time and make the bicycle cool and convenient for the public to buy in. But suffocating the automobile (reducing speed limits traffic calming, unnecessary road diets etc.) is NOT the way to go because it can backfire and produce unintended consequences.

Build a network using existing infrastructure to start and expand when the demand for more is there.
It will literally be a repeat of what happened in the video BrettB posted above but for the bicycle instead of the car. At least this time we will have another viable option to choose from.

I worry that city administration will end up doing what they have been doing for the last couple of years, just on a larger scale and like automotive road network, leave maintenance out of the equation.

One more thing, you guys need to look more towards cities in Asia for examples of successful bike networks because you won't find the first two images above in North America or Europe.

You’re saying that bike lanes will create induced demand and therefore aren’t a solution?

 

[itom987]

Creating short cuts and other time saving modifications will induce demand.