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Cycling and Active Transportation in Edmonton

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.
 
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
chinese-woman-cycling.jpg


Making deliveries
china-cargobike-styrofoam-1024x777.jpg


Soccer Mom
6184476772_cf7a417169_b.jpg

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.
 
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
chinese-woman-cycling.jpg


Making deliveries
china-cargobike-styrofoam-1024x777.jpg


Soccer Mom
6184476772_cf7a417169_b.jpg

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?
 
I like what I see but it doesn't have to be fancy and should be more compact to fit in an urban environment. I wonder how much this would cost?
 
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.
As a somewhat experienced road cyclist, I tend to even avoid marked bike lanes as often there are too many conflict points, and lots of drivers tend to have an "out of sight, out of mind" mentality with regard to them. As some can average (that is, with stops and slowing down) 30+km/hr on rides and routinely catch vehicles that pass them at the next stop light, the road is often the best place, though not without some careful route planning.
 
Feds just announced money from its Active Transportation Fund to Calgary for bike lanes.
I hope an announcement is coming to Edmonton early next week.


The city should ask for money from the $400 million Active Transportation Fund for the 100th Street pedestrian bridge, which has a cost of $17.6 million and was removed from the 2023-26 city budget - but that could be put back in. If would be so nice to put this project back in play by getting a few million from the feds.
 
The city can't forget about maintaining bike lanes even though winter is over. There are sections of bike lane where all, or more than half the lane in sections, is full of thick ice from snow that was piled up from the road or sidewalk and has now melted onto the lane creating dangerous conditions.

This was at noon on 102 Ave by 107 Street. I sent to 311.

20230322_123146.jpg
 
PARTICIPATORY PLANNING PROJECT - EDMONTON ROAD REALLOCATION

Now that part-time or full-time working from home is permanent for many people, Edmonton has clearly passed peak car activity, the social and personal health benefits are known, and the climate emergency is forcing us to quickly reduce and eliminate greenhouse gas emissions, it is time to put our roads on a diet. I have joined an international initiative identifying mass road space reallocation.

I have set up this Collaborative Spreadsheet where we can identify the Edmonton roads, mostly arterial and secondary, but also local roads if you feel strongly, that based on your experiences need space reallocation.

Please fill it out as much as possible before the April 30 deadline. If the road you were going to add already exists, but the suggestion is different from what you proposed, feel free to add a comment, because we want to be as collaborative as possible!
 
The 2024 Winter Cycling Congress is coming to Edmonton, February 22nd - 25th

 

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