In the May issue of Cyclometer - the City of Toronto's newsletter about cycling - there is a call out for help on designing physically separated bike lanes in Toronto. With the successful launch of BIXI bikes in Toronto and the recent publicity about a downtown network of separate lanes, it seems that the City is seriously considering creating some decent biking infrastructure. The call out reads as follows:
Share Your Cycle Track Design Insights
The City of Toronto is starting to consider options for physically separated bike lanes (Also known as "Cycle Tracks") in the downtown area.
You can help inform our research by contributing to the SteetsWiki Cycle Tracks web pages. You'll need to create a wikispaces account and join "SteetsWiki", which is usually approved within an hour or two, and then you can start to edit web pages. With your help we can find all the potential solutions for designing ideal Cycle Tracks.
This may be a great opportunity to ensure that the designers and planners at City hall have all the information they need to do a good job. So.... have your say!
Today the Star ran an article about a plan to build curbs to separate bike lanes in the downtown. Denzil Minnan-Wong, the new chair of the public works and infrastructure committee, has come out in support of building a network of separated bike lanes along major streets. Some streets that already have space carved out with bike lanes - such as Sherbourne - will get curbs separating cars from bikes. Other streets without bike lanes - such as Richmond - may get bi-directional bike lanes. Of course, this plan must pass through the committee and then council, but it's great news for Toronto!
Upon some research this week about 'raised lanes' I found out that Guelph has begun construction on Ontario's first raised bike lane. Separated from car traffic by raising the lane like a sidewalk, this lane is very similar to the type seen in Copenhagen.
Ottawa and Toronto make Copenhagenize:
A post on Copenhagenize today rails on the Bank Street BIA in Ottawa for opposing the planned physically separated bike infrastructure, which cited safety concerns as their reason. Apparently the study cited in support, which highlighted an increase in accidents after Copenhagen built separated lanes, came from the vehicular cycling community that argues vigorously against cycling infrastructure. Vehicular cyclists advocate for bikes to be treated the same as cars - certainly not a position supported by us here at Cycle Toronto.
Copenhagenize also linked to the Star article noted above.
Sharrows are a sorry substitute, a poor compromise, and an illusion of safety and progress. Until the City starts taking bold action to create a functioning network of physically separated bike lanes, cyclists will continue to be second-class citizens. And those who use bikes to ride on city streets must stop accepting unsafe and regressive pavement markings in place of safe and effective cycling infrastructure: we must shed ourselves of the defeatist attitude that something is better than nothing and advocate collectively for real change. A vision of Toronto as a true cycling city is not out of reach, but we must stop negotiating ourselves down to the point where we believe that separated lanes are unworkable and sharrows will push us in the right direction. If we want the City to be bold we must be bold ourselves!
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The City of Toronto will soon be holding a public consultation to discuss the relatively recent pilot project on College St. between Manning and Landsdowne that saw "sharrows" installed where College St. has been determined to be too narrow to accommodate the continuation of the College St. bike lane. On-street car parking is allowed except during rush hour when the sharrows reveal themselves for cyclists. Thursday January 20, 2011 will be an opportunity for us to tell City Hall that we won't accept second-rate gestures of progress and recognition any longer. Come out and make your voice heard.
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"Sharrows" are "shared lane pavement markings," which look like bicycles with two chevrons in front. They are becoming increasingly common on streets in North America as well as the UK and Australia. In 2004 the City of San Francisco undertook a study of sharrows, which soon after saw them spread across the U.S. For more information about sharrows generally take a look at the Wikipedia page and for more information about sharrows in Toronto you can read the FAQ on the city's website.
Sharrows are meant to do a number of things including: alert motorists to the presence of cyclists on the road, improve safety for cycists, and indicate the lateral position where cyclists should ride. In Toronto we tend to have two types: sharrows placed to the right side of a curb lane where there is enough room for cyclists and motorists to ride side-by-side, and sharrows placed in the centre of the curb lane where there isn't. In the latter case, cyclists are encouraged by sharrows to "take the lane," as it were.
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There are several reasons why I believe that sharrows are bad for cyclists.
First, the psychological sense of improved safety on the road gained by sharrows is not a substitute for the real improvement in safety that would come with physically separated lanes, raised lanes, or bike pathways. Sharrows don't provide much more security for children, older riders, less agile riders, or larger cargo bikes that could be used to transport kids. Toronto continues to be a cycling city dominated by younger and more physically fit individuals. An inclusive method of transportation this does not make.
Sharrows tend to put cyclists between fast moving cars (and/or streetcars) and parked cars that leave cyclists vulnerable to both opened doors and cars changing lanes (despite any visibility improvement gained by the sharrow): The reality is that bikes are still placed in the middle.
Second, sharrows aren't all that usable. Most of the time sharrows sit under parked cars, or cars sitting in traffic. Turns out that they aren't all that visible under snow either. Rush-hour sharrows are only operative for a few hours on weekdays and centre lane sharrows encourage unsafe riding practices - I for one would rather ride by the side of road than in the centre of a lane between cars, buses, and trucks all going 40km/hr faster than me.
Anecdotally, I have heard from drivers who find this practice of "taking the lane" to be incredibly frustrating and unsafe. The effect is to pit cyclists against motorists when the intention is to encourage a polite sharing of the road space. The result, from a vocal car driving population, is a reasonable argument to get bikes off the roads entirely.
Third, sharrows reinforce the incorrect and detrimental belief that bikes are cars. Ontario has regretfully lumped both cars and bikes into the definition of "vehicle" under the Highway Traffic Act. This allows a bike to be on the road in Ontario, but has seemingly convinced everyone to treat bikes likes cars: the same traffic laws, the same traffic violation fines, arguments in favour of requiring bike licensing, and, for our purposes here, requiring bikes to share the road with cars.
Streetcars, for example, are not "vehicles" and it has been easier to develop streetcar-specific infrastructure including right-of-way lanes, traffic lights, etc. A separate definition has provided the possibility of prioritization in some cases (such as specific and advance lights) and a broader debate about budgeting, policy, design, and engineering. "Pedestrian" is not defined in the Act, but I would venture a guess that we all think sidewalks are a good idea.
Sharrows are "infrastructure" that reinforce the false notion that bikes and cars should be treated the same and should share the road. If we start to think of bikes as a unique category of transportation, which they are - one more similar to pedestrians than cars - then the realization that it makes more sense to accommodate bikes by building separated infrastructure will follow.
Cities like Copenhagen, Stockholm, Amsterdam, and Bogotá have all been successful in creating some form of separated cycling infrastructure - whether it be separated lanes, raised lanes, off-road but networked paths, or bike paths integrated into sidewalks - that recognize bikes as a form of transportation unlike cars.
Forth, sharrows are a political step backwards and will make it harder to advocate for better cycling infrastructure in the future. Each time we accept a new sharrow on the road we signal to City Hall that this is a reasonable compromise on safe infrastructure and that we are willing to settle for anything. We set a very low standard and a dangerous precedent for how Toronto should develop it's public road space. Even though we have caught onto the idea of "complete streets" we still see a fragmented understanding of the space between buildings.
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These arguments certainly raise many questions. There are undoubtedly legitimate concerns about money, political will, available road space, design and engineering standards, the legal status of bikes, and so on. But if Toronto is ever to become a safe and enjoyable cycling city we need to at least start with a shared vision and framework of best standards, rather than worst.
Way back in September I attended the Think Bike workshop at the El Mocambo and posted a blog entry about all the great ideas that our friends from the Netherlands had for our fair city.
The Dutch bicycle/city planners teamed up with Torontonians and city hall folk to create plans for redesigning Sherbourne St. and setting out a plan for a downtown bike lane network.
I was so captivated by the discussions that I failed to take good photos of the designs. Much to my good fortune, the City of Toronto has updated its Think Bike website and has posted the presentations from that night. You can visit the site and download the PDF presentations as well as other presentations from the Netherlands.
In particular, I liked the illustrations of different ways to design a street with a separated bike lane. Here are some examples from the Blue team's presentation:
Protected 2-way bike path with central blvd
Protected 2-way bike path with small dividing curb
Low flow shared space
Traditional separated bike lanes on either side of car traffic
Be sure to check out the presentations in full. Vive le vélo!
A while ago I wrote a post on separated bike lanes, bike specific traffic lights, and BIXI bikes in Montreal. Recently, a friend of mine visited Montreal for a weekend and snapped a nice photo of a separated bike lane running along Avenue du Parc:
Montreal has been building these types of separated bike lanes for a few years now. Already installed is a bi-directional, physically separated bike lane on the downtown street Boulevard de Maisonneuve:
For those who may remember, the intersection of Parc and Pins used to be a total disaster with many roads converging into or passing one another. Recently this intersection was flattened and now there is a nice bike lane that follows it along. Below is an aerial view of the way the intersection looks now with a handy blue line to indicate the bike lane.
Of biking in Montreal, my friend said: "The BIXI program as well as ample and safe bike lanes makes cycling much more accessible for residents and visitors to the city." Below is a picture of the Montreal Bikeway Network:
Vélo Quebec, a non-profit organization, has put together a planning and design manual focusing on pedestrians and cyclists.
I haven't had the chance to look through it, but I may just go ahead and order a copy.
At the recent Think Bike workshop in Toronto, Dutch bicycle planners addressed a number of design possibilities for Toronto, including bi-directional and buffered bike lanes as they have in Montreal, and illustrated several streets in Toronto's downtown core, such as Simcoe and Blue Jays Way, that could easily accommodate a redesign with physically separated bike lanes.
Montreal remains a great example for Toronto in how it's possible to integrate safe bike lanes into street reconstruction and redesign. Montreal is also a great example for Toronto because of the similarities in physical geography of the city and climate. If they can bike in the winter so can we.
Earlier this evening I had the opportunity to attend the Think Bike Workshop at El Mocambo. The City of Toronto and the Consulate General of the Kingdom of the Netherlands played host to Dutch bicycle planners yesterday and today.
Yesterday and earlier today these Dutch bicycle planners worked closely with city planners and community cyclists to tackle two main projects. The Blue team (blue being the official corporate colour of Toronto) was tasked with developing a cycling network in the downtown core. The Orange team (orange apparently is the colour of the Netherlands) took on the project of redesigning the Sherbourne street corridor. To find out more about this you can visit the Think Bike page on the City of Toronto website.
The purpose of this event was to showcase the results of these two workshop projects. Representatives from each team took the stage to report back their conclusions, designs, observations, and recommendations. Before the official speaking began, audience members had an opportunity to view the workshop results which were tapped up on the walls. These included pictures of proposed changes; charts and bullet lists of strengths, potential problems, strategies, etc.
Each group went up in turn and, for the most part, we were given presentations by the Dutch bicycle planners. The blue team envisioned a downtown bike network that filled in the present gaps in bike lanes, created several north-south and east-west cycling corridors, and, best of all, displayed four different ways to re-imagine/create complete streets in Toronto. Most of these involved some set up of separated bike lanes, green space, sidewalks, and car lanes/car parking. In particular, the planners spoke of the need to create "safe cycle routes" which would be these types of separated bike lanes. These lanes are particularly important for getting new cyclists on the road who may otherwise feel unsafe riding in current conditions.
Welcome desk
The blue team completely redesigned Sherbourne street with separated and painted bike lanes, bike boxes at each intersection, accommodations for pedestrians getting on and off busses, etc. It was an excellent attempt at providing a detailed plan for a complete street design.
Questions from the audience touched on the issues of giving cyclists a unique legal status (i.e. different from both pedestrians and cars), cycling in Toronto's winter climate, politicians in the upcoming municipal elections who may bring with them strong political vision for cycling in Toronto, etc.
Stage before start of presentations.
The evening and workshop was a success in terms of taking in the expertise and recommendations of the Dutch bike planners. They made many great points for us to incorporate in our next bike plan including: integrating transportation planning with city planning, re-conceiving of possible street designs, connecting up public transportation with cycling, marketing cycling to the public, integrating cycling education into primary schools, etc.
At the end of the evening, one of two hosts, who is the head of cycling infrastructure (or something like that) at City Hall put it well: it's not for a lack of ideas, the question is one of money and political will.
(Sorry for the lack of photographs; I'm still getting used to whole reporting/blogging thing.)
At the end of June I went on two trips with my partner: first, to Chicago, where we saw a great Phish show, stayed with an old friend, and ate at the delicious Frontera Grill; then, to Brooklyn, where we baked in the heat, wandered the city, had some succulent pork, and had a generally fantastic time with some good friends. On both trips I did a little "field research" and observed the cycling culture and infrastructure. Below are some photos I took.
Chicago
On our way up to the L I saw this nifty bike parking area. Two levels, a great way to connect cycling and public transit. The (out of focus) picture below is the same parking area from another view.
Unfortunately, that's all I have for Chicago.
New York City
These seemed to be pretty standard bike lanes in NYC: painted white lines separating them from car traffic and green paint to indicate it as a bike lane. Definitely nice to see the green paint, much like Copenhagen's distinctive blue paint.
One morning we decided to walk across the Brooklyn bridge into Manhattan. On the way up to the bridge we found this pathway with separated space for pedestrians and cyclists.
Here is another example of the green painted bike lanes, but this one has a much larger buffer painted between the bike lane and car lane. The major design flaw, as you can see, is that it doesn't do much to prevent cars from driving across the buffer and even into the lane itself.
This road forks into two directions and you can see the green lane on the left and a sharrow marking on the right to direct where cyclists should ride. Unfortunately, the bike lane has been placed between the parked cars and the rest of traffic.
Finally! Here is a picture of a separated and dedicated bike lane. It is totally removed and protected from the rest of the street. Perhaps it's not the most attractive separated lane I've seen, but it gets the job done.
This picture shows how road designers have placed the separated bike lane and cars making a left hand turn. Presumably cyclists have the right of way on a green light.
In this photo you can see not only the physically separated bike lane, but also the bike specific traffic light. I'm a big fan of bike specific traffic lights where there are bike lanes like these because it helps cars and pedestrians realize that cyclists are on the road and have particular right of way rules.
A beautiful photo taken by my partner from the roof top of our hosts' apartment in Brooklyn.
Round Up
That's it for Cycle Toronto's summer road trip. It's always interesting to see how other cities are accommodating cyclists and improving their cycling infrastructure. Toronto was close to getting a New York style separated bike lane on University Avenue this summer, but we all know how that ended. If you're going be taking any road trips of your own, snap some photos of cycling and cycling infrastructure and send them in so that I can post them on the blog.
This is a recent Streetfilms video about cycling in Copenhagen through North American eyes. It was filmed during the 2010 Velo City global bike conference that just finished in Copenhagen. (Oh how I wish I could have been there! I just got back some beautiful black and white photos that I took in Copenhagen last fall/winter and am feeling a tad nostalgic.)
Much of what you see in this video is the result of technical solutions to problems around making cities (and Copenhagen in particular) more livable and bike friendly. As you will see in the video, it was a process that has taken shape over 40 years and much to the credit of Jan Gehl. I say "technical" because of an interesting conversation I had with a friend a few weeks ago about urban planning and the issue of technical solutions to fundamentally political problems. More on that another time.
Enjoy the video. The soothing, meditative music is a nice touch!
In a couple of hours I have my Land Use Planning exam; so what better time to clear my head and write a new post on bike lane designs in Toronto.
I have tried to contact some folks at the City to inquire about designs for physically separated bike lanes, but I haven't received any responses yet. So what I'll look at for now are the main designs that the City uses. You can also find this information on the City's Cycling Website.
Bike Lanes:
These are your strip of white paint on the road lanes. They are meant to be for exclusive use of bikes and there are signs usually posted on the side of the road to indicate that it's a bike lane. Generally they are right up against the sidewalk, but sometimes they are placed between the moving vehicles and the parked cars.
Sharrows:
This design isn't actually a bike lane. A sharrow is white hash mark painted on a road to indicate the ideal cycling position on that road, which is usually in the middle of moving cars and parked cars.
Shared Roadways:
These are signed routes which have been designated as preferred biking routes in the official bikeway network plan. There is no physical design or actual physical lane. There is simply a sign on the side of the road that indicates that bikes can ride there.
Off-Road Bike Paths:
These are essentially bike riding trails. They are multi-use for pedestrians, in-line skaters and cyclists. They are physically separated from cars. These are actually the best bike lanes in the city. You can find them west on Eglinton, north-south along the Humber River, east-west along the lake shore, and north-south along the DVP. They are a pleasure to ride on.
So there you have it: bike lane designs in Toronto. In my next post I'll look at some of the problems with these designs and even make suggestions for improvements.
