Over at the Spacing Wire Matt Blackett has posted a street-level piece on Vancouver's cycling infrastructure. It's informative and inspiring!
VANCOUVER — I’m lucky enough to have a decent bike to ride for the duration of my stay here on the west coast. I ride almost daily in Toronto but the experience of riding daily in Vancouver is much different — it’s not just the hilly terrain, but there seems to be an understanding from both city officials and drivers that cycling is a viable transportation alternative to the car. Riding through Vancouver produced not only aching leg muscles, but a self-diagnosed case of serious cyclist envy.
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You can read the entire post here.
Besides the brilliant idea of "bike waiting boxes" (pictured below) at major intersections, I like the idea of larger bikeway network route signs that are more akin to signs targetting motorists. Here in Toronto the bikeway signs are numbered and tiny. In Vancouver, they are large and use street names. Why not rename our bikeway routes in Toronto after famous or local people of prominence? I think it would be fun and make for wider recognition of the (now somewhat invisible) shared infrastructure.
Photos by Matt Blackett
Comments
tanya
A bike button makes no sense
Sun, 08/19/2007 - 14:19Its very difficult to push a button while on your bike, and particularly if it is located on the sidewalk. Traffic sensors should instead be recalibrated to automatically detect bikes.
vic
Bike Buttons
Mon, 08/20/2007 - 10:31The bike buttons in Vancouver are pretty decent. They're right next to the road, so you don't have to reach far or anything to get to them. They usually work almost instantly too. :)
It's true that they take you out of the flow of traffic into the gutter when you have to move to the side to press them, but that didn't cause any problems during my few visits there.
Loop detectors would be ideal, but they're kind of finnicky it seems.
Vancouver does have some pretty cool bike infrastructure, mainly the "bike boulevards". They have the benefit of a mostly true grid system that makes implementing those easier. Some nice multi-use trails around the waterfront.... and I actually liked the lack of bike lanes in many places, when the roads were comfortable enough to ride without them. The bridges mostly suck though.
The hills are fun. :)
Cheers,
Vic