This photo was taken by Martin Koob at the City's cycling consultation session in July. A summary of that consultation can be found here.
Remember back in June when the newly minted Cycling Committee Chair, Councillor Adrian Heaps, said we'd get 27 km of bike lanes this year or else? Heaps was quoted in the Star saying, "If the transportation department has to spray paint it themselves – you can quote me on this – it's going in."
Who's counting? Martin Koob of biketoronto.ca is. He has crafted a comprehensive list of what's done, what's approved and what's left for 2007. Let's add it up!
Paint is dry:
* Logan Ave. - Eastern to point zoom south 0.2 km (contra-flow, pictured at bottom)
* Christie St. - Bloor to St. Clair 1.2 km (more pictures in our <a href="http://www.ibiketo.ca/image/tid/191">Streetscapes gallery</a>)
* Knox - Queen to Eastern 0.2
* Roselawn - Marlee to Dufferin 1 km (additional information below - <strong>UPDATE</strong>* Pictures now added below)
Approved and ready to rumble:
* Chester Hill - Broadview W 0.1 km
* Greenwood - Danforth to Queen 2.1 km
* Carlaw - Logan /Gerrard to Dundas 1 km
* Pond - Sentinel to Murray Ross 1 km
* Rogers - Old Weston to Oakwood 2.6 km
* Sentinel - Finch to Dovehouse 1.7 km
* Stephen - Queensway to Berry 0.5 km
* Queensway - Claude to Windermere 1.8 km
* Yonge - Queens Quay to Front 0.6 km
Still waiting for Go(dot):
* Annette & Dupont - Landsdowne to Jane 3.5 km
* Conlins - Sheppard to Military Trail 2.7 km
* Dawes - Danforth to Victoria Park 2.2 km
* Horner - Judson Browns Line to Islington 3.3 km
* Mill - Rathburn to Bloor 2 km
* Pharmacy - Danforth to Eglinton 3.9 km
* Rathburn - East Mall to Renforth 1.3 km
* Shaw - Barton to Dupont 0.6 km
* Eastern - Logan to Leslie 1.1 km
* Stanley - Royal York to Superior 0.6 km
* Royal York - Delroy to Mimico Creek 1.4 km
* Wilmington & Faywood - Finch to Clanton Park 3.1 km
That gives us a total of 2.6 km of actual, installed bike lanes for 2007 so far!
Please email me or Martin if you know of any others, or see anything amiss with this list.
Now, if the City wants to meet the Mayor's 2012 deadline for the Bike Plan it will have to install almost 80 km of on-street bike lanes per year. (I include a breakdown of the numbers, with more source links, in a previous Spacing post here.)
And, Council still needs to approve 14 km more to hit the 27 km target for this year.
You might also notice that Roselawn is not on the biketoronto list, but that it is at the top of the list pictured above. I was told by a cyclist riding on Roselawn that it was done, back in August. But, it was also being reported in the bike blogosphere that it was not standard width, nor was it signed. I decided to call the councillor's office to ask: Bike Lane or No Bike Lane?
Councillor Moscoe said he had a long, bitter fight with planners over stencilling this strip as a bike lane, which they refused to do. He admitted that it is only "about 4 feet" wide -- which is about half the standard 2 m width, recommended by the Transportation Association of Canada for a bike lane on a major urban road. But, he added that there are no parked cars on this road and thus, no door zone. "Someday I'm going to go and get the paint and paint my own stencil," he blustered. As much as I can appreciate his enthusiasm for bike lanes, cyclists here don't want to be squeezed. We want lanes of proper width, clearly signed and marked.
Still unclear, I asked a friend in the area to check it out today. She said there is, indeed, a bike lane on Roselawn complete with stencils, but that it is Marlee between Lawrence and Roselawn where there are no official markings. Photos are pending.
Another bit (and I do mean bitsy bit) of lane that might look contentious on paper is the 200 metre strip on Logan. It may be small, but it's not the size that matters -- it's the functionality. This bit of bike lane is an extremely useful contra-flow lane.
One-way streets can be used as a means of traffic control in residential areas, but they are a pain for cyclists. Contra-flow bike lanes are a great way to maintain the traffic control of one-way streets while allowing cyclists to have more direct routes through their neighbourhoods. Bicycles are officially exempted from the one-way street when a contra-flow bike lane is installed. Note below: the line marking the bike lane is yellow and not white since it separates traffic moving in opposite directions.
Do you have a suggestion for a contra-flow lane in your area? I'd love to hear it.
Above photos Courtesy of Martin Koob at biketoronto.ca
UPDATE — Roselawn bike lane below… signed, stencilled and delivered!
Roselawn bike lane begins west from Marlee and is marked all the way to Dufferin.
Marlee paint stripe below. City engineers won’t sign off on “lanes” that don’t meet the TAC standard width requirements. Apparently, council voted this one to be painted anyway! (What the councillor told me now makes sense, but he was obviously referring to Marlee.) This issue will also be familiar to citizens of Ward 5 and cyclists who use Royal York Rd. The Royal York Road reconstruction from Delroy to Mimico has been finished but the bike lanes are not in.
Unmarked Marlee lane begins at Eglinton and goes all the way to Lawrence.
Photos courtesy of Karey Iron
Crossposted from Spacing...where a lively discussion on the merits of contra-flow lanes has begun...
Comments
chephy (not verified)
Marlee bike lane
Tue, 10/09/2007 - 14:25I ride on Marlee once every couple of weeks. The "bike lane" there is usable in the summer (it helps that the road has been repaved recently and is pleasantly smooth). Last winter, however, it was not cleared, and frankly, it's so narrow that you can't really clear it - there is nowhere to put the snow. With other bike lanes, of proper width, you can clear the leftmost portion of the bike lane which is not ideal, but leaves enough space to ride. Riding on Marlee, however, is pretty dodgy in winter, since the "bike lane" is exactly where all the snow is. I think that's one good reason not to approve a bike lane that narrow. Really, bike lanes should at the very least meet all the standards. Otherwise we'll soon end up with 1 foot wide lanes and politicians claiming that those lanes are "better than nothing". Actually, subpar bike lanes are way worse than nothing.
cyclistpaul
Bike Lanes in Winter
Fri, 10/12/2007 - 13:31Two years ago I emailed Adam Giambroni (sp?), then the counciller on the cycling committee, now the head of the TTC (wow, helping out our mayor really pays off) about the Davenport bike lane in the winter. The snow plows push the snow into the parking spaces, so the lazy residents, instead of clearing their spaces, were parking in the bike lane, leaving me to do my commute in the same single lane as the car traffic. Of course, Adam was holidaying in the south at the time.
Bike lanes in the winter are just a great place for snow or parking. I was shocked when we moved to Mississauga in December; the little bike path following the stream beside our apartment building is plowed in the winter, and has lighting! I haven't found Mississauga's bike network to be helpful to me yet in getting me where I want to go, but with what they have, they do a great job.
And this problem with bike lanes is why I prefer to ride on main arterial roads (Dundas, Keele, Bloor, Wilson) - they get plowed first after a snowfall. The secondary streets with bike lanes aren't going to be plowed before you need to get to work - and, where will they put the snow? - right where you want to ride.
With all the year-round cyclists in the city (admittedly, more in the downtown core than elsewhere, one would think the city could do a little more. For example, some evening after a snowfall, post letters at all the houses saying to park in the local school parking lot that evening, then bring in the trucks and clear the snow, then the people move their cars back, and lo and behold, we can ride on the bike lane again. And the mayor could get major bucks for his budget crisis by towing any cars that aren't moved, and fining the owner.
Take care, Paul Dicks
hamish (not verified)
the Bloor construction
Fri, 10/12/2007 - 23:15Watermain work is being done on Bloor starting from Ave. Rd. and going east. It's in advance of the "revitalization" project on Bloor that the BYBIA has promoted, and it's uncertain if it means we get bike lanes or not, though the merchants did agree to strip off the parking for wider sidewalks - some of us are going "well what about bike safety huh?" The westbound is really dodgy for biking in - take the lane, but the eastbound is wider, likely to be accomodating for those cars that need to stop for a moment vs. bike traffic.
I think it's finished by end of Nov.
The cost of the redoing of that 1km is c. $22M and the City is borrowing it but the BYBIA is repaying it. How much public input and process is "allowed" with this privatization of public space is a question. Councillor Rae is the local councillor.
Annie (not verified)
Christie
Tue, 10/09/2007 - 14:30The Christie bikelane hasn't made it all the way down to Bloor yet. I was just S. of Dupont yesterday and there were no signs of the bikelane. N. of Dupont maybe?
Darren_S
Spray paint
Tue, 10/09/2007 - 15:32Let us hope that the bike lanes are much more than just mere spray paint. They also have to be enforced. Having the city park its own vehicles on the bike lanes to take lunch does not have them count for too much. :()
Dr. Steph
Bloor st construction
Wed, 10/10/2007 - 11:26Anyone know what they're doing on Bloor between Yonge and Avenue? It's down to two skinny lanes (very tough to bike there right now). Nice if they fix the potholes, and I'm guessing no bike lane will end up there when they're done.
chephy (not verified)
No bike lane on Bloor.
Wed, 10/10/2007 - 22:30Not this time around anyway. Guaranteed.
Though if there is going to be a bike lane anywhere on Bloor, I vote for starting it around Spadina and going west. 99% of cyclists who take Bloor between Spadina and Dufferin ride within a foot or less of parked cars. I witnessed a dooring there myself once. It's probably the most underestimated danger in urban cycling, if I judge by the numbers of people who routinely ride in the door zone.
East of Spadina is not too bad though, in my humble. Yeah, the potholes were pretty bad, and it's great that they're getting fixed. But the curb lanes themselves are wide around there.
herb
and one bike lane less
Fri, 10/12/2007 - 09:37I wonder if it is just my imagination. I was biking on Davenport between Dovercourt and Ossington where they resurfaced the road and repainted. I seem to recall that previously this section was striped as bike lanes. Now it seems that they've repainted it to be a long dotted line - still in the same position as the bike lane - but allowing drivers access to the space at any time to double park, turn into, etc.
Can anyone confirm this? Maybe it was always like this.
vic
Davenport
Fri, 10/12/2007 - 10:01Herb,
I haven't been along that stretch of Davenport for a few weeks. Maybe I'll check it out sometime next week.
In some ways, dashed lines make more sense for bike lanes anyway. Solid lines are supposed to mean that you're not allowed to cross them. Bike lane stripes have to be crossed all the time when passing, turning, parking, etc..etc...
I have no idea why they did this on davenport though. Could possibly be just the temporary paint they put on before they lay down the "real" stuff?
The EnigManiac
Davenport Dovercourt-Ossington
Fri, 10/12/2007 - 12:44I live right at Dovercourt & Davenport and have used the Davenport bike lane since it was installed a number of years ago. There was never an eastbound bike lane between Oakwood and Ossington due to parking for the shops that are there. It's a short gap, but a gap none-the-less. The road re-surfacing did not eliminate the lane. It simply never existed. Westbound, however, there is a bike lane.