bike infrastructure

Come see what all this BIXI Toronto talk has been about!!

July 28 · 7:00pm - 10:00pm
Gladstone Hotel @ 1214 Queen St. West (near Dufferin)
Complimentary food and entertainment!

• Be one of the first to subscribe to BIXI Toronto and help make public bikes a reality in our City!
• Take a BIXI bike for a test spin and feel what a great ride they are.

Public Bikes have been dramatically improving cities around the world in recent years - and now it's our turn in Toronto!! But we need your participation to help make this happen.

Help us insure that this amazing program gets the support we need to roll out 1000 public bikes across downtown in Spring 2011 - without 1000 subscriptions sold by November, we lose the public bikes program altogether...

More information and a Q&A doc can be found here - http://bikeunion.to/bixi-toronto

• Community Facebook group I Will BIXI Toronto
• Official Facebook page BIXI Toronto
• Official Facebook event page BIXI Bash!

For more information about the event, and to indicate your interest in subscribing for year-round access to BIXI Toronto's public bikes, email bixitoronto@toronto.ca

If you cannot attend the event you may also subscribe online after the July 28th website launch at: www.toronto.bixi.com

Thank you HiMYSYeD for your photos of Jarvis Street bike lanes. Thank you to whoever clarified what we're really fighting for in the posters: clean air, safe roads, a fair share of public funds; and recognition that cyclists give back much more than we cost. Why wouldn't you love us?

Installing the bike lane signs:

The new bike lanes were just installed this last weekend. The photo above is of pre-bike lane Jarvis Street as taken by Yvonne Bambrick (just before she got two tickets for riding down the centre and taking photos). Luckily, riding in the actual bike lanes, as of today, will not get you a ticket. Photos and analysis to come soon. For now, some tidbits of the no-man's land of Jarvis Street in transition:

National Post

The Jarvis lanes represent a symbolic victory for cycling advocates who have lobbied for a more integrated cycling network, and safer conditions for bike users. But it’s been a polarizing issue, too, that triggered heavy opposition from critics who envisioned traffic chaos.

Mayoral candidate Rocco Rossi has made it a cornerstone of his campaign, vowing this week to “paint over” the Jarvis lanes if he is elected. He believes lanes are meant for secondary streets, like the ones on neighbouring Sherbourne Street that, he points out, could use some attention.

The lanes on Jarvis will link up to routes on Wellesley and Gerrard streets and get very close to Shuter Street, says Daniel Egan, manager of pedestrian and cycling infrastructure at the City of Toronto. He disputes suggestions that they go nowhere.

Streetfilms interviewed North American attendees at the Velo-City 2010 conference in Copenhagen to capture their view of Copenhagen and the differences with North American cities. Yvonne Bambrick of the Toronto Cyclists Union was also interviewed.

I was recently given a sneak peak of the BIXI Toronto bikes, which are being securely stored in a City "bunker" somewhere. We've made progress in the last two years.

Two years ago TCAT presented the TCAT Public Bike Forum (I helped Fred Sztabinski and Andrew Bieler organize it). At the forum we invited the top bikesharing systems out there (the advertising-based systems stayed away, most likely because Astral Media already had a lock on Toronto's street furniture deal). Alain Ayotte of Public Bike System Company out of Montreal gave an interesting presented on BIXI; it was the first time someone said that a bikesharing system could be financially self-sufficient and not rely on advertising or grants (I had presented on Bikeshare which met its death because it relied on unstable grants and received no public funding to keep it running).

BIXI was (and is?) the best of breed. Soon after that TCAT and the bike union invited BIXI to come show off their bikes. That was the first taste Torontonians had of the BIXI system. Come July 28th, T.O.ers will get their second taste at the BIXI Bash at the Gladstone Hotel (7:30pm), as BIXI launches its membership drive (only 900 or so left to sell!).

The contentious Jarvis bike lanes should be operational by the end of July. Transportation Services will be removing the reversible centre lane and hardware starting Friday July 16. Depending on who you are this will either be the end of the world as we know it, or a small addition to a street network that is safer for cyclists.

Read more about the Jarvis Streetscape improvements, and read the press release:

News Release
July 14, 2010

Installation of bike lanes on Jarvis Street begins this Friday

The City of Toronto's Transportation Services Division will begin the installation of bike lanes on Jarvis Street (from Queen Street East to Charles Street) on Friday, July 16, continuing until late July.

As a result of this work, Jarvis Street will be transformed from five lanes of traffic to four, with two bicycle lanes. In order to undertake this work safely, a series of partial road closures and lane reductions will be required.

The following is a summary of the work:

Friday, July 16 - The removal of pay-and-display parking machines and the installation of no-stopping regulations on the roadway will occur.

Friday, July 16 (evening) - The centre reversible lane will be taken out of operation in both directions.

Saturday, July 17 or Sunday, July 18 (weather permitting) - Temporary pavement markings will be installed to mark the closure of the centre lane. This work will take place during the evening.

Wider Viaduct bike lanes: Photo: Michelle St. Amour

Wider bike lanes and sharrows to help cyclists through intersections and to make it past the DVP highway turnoff have been installed this week on the Bloor Viaduct. Thanks to Michelle St. Amour of bikeSauce for providing some investigative photos. (bikeSauce is a DIY bike repair hub and community space at Queen and Broadview, and being eastenders likely have an interest in an improved Viaduct.)

A 2008 report by the Ward 29 advocacy group (as part of the bike union's ward advocacy program) were instrumental in identifying the issues with the viaduct for cyclists.

Staff have indicated that widening the bike lanes have required narrowing of the other lanes, but that this provides the added benefit of motor vehicles slowing down. There is studies that show narrower lanes reduce traffic speeds, increases traffic calming thus making it safer for pedestrians and cyclists.

For years cyclists had to put up with a pinch on the curve going eastbound before the Viaduct. Cars and trucks would almost always drift into the bike lane as they turned, leaving cyclists vulnerable. This small change has likely made a big difference:

Removing the pinch: Photo: Michelle St. Amour

This video shows the wide variety of conditions for cyclists in the West End of Toronto, everything from major streets (Keele) with no bicycle lanes to really major high-speed roads (Queensway) with bicycle lanes.