Open house on Sherbourne Street separated bicycle lane designs

Montreal separated bike lane - probably not exactly how Sherbourne will look

You are invited to an open house to review designs for separated bike lanes on Sherbourne, likely to be approved and installed this year.

When: January 26 5:00 PM-8:00
Where: Our Lady of Lourdes Catholic School Gym - 444 Sherbourne St. (at Wellesley)

You can read up on City's info on separated bikeways. What is likely to be a contentious aspect of the separated bike lanes is the removal and offsetting of all on-street car parking, some of which will be moved to side streets. Hopefully this won't hinder it.

If you can't attend you can call the cycling infrastructure voicemail: 416-338-1066 or email: bikesherbourne@toronto.ca

From City's page:

The existing Sherbourne Street bike lanes were installed in 1996. On July 12, 2011, City Council directed City staff to proceed with detailed design and consultation to upgrade the Sherbourne bike lanes with the aim to better separate cars and bikes and improve safety for cyclists. The construction of the upgraded bike lanes is scheduled to start in summer 2012 in combination with the resurfacing of Sherbourne Street.

Separated bike lanes have been implemented in Montreal, Ottawa and Vancouver and are popular in hundreds of other cities around the world. Sherbourne is the first of a series of separated bike lanes approved by Council to improve the cycling network in downtown Toronto.

Design Considerations
Separated bike lanes require more width than the existing painted bike lanes. In order to maintain the traffic flow and efficient TTC bus service along Sherbourne Street, the new design will result in the following changes:

Removal of all on-street parking on Sherbourne
Left-turns restricted at King Street and Shuter Street during rush hours
The design will maintain vehicle access to all connecting driveways and laneways along Sherbourne Street. In addition, approximately 27 new on-street parking spaces will be added to some east-west streets off of Sherbourne Street to partially offset the loss of parking on Sherbourne Street.

Affected City agencies and departments are involved in the design process to ensure the needs of City services are addressed. This includes:

TTC Bus service
Wheel-Trans pick-up/drop-off
Fire and emergency access
Curb-side waste collection
Snow removal and street cleaning
Design details are still being finalized and we would appreciate your review and feedback. View the draft designs at our January 26 public open house.

Design and Construction Time Line
Design and construction timing will vary by section as described below.

Elm Ave. to Bloor St.

No change to the existing bike lanes.
Bloor St. to Gerrard St.

No major road works – localized surface repairs where needed in 2012.
Bike lanes maintained at road level.
Mountable curbs, flexible bollards (short poles) and painted buffers to separate bike and traffic lanes.
Gerrard St. to Front St.

Roadway resurfacing in 2012 enables permanent cycle track design.
Cycle Track – raised bike lane at sidewalk level.
Separated by rolled curb with a painted buffer between cycle track and traffic lanes.
Front St. to Lake Shore Blvd.

2013 roadway reconstruction – permanent cycle track design.
Lake Shore Blvd. to Queens Quay

2013 Waterfront Toronto reconstruction.
To be designed in consultation with Waterfront Toronto.

herb : 13 years 4 months ago
Tags:

Toronto Committee to give cyclists late Christmas gift

Everyone loves to park in the bike lane

City Hall is back in business after the holiday season, but the gifts keep on coming. Parking on busy streets during rush hour, or blocking a bike lane any time has been increased by $150 fine if passed by city hall.

Public works and infrastructure voted 3-2 Wednesday to hike the fine from the current $60 for parking in a no stopping or standing zone and $40 for parking in a no parking zone.

The two dissenting votes were cast by councillors Shiner and Parker, who worried the hike is a “feel good” motion when the real problem is enforcement.

Tickets are issued by parking enforcement officers who work for Toronto police.

Shiner said their quota system — called “targets” by police — that sees parking officers expected to issue a certain number of tickets per day means they hit lots of cars at expired meters or on side-streets, rather than one car blocking busy traffic and causing a huge headache.

Councillor Denzil Minnan-Wong, the committee's chair, agreed with the dissenters and said city staff will talk to police about better enforcement.

“We are moving forward in trying to address congestion,” said Councillor Denzil Minnan-Wong chair of the public works committee. “This is a positive step forward.”

The increased fine is one part of attacking the problem, he said, and proper enforcement is another.

The fine hike would need to go to council for approval before coming into effect.

Watchers of how things are done at City Hall have already placed bets on Doug Ford and his puppet mayor brother putting up stiff opposition to the intended by-law change.

The committee is also debating a system that would see courier and delivery companies able to buy annual permits, at a cost of $600 per vehicle or $5,000 for a 10-vehicle fleet, allowing them to park in no-parking zones for up to 30 minutes outside of the morning and afternoon rush hours.

Perhaps they will consider offering this deal to all car drivers, though with the amount of enforcement in bike lanes, car drivers in Toronto are already getting this for free.

Toronto drivers can expect to pay more for stopping illegally on main streets during rush hour under a plan endorsed Wednesday by the city’s public works committee.

Councillor Gord Perks, who voted for the measure, said he was skeptical about the effects.

“This is more about the appearance of action than real action,” he said.

Councillor John Parker, one of two committee members to vote against the increased fines, said hiking fines is unlikely to solve gridlock. “If we are really serious about clearing the street the issue is not the fine, it is what policy we put in place to clear the path,” he said.

The new fines will be debated by council at its next regular meeting.

Derek Chadbourne : 13 years 4 months ago
Tags:

Top eleven posts of 2011

Photo: Herb. Bells on Bloor 2011, popular as ever, even though City Council voted to stop the Environmental Assessment

Cycling and politics were a hot item in 2011, from the vote to remove Jarvis Bike Lanes, the vote to install protected bike lanes, the launch of Bixi, and the politicians who took cheap shots by trying to make cyclists into urban terrors. Here's a recap of 2011's top 11 blog posts, ranked by the number of comments. It's not the only way to rank blog posts, but the easiest to come by.

  1. Separated bike lane proposal and battle heating up
    Bixi bikes are on the streets and the fight continues to get separated bike lanes approved for downtown. Some lefty councillors oppose, some support.
  2. Few bike lanes: the cause of most sidewalk cycling
    A pedestrian dies after colliding with a cyclist in North York. There is a strong call to crack down on cyclists yet the pedestrian's family say he was an avid cyclist and understood how bad cycling infrastructure is in the burbs. And where are the critics when a pedestrian is killed by a motorist?
  3. Public Works committee votes to take out Jarvis bike lanes: total -8 km bike lanes this year
    The vote to take out the Jarvis bike lanes made international news. What big city in this era votes to take out bike lanes?
  4. The Toronto Parking Authority exists solely to subsidize drivers of private automobiles
    City Council sets the limit of what the TPA charges instead of leaving it to supply/demand. Why not stop subsidizing drivers if we don't want to subsidize cyclists or transit?
  5. Indirect lefts: how to improve what most cyclists do anyway
    Simple diagram from a NYC bike guide on how to make left turn that's easy for those not fast enough or skilled enough to make a "vehicular left".
  6. Downtown separated bike lanes plan: Minnan-Wong makes it his own
    In a strange turn of events right-wing Minnan-Wong takes on the separated bike lane cause just as some left-wing politicians oppose.
  7. If not now, when? If not here, where? Separated bike lanes in Vaughan's Ward
    Councillor Vaughan wasn't keen on separated bike lanes despite their popularity and had other designs on some of the chosen streets, such as Richmond and Adelaide.
  8. How to get cyclists off the sidewalk: councillor asks, answers and then ignores herself
    It's an easy win for a North York politician to raise an outcry against cyclists on sidewalks even if she can't name any particular moment. Councillor Karen Stintz gets to look like a hero without having to come up with any practical solution that would get cyclists off the sidewalk, namely bike lanes.
  9. A preventable death
    Jenna Morrison died after being crushed by a turning truck at Sterling and Dundas, near the entrance of the Toronto West Railpath. There was a strong outcry from the community. Most people agree it was preventable, and have suggested a number of ways to have prevented it, including truck side guards, bike lanes, safer intersection.
  10. City transportation planners give cycling policy a big boost
    The Urban Bikeway Design Guide was released by the National Association of City Transportation Officials (NACTO) at the National Bike Summit in Washington D.C. It's a great resource for transportation planners and a counterpoint to the AASHTO's Guide for the Development of Bicycle Facilities which has dominated the scene for decades.
  11. Separating a core of continuous bike lanes from traffic: some reasons why it's a good idea
    Some reasons for why separated bike lanes are a good idea, including, most Torontonians want them; they can hep increase pedestrian safety; encourage newbies, old, very young to start cycling more; prevents cars from parking in the lanes.

Top forum posts:

  1. Police demanding bicyclists abandon roadway and use sidewalk on Queen E/B E of Bathurst
  2. Condo rules not allowing bike storage in dwelling units Toronto.
  3. Downtown Bike Lanes Back on City Hall Burner
  4. Observations from the Jenna Morrison ghost bike installation
  5. Restrictions on "Motor-Assisted Bicycles" (aka e-bikes)
  6. Write your MPP! Motorist education time!
  7. Thanks to the safety signer at College/Spadina
  8. Give and Take at PWIC
  9. Taking the Lane
  10. Commute from Etobicoke North to the Annex
  11. P-gates are back at Ontario Place
herb : 13 years 4 months ago
Tags: