Winter cyclist profile — Tanya the IT Coordinator

Name / Occupation / Age

Tanya Quinn/ IT Coordinator / 34

What do you use your bike for?

Everything! Commuting, shopping, visiting friends, crazy long day rides sightseeing small town Ontario, camping etc.

How often do you ride?

Pretty much every day. It’s my main mode of transport. Some days when I’m more local, I walk.

How long have you been commuting by bicycle and what made you decide to start?

It was six years ago that I became seriously committed. I had been taking the streetcar to work and I found it slow and unreliable. At first I was in bad shape, since I rarely got any exercise, and the streetcar I would have passed me while I was red-faced and lying on the boulevard trying to catch my breath. I kept doing it every day because I bought a bike computer and was fascinated watching my mileage go up and up. After 2 or 3 weeks it wasn’t so hard anymore.

What would you say to convince someone who is considering commuting by bicycle to go for it?

Just pick a nice day and try it out! Or try your commute on a Sunday. The perception of what it’s like to bike in traffic always seems worse than the reality.

When did you start commuting in winter and why?

Other people were doing it, I figured how bad can it be? The first winter I was commuting I had a long commute so I did half bike and half transit to avoid the unpleasant parts of the TTC trip.

What are the biggest challenges for winter bikers in Toronto?

The snow and ice accumulate on the sides of the road so you have to move over and take up more space. Some drivers don’t respect that. Few bike lanes are usable during winter, instead they seem to be snow repositories for the plows.

What reaction do you get from co-workers?

I think they are used to me being an all-weather cyclist. I sometimes have interesting conversations with drivers in the elevator to the underground parking (where the bike racks are.)

What’s the best thing about commuting by bicycle in winter?

I like the warmth of exercise mixed with the biting cold wind on your face. It makes you feel alive. Staying fit, having fun, efficient travel…there are just so many bonuses! And it’s easy to get a spot on the bike racks because there are less people doing it, though I’d welcome more company on the roads! I also totally love that I don’t have to dig a car out after a snowfall, or scrape ice, or wait for the engine to warm up. Just start pedalling and the heat turns on pretty quick!

Can you give a brief description of your route?

My commute is 6 km one way from Leslieville to Richmond/Bathurst. I usually take Queen Street there, and Adelaide coming home (Queen to cross the Don.) It's very flat. I don’t sweat, so the only time I need to change clothes is if there’s a bad heatwave. I like to leave after 9 a.m. so there are a few parked cars on Queen Street to slow things down. Adelaide can be hectic, but just pick a lane - ride in the middle - and flow along with the traffic (which can often be mind-numbingly sloooow.)

Where are your favourite places or streets to bike in Toronto? Least?

Queen Street. Bloor/Danforth. Lots of bikes, street life, and sights. In the summer Leslie Spit is a nice oasis. Least favourite? Pick any suburban carterial. The speed differential is a lot between bikes and other traffic. Generally anywhere downtown is great because of congestion, traffic is fairly slow moving.

What do you like about biking in Toronto in winter?And dislike?

Since we don’t get a lot of snow, usually the challenge is keeping warm. Biking keeps your internal temperature warmer and winter doesn’t seem so long and chilling.

I dislike parked cars that keep proper snow clearing from happening. Oh, and, people that shovel snow into the roadway.

What could the City do to make winter biking better?

Plow bike lanes and the Martin Goodman. Enforce no overnight parking on snow routes, and then actually clear all the snow to the edges of the road. The curb lane on Queen can often get quite messy after a storm because of the parking.

What’s your favourite piece of winter cycling clothing?

That’s a toss up. I love my MEC rain pants that I wear to keep the cold wind out and any slushy road spray from passing vehicles off my pants. The thin balaclava under my helmet is great for keeping warm.

Any bike gadget/gear winter cyclists should not go out without?

Windproof outer layers are great since its the wind chill that will really make you cold. With a combination of over pants and fenders, you won’t need to worry at all about slush. Helmet covers are useful for keeping your head warmer - lots of vents are great in summer, not so great in winter. I love my rear-view mirror. Changing lanes needs to happen often in winter to go around big blobs of ice/snow and parked cars that are too far out because of the snowdrifts.

Do you use a different bike for winter riding?

I have a beater bike that I ride around the city year round. I like not having to worry when I lock it up whether it will be there or not when I come back. It usually needs some repairs after the winter. I have a touring bike which I use for longer excursions, but I don't like to take it out when there is road salt about.

Have you done any Holiday shopping by bike?

Haven’t started yet! I always shop by bike and find it interesting when shopkeepers ask “Are you going to carry that by bike?” even when the thing clearly fits into my backpack! This year I’m totally set with a homemade cargo trailer. You can see plans to make your own here: http://www.drumbent.com/trailer.html

Are you a member of any cycling organizations/clubs? If so, which ones?

I ride with Randonneurs Ontario for fun. We do brevets of 200 km and more. I’m a member of Advocacy for Respect for Cyclists, which provides information to cyclists that have been involved in accidents or been unfairly targeted by police, and holds memorials for (lets hope for none next year!) cyclists killed in traffic. I’m on the board of Community Bicycle Network which is involved in recycling bicycles, has a Toolworks program for people to work on their own bikes, and is working with other organizations to get some of our former BikeShare bikes out on the road again. I write for my own blog at http://crazybikerchick.blogspot.com and for http://www.ibiketo.ca.

Favourite winter bike stories?

Any day I successfully conquer the elements is a good one!

Cautionary winter bike stories?

Thinking every day is a good biking day, and then bundling up and going out in -40C (with the wind chill) weather on really messy roads. I went down in the first kilometer or so. With snow on the road it doesn’t hurt [as much - Ed’s note], but I was sure to get up off the road awfully quickly to avoid being hit by other traffic. Now I try to be less stubborn and use transit if the roads are really bad. This is only 3 or 4 days a year, meaning the rest of the time is great for winter biking!

tammy : 18 years 4 months ago
Tags: city hall, profiles, weather

A bike path through the airport

air france crash pearson airport - CBC
Soon you'll be able to take a bike path right through the Etobicoke Creek running through Pearson Airport, the National Post reports.

Officials have nearly resolved security issues over a new bike path across Pearson International Airport property, one of the last pieces in a new path that will allow bicyclists to travel from Toronto to Caledon.

“The big push in cycling circles is this concept of connectivity,” says Mississauga Councillor Eve Adams. “You want to be able to get onto a trail and go for a long run.”

Apparently the Etobicoke Creek trail should be quite idyllic unlike the surrounding flat, treeless airport lands.

The Etobicoke Creek bed is an uneven terrain, and the airport is therefore unable to use it, although it is officially part of the property the Greater Toronto Airport Authority leases from the federal government. Negotiations with the GTAA began in October and are expected to wrap up by this spring, in time for work to commence during the summer months. The trail will have its grand opening in spring 2009.
No public trail in North America has ever crossed airport property. Both the city and the GTAA want to make sure that the area can still be restricted in case of emergency situations at the airport.

There will be gates on either end so that in the event of an emergency they can still lock people out (or in?). Par example, the Air France plane that went beyond the runway and came to a stop in the Etobicoke Creek. They cyclists should have a great view of any future crashes!

herb : 18 years 4 months ago
Tags: airport, bike paths, cycling infrastructure

Blame it on the snow

Chester Hill Road bike lane: End of the lane

Four weeks. That's how long it's been since crews started work on the short (about 70 metres) contra-flow bike lane on Chester Hill Road between Cambridge and Broadview Avenues. I've been sitting on this post since they started work on the lane around November 20. Instead of celebrating its completion a day or two later, I'm still waiting.

Chester Hill Road bike lane: Can't you read the signs?
To date, the 70 metres of asphalt is only half painted: the solid yellow line separating the lane from oncoming traffic is done, but the diamond markings are still missing. In their place for about a third of the length are diagonal stripes that prohibit traffic (including bikes) from using that portion of the road. Those were put in earlier this year when the City repainted the road to make left- and right-turn lanes.

Only one bike lane sign is up (ironically, the one that proclaims the end of the lane) so far. Another is still covered in plastic wrap, and at least two more signs are still missing: one "bicycles excepted" sign allowing bikes to turn onto the street from Broadview despite the right-turn prohibition, and a stop sign for bikes at Cambridge (which, I'm quite sure, all cyclists will obey).

The signs and paint merely formalize what has long been an informal and well-used route to the Bloor Viaduct for cyclists wishing to avoid the traffic on Broadview. Chester Hill is one-way for only a single very short block, presumably for the express purpose of preventing cars from taking this very same shortcut.

I'm not faulting Transportation Services for the snow and rain we've seen since the day after they started work on the lane, and I realize they can't do much until the snow is gone. But it's unacceptable that virtually all of the bike lane work in the city was left to the last three months of the year.

When Adrian Heaps made his ill-advised promise of 30 km of lanes this year, many cyclists were skeptical. Even so, the year's piddly effort of 5 km or so is, in a word, pathetic. I don't think anyone expected that the city could do any worse than the glacial pace of installations during the last couple of years, yet they managed handily. So now Heaps is promising 50 km for next year? Pardon my skepticism, but once bitten...

The astounding thing is that Council still talks about finishing the Bikeway Network by 2012. They do realize that that's only 5 more working years, right? They do realize that since the inception of the Bike Plan, bike lanes are being created at a quarter of the necessary pace, and that even that pace has been slowing down in recent years, right? They do realize that they have no credibility on this matter any more, right? They do realize that their lip service is the reason that groups like OURS are thriving this year, right?

Council's plan to kickstart the creation of 50 km of lanes next year by picking all the low-hanging fruit sounds good, but it means that they're leaving the more difficult 400 km or so for the final four years. If they can only do 50 km of "easily-approved" lanes in a single year, what are the odds that they'd be able to do 100 km of "difficult" lanes each year for the four years after that? I believe the correct answer would be "Nil."

I suppose that the Chester Hill bike lane is a perfect metaphor for the bike plan: a small but important piece of a larger puzzle that seems hopelessly stalled after a promising start. Well, there's always next year.

Val Dodge is a Toronto cyclist and writer with a keen eye and some uncanny math skills (of which our council is hopefully taking advantage). This post originally appeared on Dodgeville, where Val shares more of his unique observations.

Val Dodge : 18 years 4 months ago
Tags: Adrian Heaps, bike lanes, Bike plan, ward 29, winter