Everything Bicycles | Winnipeg

[Auror]

Originally Posted by rrskylar

Disagree, society and tax dollars should be for the common good not spent frivolously on entitled groups. If you are outlying this amount of capital for only .01 % of the population that actively cycle and closing vehicle lanes is this really the best use of resources? Common sense would say no on many levels except in Skyscraper Page forums.

You do realize that sometimes you have to build it to induce demand? I normally don't bike. But now those lanes are there, I'm looking forward to biking to work. Since a non biker like myself now are interested, there would be many others too. I just talked with a friend at work about the new bike lanes, and she said she would start using it.

How about that?

[rrskylar]

Originally Posted by Auror

You do realize that sometimes you have to build it to induce demand? I normally don't bike. But now those lanes are there, I'm looking forward to biking to work. Since a non biker like myself now are interested, there would be many others too. I just talked with a friend at work about the new bike lanes, and she said she would start using it.

How about that?

BUt not until next May or June though right? Be honest.

[TimeFadesAway]

Originally Posted by rrskylar

It's not just the 1% spent on curbs and paint for the dedicated bike lanes, the true cost is the expense of the road, if you have three lanes of roadway and one is hacked out for a bike lane the real cost is much higher, more like 33.3% of what the actual road cost is.

No, it isn't.

[windypeg]

Originally Posted by rrskylar

BUt not until next May or June though right? Be honest.

Sure most cyclists only bike 1/3 of the year, but most motorists only use 1/5 of their vehicle capacity, driving around solo in a vehicle that seats 5 or 6. You might think it’s unfair to provide lanes for cyclists who don’t use them year-round, I find it unfair to provide lanes to drivers who use them very wastefully and inefficiently.

At the end of the day cars take up the most pavement per passenger because we use them to transport 1 person at a time, 90% of the time. Cyclists may only use their space for part of the year, but drivers usually only use a fraction of the space they take up. If drivers are entitled to hog 5 times more road space than they really need, why shouldn't cyclists get space even if they only use it part of the year?

[Auror]

Originally Posted by rrskylar

BUt not until next May or June though right? Be honest.

Why not late April, or early May? October is still bikeable weather now as long as you dress warm. (if that's a word ). That's still half a year, or almost half a year. The cold doesn't bother me. I'm not one of those people that posts on FB that OMG it's snowing on the first sign of snow lol.

Late April, May, June, July, August, September, October. Maybe November if we have a nice indian summer.

Let's be honest. That's more than 1/3 a year. But if you want to involve strictly warm weather (over +10), then still May to September. That is 5 months. This Thursday apparently will be +17. Bikeable weather!

[buzzg]

More people biking means a healthier population, less money spent on healthcare, less people driving, which means more room for drivers & less environmental impact. Looking simply at the cost of bike lanes (which is on par with usage, as mentioned) is ridiculous.

[Authentic_City]

People walk a lot less in the winter too, so why bother providing sidewalks if most people only use them for half the year?

Why build roads and bridges to handle peak traffic loads? Most roads and bridges are deserted at night and on Sunday mornings, so why are we wasting money building infrastructure that isn't used heavily all the time?

Why use public money to build a stadium that's not used for half the year?

[Ando]

watch it, you're robbing skylar of all his creative ideas.

[buzzg]

Three things:

1) The city finally installed plastic pylons/bollards on all the new bike lane curbs downtown, just in time for winter. They're neon yellow/green, so they should be more visible and not look disgusting after one week – good job.

2) I don't understand why a bus stop island wasn't built here (below). There's plenty of room to build it like on McDermot, as there's now just a giant wasteland of a former lane that's unusable between the through lane and bike lane/curb. At most you may have to take out 1 tree if necessary for the by-pass, but all three in the photo were planted a month ago. Also so dumb they didn't blast off or cover up all the old lane markings.



3) I have seen SO MANY not-in-service busses (or ones waiting to get timing back on track) pulled over blocking the bike lanes on Pembina. It's bad enough that massive delivery trucks are doing this, but the fact city busses are is ridiculous. Send out a memo – they still block half the right-hand vehicle lane when doing this, so what's the point.

The city needs to put curbs & bollards all down Pembina – not just where there's parking.

[buzzg]

Anyone figured out what these are for yet?

[rrskylar]

Originally Posted by buzzg

Anyone figured out what these are for yet?

Who knows, hopefully the machines doing the snow clearing take them all out this winter!

[Authentic_City]

Originally Posted by buzzg

Anyone figured out what these are for yet?

Scooter parking?

[Authentic_City]

I was riding in the McDermot bike lane today near HSC and I caught up to a mini van that was also driving in the bike lane. Crazy!

[headhorse]

^ honestly, I'm at the point where I'm not even sure cycling infrastructure can save is. winnipeg drivers are horrible and entitled and enforcement either needs to be dramatically increased or we need to make licensing testing more difficult and have mandatory re-testing every 5 years

[Pinus]

Originally Posted by headhorse

^ honestly, I'm at the point where I'm not even sure cycling infrastructure can save is. winnipeg drivers are horrible and entitled and enforcement either needs to be dramatically increased or we need to make licensing testing more difficult and have mandatory re-testing every 5 years

It's not just Winnipeg drivers who are like that.

[headhorse]

I mean yeah, most drivers are horrible and the entire culture of cars is built on entitlement, but were talking about winnipeg and things we can do here.

[Authentic_City]

I’ve seen more than one car nearly turn into the protected bike lane, usually turning right from Emily onto McDermot. They normally correct at the last minute but I guess a few get into the bike lane and have to ride it to the end. I guess the green paint, multiple signs and bike stencils on the pavement aren’t clear enough?

[Ando]

Education and enforcement should reduce this kind of thing over time. Plus, give them an earful if they're riding in the bike lane.

[optimusREIM]

Originally Posted by headhorse

I mean yeah, most drivers are horrible and the entire culture of cars is built on entitlement, but were talking about winnipeg and things we can do here.

The culture of cars is not necessarily based on that. I mean, necessity does play a strong role. Lots of people have no other choice but to drive, it's just part of our reality.

Doesn't mean they should act like dicks though. Lots of Winnipeg drivers simply don't get the exposure to these fairly standard elsewhere things like bikelanes and simply need time to get used to it.

[StNorberter]

Originally Posted by Authentic_City

Scooter parking?

I think I recall hearing something like that. I'm confused by that though. 50cc scooters can park on any sidewalk, so is it for > 50cc scooters? And can you park a motorcycle there as well?