Advocacy

Bill 31 (The Bill Formerly Known As Bill 173) – Brief Update

January 19, 2015 Hansonthebike 0

Reading Time: 12 minutesHere is a bit of an update on Bill 31, which we used to know as Bill 173, that was to deal with safer roads. As you have read in an earlier post, Bill 173 was going to deal with cycling safety too. You can read back my post here. But the Ontario Government fell and when a government falls, the Bills “die” and they have to be reintroduced. On Tuesday October 21, 2014, the Bill was reintroduced as Bill 31 (Read Bill 31 to here). Bill 31 deals again with bike lights, counterflow lanes, cross rides next to a cross walk, bicycle [Read more…]

Canadian books about cycling: FrostBike, Happy City and Every Day Cyclist's guide to Canadian law

Gift Card from Santa? Here Are Three Canadian Books

December 29, 2014 Hansonthebike 1

Reading Time: 5 minutesSo now what? Your mother-in-law gave you a gift certificate (or even cash in an envelope) for Christmas and you really don’t know what to buy because you have everything already. Here are three books related to cycling (or to the broader theme of a better city) for winter reading. All three books are written by Canadians: Tom Babin, who writes for the Calgary Herald; Charles Montgomery, a Vancouverite and our own Ottawa authors Craig Forcese and Nicole Laviolette, law professors at Ottawa U. 1 Frostbike – Tom Babin Tom interviewed me in September 2011 when I was speaking in Calgary [Read more…]

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Large Turnout for First Fisher Heights Bike Day

May 26, 2014 Hansonthebike 0

Reading Time: 4 minutesWow, was that ever a fun afternoon. The whole week we had been watching the weather at Fisher Heights. The entire week, the weather forecasters predicted a gray and rainy Saturday. Until it was Saturday: wall to wall blue sky in the morning, clouds in the afternoon, but sun all day. Fisher Heights and Area Community Association Bob McCaw had suggested a bike afternoon already months ago. The association wanted to have a spring event and asked if something like that would be feasible. We invited the City Wide Sports department staff, who design a few mini road situations with [Read more…]

The front page of the 2014 Citizens for Safe Cycling Report shows the beautiful new Multi Use Pathway along the Rockcliffe Parkway.

2014 Ottawa Report on Bicycling

March 24, 2014 Hansonthebike 0

Reading Time: < 1 minute(This should be on the website of Citizens for Safe Cycling, but for some reason, despite it being small enough, the server refuses the file, even though we host more PDF files on the website.  I will host the report here for now, and once I figured out the technical issues, I ‘ll put in on the website too.) This is the third time we put the report together and we had more volunteers than ever involved. That is great news, as it is a lot of work. The report takes about four months to complete. As Schuyler and her [Read more…]

2014 Spring.Bike.Ottawa: "Understanding the Ottawa Cycling Budget" and much more.

March 19, 2014 Hansonthebike 0

Reading Time: 3 minutesOn March 22 we are holding our third Spring.Bike.Ottawa event. The purpose is to get updates on local cycling. It turns out to be an event that is appreciated. We started the event because we felt no one had a good overview of all the bike initiatives going on in Ottawa. And there are a lot. There are many people working on cycling in Ottawa, often in the background. They are doing great things with little or no money. Spring.Bike.Ottawa brings those (mostly) volunteers together. We hold the event early in the year, to make people aware that cycling is [Read more…]

Bill 173: Amending the Highway Traffic Act for Cycling

March 18, 2014 Hansonthebike 0

Reading Time: 6 minutesDid you ever read Ontario’s Highway Traffic Act? I have to admit I have never gone through it with a dust comb, but I do flip through it once in a while. One of the oddities I found is that you don’t have to have a rear light (as I read it). Currently, you need to have a reflector or a red light. Indeed, you don’t need to have a rear light. Bill 173 is repairing a number of issues that society had already more or less accepted. Flashing Rear Lights Bill 173 is going to change that light issue. Or [Read more…]

Bike and Walk to school programs appear to work

January 29, 2014 Hansonthebike 0

Reading Time: 4 minutesRemember that time when you put your coat on and cycled to school? You had not heard of ‘net present value benefits’, ‘benefit-cost ratios’, relatively cost-effective interventions’ and ‘student travel mode data’.  You better get used to these terminologies as recently, the results of a School Travel Planning study were published and it looks good. Nineteen projects (covering 71 schools)  were studied and on average estimated car use (to drop the kids off at school) decreased by 2.8% (or in estimated absolute numbers:  192,224 km), and increased physical activity was observed, including 1.3 million minutes of walking, and 2 million minutes [Read more…]

2013 Citizens for Safe Cycling Recap

December 31, 2013 Hansonthebike 0

Reading Time: 5 minutesCanada’s Banks use the image of cyclists as models for succesful planners on a bill board on Sparks Street. Les? We look back to a fairly good year for cycling in Ottawa. There have been ups and downs, but generally speaking, Ottawa is moving into the right direction. Some missing links are no longer missing and we believe the city is making a genuine attempt to improve cycling conditions, although it is difficult to believe in progress sometimes, watching the slow pace of implementation. Unfortunately, two cyclists lost their lives in Ottawa, in both cases heavy trucks turning right were involved [Read more…]

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Nervous Nellies and Fairweather Freds: November 3, 2013

October 29, 2013 Hansonthebike 0

Reading Time: < 1 minuteby Ottawa city councillor David –I am not an “avid” cyclist– Chernushenko. If you have missed David Chernushenko’s documovie, this is your chance to see it.  And if you enjoyed it so much the first time that you ‘d like to see it over and over again (like your kids’ Dora the  Explorer), than here is another chance to see the 2013 Bike Documentary with wise words from councillor David -I am not an “avid” cyclist- Chernushenko. It has lots of Ottawa content. The film will be followed by a panel discussion with Bruce Timmermans Award winner and newly elected Citizens [Read more…]

Ottawa's 2013 Annual Plaid Parade Recap (with pics)

October 27, 2013 Hansonthebike 0

Reading Time: 5 minutesDespite a cool Sunday (5C or 41F), about 150 people or so came out to cycle in the second annual Ottawa Plaid Parade. This year we started at the City Centre’s Art-is-in Bakery. Not a great back drop for photography, but lots of space to get together before the start. The tour followed the O-train pathway, connected with the Ottawa River Pathway and then turned south near the stacked stones in the Ottawa River. We then  made our way back through Tunney’s Pasture and then turned east towards the Carleton Tavern on Parkdale. The ride ended a bit abrupt on [Read more…]