Reading Time: 6 minutesNetherlands’ cities have been building some fantastic bike infrastructure in the last decade. Bridges that look more than just a utilitarian crossing over a river or road. Cities don’t always chose the cheapest option per se, to great chagrin of some, but don’t underestimate the effects of beautiful design.
Reading Time: 5 minutesFor a number of years now, cyclists pass a bicycle counter totem on the Portage Bridge across the Ottawa River on the border of Quebec and Ontario. The totem shows to everyone passing the inter provincial bridge the number of bike trips when people cycle over the conductivity loops embedded in the bike tracks. Gradual growth on Portage Bridge The numbers show a gradual growth since 2014, although the wet spring might have an effect on the 2017 numbers. Yet, three years of over 300,000 trips annually is considerable. Bear in mind that the counter doesn’t operate in the first [Read more…]
Reading Time: 3 minutesLast week, I cycled along the renovated canal walls on Colonel By. The path there has been repaved after extensive work on the walls, but I was a bit disappointed that the path wasn’t made any wider now everything was open anyway. Most of the multi use pathway is a fair bit away from the road, which makes it a much nicer cycling experience. Unfortunately, the stretch east-ish of the Bank Street bridge runs right next to the road, a stretch of about 400 metres. At the other side of the road there is an area that is really [Read more…]
Reading Time: 8 minutesLast Saturday, the renovated Main Street in Ottawa was officially opened. The opening of this brand new complete street was folded into the annual Main Street fest and part of the street was closed off for motorized traffic. There was a brass band playing, there was an artisan farmers market, there was the bouncy castle (no event in Ottawa is complete without a bouncy castle, face painting and a booth of Safer Roads Ottawa) and there were hamburgers (veggie and halal included) for the fundraising part of the event. Cast iron for David Chernushenko From the tongue-in-cheek gift of the [Read more…]
Reading Time: 5 minutesAs you read in the previous post earlier today, the Mackenzie bike lane was opened today. The stretch in front of the embassy was an eye sore after a lane was blocked off by concrete barriers. Mayor Watson called it something else, but I forgot what he called the barriers. (Update, Mathieu Fleury wrote they are called Jersey barriers) The mayor mentioned former ambassador Bruce Heyman and thanked him for his initiative. Dr. Kristmanson said a few words, mentioning the closing of the ceremonial boulevard this Sunday morning for Bike Sunday (“The first time ever that the boulevard is closed [Read more…]
Reading Time: 4 minutesToday, the bi-directional bike lane on Mackenzie Ave in front of the US Embassy will officially open. It is probably the safest one in the world, with bollards anchored in two meters of underground concrete. Why is that? To protect the embassy. Soon after the attacks on 9/11 the American embassy in Ottawa became even more fortified as it already was. On the west side of the embassy in the Byward market, Clarence street was slightly reconfigured so that truck bombers couldn’t drive straight into the embassy. The road got a wave built in, to stop high speed attacks; an [Read more…]
Reading Time: 2 minutesOver the last year or so Karen and I talked on and off about how we want to live when we are reaching our 70’s. Do we still want to live in the inner suburbs in a house with a garden and be car dependent at times? Do we want to move into a condo closer to LRT and use shared bike and car systems? When you are not adding much to your income anymore at that age, a car is probably the worst to own with its cost of at least $7000 annually. Does everyone need parking? We’d probably [Read more…]
Reading Time: 3 minutesLast week at the Ontario Bike Summit, the Ontario Minister of Culture, Tourism and Sport and the Minister of Transportation announced the next step in developing an Ontario cycling network. The focus is very much on long distance tourism cycling in the province. The province is planning to fund part of the network from the carbon auction that generated hundreds of millions of dollars. Of that fund, $200 million is set aside for cycling. (Mind you: that same province set aside $ 100 million to widen the Queensway with one lane on both sides for a 3 km stretch) Serious money That is still pretty [Read more…]
Reading Time: 4 minutesDynes Road will get a make over as there is sewer work to be done. Much of the cycling infrastructure is usually put in place when the sewers have to be replaced. Main Street was an example of that. The road is open anyway, so this is a good reason to rebuild the street and these cost don’t eat into the cycling budget. So essentially we’ll get free Dutch style intersections. The residents at Dynes complained about speeding and part of the reason is that the road is very wide. (Mind you, it is drivers who speed, not roads). The part [Read more…]
Reading Time: 4 minutesLast week, Karen and I were at a public information session for the reconstruction of Dynes Road off Prince of Wales Rd just north-west of Hog’s Back Falls. The road will be ripped up between summer 2017 and 2019, so the city brought the residents together to explain what the plan is. Poof, slip lanes gone There were drawings of the street on display with a cool new element, plus bike lanes and bike tracks. The slip lanes at Dynes and Prince of Wales are gone in the drawings, thus making the intersection a lot safer for everyone. The engineers and councillor [Read more…]
Copyright © 2025 | WordPress Theme by MH Themes
