Alternative Transportation

[Wooster]

I was referring to not only the fact that the street had a dedicated on street bike lane, but also the overall balancing of the right-of-way. It's clearly thought of in the context of meeting the needs of pedestrians, cyclists and cars, with a high quality of streetscape design. I actually think this little cut through is a clever way to deal with a dedicated right hand turn merging onto the street preventing cyclists and merging cars from colliding.

[MasterG]

I do like the addition of bike lanes down 26th ave sw, but im sure you could get even more people riding if there was dedicated right of ways for bicycles.

Why doesnt the city use the extra space along the main throughfares (i.e. crowchild, bow trail, shaganappi etc.) to create dedicated bikeways? For most of the distance on these roads, there is just a grassy hillside next to the road, easily enough room for a bike path plus a healthy distance between the path and the road.

Obviously space gets tighter on these roads towards the inner city, but for the vast majority of crowchild and bow there is easily enough space for these bike ways, at least 5 to 10 km stretches on each

If the city is serious about promoting biking for commuting, following these roads in straight lines would shave tons of time off for cyclists who cut down to the river, and are more concerned with speed and convienience rather than a leisurely scenic pathway. And they still will not mix often with car traffic.

couple that idea with increasing the speed limit for cyclist on these routes, and bingo: cycling to get places becomes a much more attractive option. plus it would definately cost less than adding another lane to these roads.

What do you think? is this a viable idea? Comments!!!

[jeffwhit]

Great idea- so many major roads this could be easily implemented on.

[fusili]

So many things could be done for bicycles, and not just pathways. Bike boxes are one idea, and placing the bicycle lane between parked cars and the curb is good too.

[jeffwhit]

so true, the next administration should have some sort of summit. Despite our lengthy pathway system, we're actually lagging way behind on encouraging cycling as a legit transport option.

[Riise]

One of the things I was thinking about the other day is how to get people like myself to use a bicycle during their commute. To explain, I love dressing to the nines and couldn't be asked to use a public shower. Also, I value my life and require cycle lanes. While this rules out cycling to work because of my squeamish sanitary needs, I'd be open to cycling home using paths and cycle lanes. One of the hurdles to this plan is that I'd need a bicycle to use after work as I didn't bother to bring one with me on the train journey to work. What ever would I do?

If we had a cycle hire scheme, bicycles could be made widely available around the inner-city and at Ctrain stations downtown. If we also placed docking stations at suburban stations, people could ride the train to work and cycle back to their original station, which would leave them at one of the transfer points of their usual commute. During the night, we'd simply have to get the people doing the maintenance for the docking stations to transport the cycles from the suburban CTrain stations back to the inner-city docking stations.

[jeffwhit]

^^That is interesting, but I wonder how narrow your demographic as you describe it is. That being said, I wonder how a city goes about courting a company like Bixi, or Metrobike seeing as we are probably at least only half the size of a city that these companies enter on their own terms.

This discussion has been fascinating. I can really see that what we need is some radical, comprehensive planning that goes far, far beyond painting some lines on roads.

[Riise]

Originally Posted by jeffwhit

^^That is interesting, but I wonder how narrow your demographic as you describe it is.

I'm not sure how large the squeamish metro-sexuals population of Calgary is, but I think there may be other groups of people who might find themselves in a similar situation where they would prefer to take the train in and a bicycle out. Off the top of my head: people who usually cycle in but run late some mornings and need the speed of a train, and people who do not have showering facilities at their place of employment.

[freeweed]

Originally Posted by Riise

I'm not sure how large the squeamish metro-sexuals population of Calgary is, but I think there may be other groups of people who might find themselves in a similar situation where they would prefer to take the train in and a bicycle out. Off the top of my head: people who usually cycle in but run late some mornings and need the speed of a train, and people who do not have showering facilities at their place of employment.

I ain't metro by any definition of the word, but I'm with you. I don't want to have to wake up an hour earlier to deal with the longer commute, plus a shower, etc. But I would love to cycle home from time to time.

[MasterG]

Originally Posted by Riise

If we had a cycle hire scheme, bicycles could be made widely available around the inner-city and at Ctrain stations downtown. If we also placed docking stations at suburban stations, people could ride the train to work and cycle back to their original station, which would leave them at one of the transfer points of their usual commute. During the night, we'd simply have to get the people doing the maintenance for the docking stations to transport the cycles from the suburban CTrain stations back to the inner-city docking stations.

THis is an interesting idea,especially if they built a dedicated bikeway for speedy commuters on the extra land on the sides of crowchild trail, as the NW line follows it, a dedicated pathway and bike-sharing scheme could complement each other nicely.

In order to accomplish this, the key thing here is to make biking quick. A straight line path down that section of crowchild (like tuscany through to the university), with some sort of connection to the river pathway in the harder to manage section of 24th to memorial (i.e. its a little tight on space).

The city should start by planning biking as a way to get around, not doing dipsy-doodles on curvy paths. straight and speedy, with the bike-sharing at the Lrt stations? that sounds like a winner to me

[jeffwhit]

Alright... I'd love to see some forumer proposals for bike commuter corridors and dedicated ROWs. Get on the google maps machine people.

[MichaelS]

Originally Posted by Riise

One of the things I was thinking about the other day is how to get people like myself to use a bicycle during their commute. To explain, I love dressing to the nines and couldn't be asked to use a public shower. Also, I value my life and require cycle lanes. While this rules out cycling to work because of my squeamish sanitary needs, I'd be open to cycling home using paths and cycle lanes. One of the hurdles to this plan is that I'd need a bicycle to use after work as I didn't bother to bring one with me on the train journey to work. What ever would I do?

If we had a cycle hire scheme, bicycles could be made widely available around the inner-city and at Ctrain stations downtown. If we also placed docking stations at suburban stations, people could ride the train to work and cycle back to their original station, which would leave them at one of the transfer points of their usual commute. During the night, we'd simply have to get the people doing the maintenance for the docking stations to transport the cycles from the suburban CTrain stations back to the inner-city docking stations.

I don't understand, are we trying to encourage people not to take transit? Your idea wouldn't work for someone who drives to work in the morning, as they would need to get their car home at night. And removing cars from the road should be the primary goal for alternative transportation options, not transferring from one alternative system to the other.

Edit: not meaning to take the piss out of you with this post, I just feel that we should be focusing on removing cars before we worry about a demographic that is already willing to take an alternative mode of transportation.

[Riise]

Originally Posted by MichaelS

I don't understand, are we trying to encourage people not to take transit?

Edit: not meaning to take the piss out of you with this post, I just feel that we should be focusing on removing cars before we worry about a demographic that is already willing to take an alternative mode of transportation.

Don't worry, you made a very valid point.

One way we can look at it is as such, the CTrain is very well patronized during the morning and afternoon rush. By moving riders from LRVs to cycles we can improve the riding environment or free up space for more riders, potentially those currently using private automobiles, without putting more people in automobiles. One of the ways to get more people cycling is through safety in numbers and it might be a worthwhile risk to siphon some transit users in order to get cycling into the mix.

[jeffwhit]

Originally Posted by MichaelS

I don't understand, are we trying to encourage people not to take transit? Your idea wouldn't work for someone who drives to work in the morning, as they would need to get their car home at night. And removing cars from the road should be the primary goal for alternative transportation options, not transferring from one alternative system to the other.

Edit: not meaning to take the piss out of you with this post, I just feel that we should be focusing on removing cars before we worry about a demographic that is already willing to take an alternative mode of transportation.

I don't think that bikes will ever be a threat to c-train ridership, but a lot of Calgarians though, the C-train option might never happen in their area, in their lifetime.

[kw5150]

Originally Posted by MichaelS

I don't understand, are we trying to encourage people not to take transit? Your idea wouldn't work for someone who drives to work in the morning, as they would need to get their car home at night. And removing cars from the road should be the primary goal for alternative transportation options, not transferring from one alternative system to the other.

Edit: not meaning to take the piss out of you with this post, I just feel that we should be focusing on removing cars before we worry about a demographic that is already willing to take an alternative mode of transportation.

Maybe offer another solution then? We would love to hear your ideas.

[kw5150]

How about this. A development where you can downhill ski to work from the northwest and then take gondola back home after work. It would evolve the expropriation of thousands of homes..... lol

[kora]

One of the ideas being thrown around at the City is to do a road diet at one of the streets that connect downtown to the Beltline. Think of the underpasses at Macleod Trail, 1 Street SE, 1 Street SW, 4 Street SW, 5 Street SW and 8 Street SW. The thought is to reduce the number of car/vehicle lanes from 4 to 2 while widening sidewalks and putting in designated bike lanes. In my mind, this is especially possible at 8 Street SW and 1 Street SW, which are not really commuter roads like Macleod Trail.

[fusili]

Originally Posted by kora

One of the ideas being thrown around at the City is to do a road diet at one of the streets that connect downtown to the Beltline. Think of the underpasses at Macleod Trail, 1 Street SE, 1 Street SW, 4 Street SW, 5 Street SW and 8 Street SW. The thought is to reduce the number of car/vehicle lanes from 4 to 2 while widening sidewalks and putting in designated bike lanes. In my mind, this is especially possible at 8 Street SW and 1 Street SW, which are not really commuter roads like Macleod Trail.

So Beltline Planning Group has been advocating this for how long? 8th street is perfect. It has 5 lanes, and no freaking traffic (I live right next to it). You can even just reduce 8th street to 4 lanes and that would be good. Man, the city takes forever to catch up to the community.

[kw5150]

Originally Posted by fusili

So Beltline Planning Group has been advocating this for how long? 8th street is perfect. It has 5 lanes, and no freaking traffic (I live right next to it). You can even just reduce 8th street to 4 lanes and that would be good. Man, the city takes forever to catch up to the community.

8th would be great and same with 4th. 1st street would probably enrage drivers. It is very busy at rush hour. How about letting people bike down stephen?? We cyclists going too fast down stephen and they banned it?

[fusili]

Originally Posted by kw5150

8th would be great and same with 4th. 1st street would probably enrage drivers. It is very busy at rush hour. How about letting people bike down stephen?? We cyclists going too fast down stephen and they banned it?

I assume you mean 1st SE? 1st SW has very little traffic. 4th is also not a good idea, as it has some pretty high traffic volumes. Realistically it is only 8th and maybe 1st SW that should have this.