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Cycling infrastructure (Separated bike lanes)

"You're not getting....magically make them disappear". "....maximize car lanes at all cost..."

Guys, slow down. Take a breath. The car lanes are already there. There is no suggestion to maximize car lanes at all cost. There is no cost to leaving them the way they are. Removing a lane of traffic will very likely go against the new bill, so the realistic alternative is no bike lane.

There are already roads/trails in the park. Spring Road runs north/south more or less parallel to Parkside. You could link the trail at the north east entrance to the park, run north of the ponds and hook into Spring Road. I understand it's not perfect, but it's not economically outrageous as Northern Light seems to suggest.
 
There is a high and ongoing cost of leaving them as is:



In the past decade, there have been nearly 1,500 collisions on Parkside Drive leading to five serious injuries and three deaths in the stretch where the bike lanes are proposed, according to the city's infrastructure and environment committee's final report studying the area.
Click to expand...
 
Midtown Hank said:
"You're not getting....magically make them disappear". "....maximize car lanes at all cost..."

Guys, slow down. Take a breath. The car lanes are already there. There is no suggestion to maximize car lanes at all cost. There is no cost to leaving them the way they are. Removing a lane of traffic will very likely go against the new bill, so the realistic alternative is no bike lane.

There are already roads/trails in the park. Spring Road runs north/south more or less parallel to Parkside. You could link the trail at the north east entrance to the park, run north of the ponds and hook into Spring Road. I understand it's not perfect, but it's not economically outrageous as Northern Light seems to suggest.
Click to expand...

I'm not making any mistakes in what I'm saying; rather, you were vague in your wording about going a bit further into the park, that suggested to me a meter or two or three........not several blocks.

I'm happy to look at alternative proposals, but you have to properly describe what you have in mind.

****

This seems to be your idea (correct me if I'm wrong)

1731947103000.png


Its potentially feasible, though you do have some real trade offs and a couple of challenges:

1) At the north end this puts your over 400M west of Keele/Parkside.

2) You still have the problem of how to get under the Queensway, the railway corridor, and the Gardiner

The existing sidewalk is not wide enough for MUP conversion, so if you're not chopping vehicle lanes, you're going to have to rebuild all of those bridge structures:

1731947310041.png


3) The southernmost leg of Spring Road (below) is very prone to flooding

1731947399004.png


The central leg of the road is generally wide enough for purpose, though there are some potential issues, such as the proposed mobility service (something similar to the zoomobile I expect, which would have to fit, in addition to any MUP function.

But when Spring Rd. turns west, you will be adding a substantial hill to climb.

1731947641913.png


Excluding massive structural work from Queensway south, and providing you can make use of the existing road, something could be reasonably done, including some flood mitigation for a similar budget to the Parkside work.

Whether that is an adequate alternative I will leave to others to consider.
 
Northern Light said:
This seems to be your idea (correct me if I'm wrong)

View attachment 613035

Its potentially feasible, though you do have some real trade offs and a couple of challenges:

1) At the north end this puts your over 400M west of Keele/Parkside.

2) You still have the problem of how to get under the Queensway, the railway corridor, and the Gardiner

The existing sidewalk is not wide enough for MUP conversion, so if you're not chopping vehicle lanes, you're going to have to rebuild all of those bridge structures:

View attachment 613036

3) The southernmost leg of Spring Road (below) is very prone to flooding

View attachment 613037

The central leg of the road is generally wide enough for purpose, though there are some potential issues, such as the proposed mobility service (something similar to the zoomobile I expect, which would have to fit, in addition to any MUP function.

But when Spring Rd. turns west, you will be adding a substantial hill to climb.

View attachment 613038

Excluding massive structural work from Queensway south, and providing you can make use of the existing road, something could be reasonably done, including some flood mitigation for a similar budget to the Parkside work.

Whether that is an adequate alternative I will leave to others to consider.
Click to expand...

Your small map (aerial) is pretty close. I was thinking the north entrance right at the corner of Parkside & Bloor - it's a walking trail.

Anyway, like I mentioned earlier it's not perfect, but IMHO taking a car lane out of Parkside will be very challenging under the new Bill.
 
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nfitz said:
It's not several blocks; even with a 3:1 slope. Let alone a retaining wall!
Click to expand...

^^^^ This is why you're on ignore.

Spring Road is several blocks into the park.

That's what the reference is; you didn't take the time to read the entire sequence of posts before replying, as is often the case.
 
Northern Light said:
Spring Road is several blocks into the park.

That's what the reference is; you didn't take the time to read the entire sequence of posts before replying, as is often the case.
Click to expand...
My suggestion was widening Parkside. Which you wrongly said was not possible. It's always possible - it's just a question of cost and impact. I doubt it would be as much as the relatively short extension to the trail along the Weston sub.

Perhaps I replied to the wrong post? I'll fix it.

No need to be rude!
 
Here’s a Parkside alternative I’d like to see explored:
  • Reduce Indian Rd. to one-way with contraflow cycling. Opposing auto travel is supported by local roads Indian Grove and Sunnyside
  • Expand the pathway connecting Claude, south end of Indian, and Parkside
  • Under the bridges on Parkside, remove one northbound lane and replace with a two way cycle track. This lane is really just for overflow now since beyond the underpass it is used for parking. Two lanes southbound is reasonable as there are two choices of direction at the Lakeshore intersection
IMG_3048.jpeg


I may be out of the loop, has anyone proposed this previously?
 
reinventingthewheel said:
Here’s a Parkside alternative I’d like to see explored:
  • Reduce Indian Rd. to one-way with contraflow cycling. Opposing auto travel is supported by local roads Indian Grove and Sunnyside
  • Expand the pathway connecting Claude, south end of Indian, and Parkside
  • Under the bridges on Parkside, remove one northbound lane and replace with a two way cycle track. This lane is really just for overflow now since beyond the underpass it is used for parking. Two lanes southbound is reasonable as there are two choices of direction at the Lakeshore intersection
View attachment 613079

I may be out of the loop, has anyone proposed this previously?
Click to expand...
While that route is an option, remember the point of "complete streets" isn't just to get bike lanes. but to lower speeds, accidents and deaths of car users, pedestrians and cyclists
Bike lanes just help do that.
Why do you think that speed camera makes so much money on parkside?
 
generalcanada said:
While that route is an option, remember the point of "complete streets" isn't just to get bike lanes. but to lower speeds, accidents and deaths of car users, pedestrians and cyclists
Bike lanes just help do that.
Click to expand...
Fair point, I’ll make no suggestions how we appease all parties there.
generalcanada said:
Why do you think that speed camera makes so much money on parkside?
Click to expand...
On that topic…

IMG_3050.jpeg
 
A street with 150 accidents a year is a good street to Ford, since it means cars are probably going fast. But yeah, bike lanes are only one reason the city wants to redesign Parkside.

When we biked to High Park a few times last summer, we did it via Bloor and Indian Rd. Indian Rd is pretty nice to bike on even without bike lanes because there's hardly any traffic. There's space for cars to pass you if nobody is coming the other way, and if someone is coming there's obviously no space to pass, so they wait. They don't try to squeeze by.

If the Bloor lanes get closed, we wouldn't bike to High Park because there's no alternative coming from the east. The only other place to cross the tracks is Dundas, which is deadly to bikes. Or you have to go even further south to the underpass on Lansdowne. That underpass has a nice bike lane, which just evaporates on the south side into a narrow lane (and only goes north to College). So it's not a very family friendly route.
 
reinventingthewheel said:
Fair point, I’ll make no suggestions how we appease all parties there.
Click to expand...

The thing is, you "appease" one side by allowing cars to go fast, thereby traversing Parkside in roughly 30 seconds less while causing 150 accidents/year. You "appease" the other side by reducing death, injury and damage, and enabling a whole bunch more people to use the road.
 
Get ready to say goodbye to Richmond, Adelaide and the Danforth bike lanes as well.

New: Campaign Research, Ford's preferred pollster, had a survey out over the weekend asking not just whether the Bloor, University and Yonge bike lanes should be ripped out, but also those on Richmond, Adelaide and the Danforth.

also here is the wording of this completely unbias "survey"

  • Some people say the Richmond Street bike lanes cause too much traffic congestion and lead to too much of an increase in travel times for drivers, and that they should be removed immediately.
  • Other people say that the city should continue to keep this stretch of bike lanes in place
 
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