Toronto Queens Quay & Water's Edge Revitalization | ?m | ?s | Waterfront Toronto

Yup, they are. Those sticks (some claim they are trees) feel so insignificant when walking along Queens Quay. I had to Google Image search to verify that they did indeed exist. When they grow to full size it should help fix the right of way issues. How long will they take to grow to a substantial size?
 
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Although trees will naturally act as a good buffer to help ID the different parts of the pedestrian / cycling / streetcar lanes (not to mention bring much-needed shade), I think it's possible they could make things worse. Reduced line of sight for peds, cyclists, and streetcar drivers...may equal more opportunities for collisions.

The area's fantastic, and the improvements made are simply astounding. However it's definitely unfortunate that QQW is a bit of a victim of its own success. Last summer what I saw was insanity, both good and bad. Throngs of happy people, selfie-sticks galore, but lots of close calls and rude cyclists yelling at families. Haven't been down there on foot or bike in the last few months, but I think things will only get worse. And unfortunately collisions will increase in frequency and severity (be it cycle vs ped, streetcar vs car, ped vs streetcar...or any combination).
 
I'm there year round. As I've mentioned before, it's sorted itself out in the quieter seasons and works quite well, apart from the drivers on the streetcar ROW (which happens on others ROWs too -- Fleet St. on a daily basis). Tourist season will likely revert to chaos.
 
Talking to a few Waterfront Toronto people tonight, some changes are coming in the next few weeks to deal with various issues that have been noted by various members here.

A few intersection will have traffic light changes.

The north side trees are in good shape, but a number of dead ones on the south as well late bloomers.

One way was looked at a number of times, but the locals who live there wanted 2 way with 2 way winning.
 
Napoleon said:
I strongly agree that there are still serious issues with the street. It was apparent as soon as I saw their material with descriptions of "pedestrians noticing the change from PaleoTec pavers to grey granite pavers to make them aware...." There are some ways to vastly improve the situation:
  • Clearly use a visually obvious barrier to separate the different modes: cars, streetcars, MGT, and pedestrians.
  • Clearly mark intersections. Cross walks should be obvious that pedestrians can expect cross-traffic from cars, streetcars, and bikes.
  • Move the "walk request" button to the far side of the MGT. There's a tiny space where pedestrians are trapped between bikes and streetcars to activate it.
  • Clearly delineate the streetcar ROW with red paint or grass.
  • Redesign the traffic signals to some reasonable modern standard. Forget the redundancy (one light per phase is enough these days). Make the left turn signal a red left arrow. Make the transit signal not look like the other signals. Make the bike signals (including the red one) look like bikes. Move the signal heads to reasonable places aligned with traffic they're meant to control. Get rid of the explanatory signs for the phases like "left turn", "transit", "bike".
I know some of it is not entirely within Waterfront Toronto's purview, but this street is dangerous. It's only a matter of time before serious accidents happen.
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These suggestions unfortunately will be ignored by the people in charge because they did not think about it. They did not think about it because they are very addicted to the automobile, and consider bicyclists and pedestrians second-class "things" and have to be tolerated.
 
44 North said:
Although trees will naturally act as a good buffer to help ID the different parts of the pedestrian / cycling / streetcar lanes (not to mention bring much-needed shade), I think it's possible they could make things worse. Reduced line of sight for peds, cyclists, and streetcar drivers...may equal more opportunities for collisions.

The area's fantastic, and the improvements made are simply astounding. However it's definitely unfortunate that QQW is a bit of a victim of its own success. Last summer what I saw was insanity, both good and bad. Throngs of happy people, selfie-sticks galore, but lots of close calls and rude cyclists yelling at families. Haven't been down there on foot or bike in the last few months, but I think things will only get worse. And unfortunately collisions will increase in frequency and severity (be it cycle vs ped, streetcar vs car, ped vs streetcar...or any combination).
Click to expand...

I was thinking the same thing about the trees. It's going to be difficult to see pedestrians crossing into the lane. This is a tricky design problem, if I had to spitball an idea I would put a shallow rounded curb along the lane and maybe a few high visibility flexi-posts or small bollards. Just to alert people to the fact they're entering a bike lane, they seem totally unaware right now (not entirely their fault).
 
There already is a depressed curb separating the bike lane from the sidewalk. The trees will create a further separation once the canopy grows.

The real problem are people (cyclists and pedestrians alike) who intentionally ignore their signals. I almost got mowed down by a cyclist doing 60k and increasing speed when the light was changing. He knew very well that the light was turning red but chose to speed through a dozen pedestrians beginning to walk.

I'd love to see a highly publicized police blitz here. A cop at each intersection would be writing tickets all day. Make it news, let people know that they will be ticketed for disobeying their signals.
 
That depressed curb is barely noticeable. It does pretty much nothing to provide separation from the two modes of movement.
 
I think the stretches along the trail are fine. The trees, benches, and pavement make it fairly clear where people should be, and though some people still wander onto the trail without looking, all the design in the world wouldn't change that without physically fencing everything off, which I wouldn't support. The problems are at the intersections, where realignment of the trail and pedestrian space, different pavement types, strategic fencing, and a curb would minimize pedestrian and cycling conflicts.
 
Something like the image below at the intersections would be useful and serve a dual purpose of delineating the bike path for pedestrians and providing a more noticeable stopping area for cyclists.

copenhagen-bicycle-bike-lane-handrail.jpg
 
I thought of that exact same thing yesterday. It's a good solution, although I would hope that ours would involve a little more design sense.
 
MetroMan said:
The real problem are people (cyclists and pedestrians alike) who intentionally ignore their signals. I almost got mowed down by a cyclist doing 60k and increasing speed when the light was changing. He knew very well that the light was turning red but chose to speed through a dozen pedestrians beginning to walk.
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Not to defend the cyclist, but this sounds like a huge exaggeration. 60k is very difficult to get to on a bicycle.
 
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