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

[MetroMan]

I witnessed another cyclist/pedestrian collision at Queens Quay and Lower Simcoe today. It's become so routine that I've just stopped caring. The pedestrian had the green, the cyclist in full racing gear sped through the intersection against a red light. Both got tangled up on the bike. I just shook my head and continued on.

On the way back less than 10 minutes later, they were gone, confirming the theory that these kinds of accidents don't get reported which is why there are no real stats. The lack of official numbers leads some to argue that people don't get hurt by cyclists so policing cyclist traffic violations shouldn't be a priority. There's a study that was done in New York that does have stats to back up that pedestrians get routinely injured by cyclists. About 500 of them a year badly enough to require hospital treatment.

Cyclists rightfully complain about motorists endangering them but when it comes to endangering pedestrians, cyclists have the same attitude as drivers and don't think that their disobedience of traffic laws poses any risk to those lower on the food chain. They're wrong.

 

[pstogios]

Cyclists rightfully complain about motorists endangering them but when it comes to endangering pedestrians, cyclists have the same attitude as drivers and don't think that their disobedience of traffic laws poses any risk to those lower on the food chain. They're wrong.

How dare you question the sanctity of the cyclist? That is verboten. Cyclists are pure and their obeyance of the law and responsibility of action should never be questioned.
/endsarcasm

 

[DSC]

I'm curious is there anything in the Highway traffic act that would prevent the city and or the TTC from putting in railroad crossing signs and or lights and gates at the intesections wher the streecars cross Queens Quay?

I doubt they would be legal but if you are really curious I suggest you look it up: https://www.ontario.ca/laws/statute/90h08

 

[W. K. Lis]

I'm curious is there anything in the Highway traffic act that would prevent the city and or the TTC from putting in railroad crossing signs and or lights and gates at the intesections wher the streecars cross Queens Quay?

It is a "street railway".

 

[PinkLucy]

I doubt they would be legal but if you are really curious I suggest you look it up: https://www.ontario.ca/laws/statute/90h08

I also expect that the emergency folks wouldn't want them. If they got the grass stopped they're not going to allow crossing bars

 

[W. K. Lis]

It's too bad that the Transportation department is still anti-transit, anti-bicycle, and anti-pedestrian, but very pro-automobile. Not going to change until the top management ever changes their thinking.

 

[EastYorkTTCFan]

It is a "street railway".

yeah I definitely would classify it as one. Maybe they should put up some cross bucks that say Streetcar crossing and flashing lights like all the streets that a street railway crosses through.

 

[EastYorkTTCFan]

It's too bad that the Transportation department is still anti-transit, anti-bicycle, and anti-pedestrian, but very pro-automobile. Not going to change until the top management ever changes their thinking.

Anti transit: maybe, Anti Pedestrian: it depends on the location Anit bike : I think the main problem with them her is they don't want to play by the rules they are given. The law says Bikes over 24 inches have to be on the road but bike riders say"I don't feel safe on the road so I'll go on the sidewalk" Me as a pedestrian has to say to them "get off the sidewalk onto the road where you belong." Then when you give them a bike lane that is siloadte from the road the tret it like arec track and don't want to obey traffic lights or stop signs or anything else because "I'm on a bike and I'm going faster then everyone else and you need to watch out for me."

 

[the lemur]

How dare you question the sanctity of the cyclist? That is verboten. Cyclists are pure and their obeyance of the law and responsibility of action should never be questioned.
/endsarcasm

When I'm biking on the MGT and I have a green, I still have to look out for pedestrians who step out without looking.

 

[the lemur]

My understanding was that the red stone pavers indicate the sidewalk, and the paved flat surface is where cyclists go. At York & QQ, the red pavers interrupt the bike lane. So it seems as though cyclists are meant to stop there and pedestrians would get priority. If this is the design, I can't imagine it will ever work.

The streetcar tracks are another issue since they are flat with the bike lane and sidewalk. A pedestrian needs a physical marker to indicate they are standing on a streetcar track.

I'm no expert on this, but it seems like our streets generally have two zones: sidewalk and street. Vehicles go on the street, people on the sidewalk. Bike lanes on some streets complicate this, and there will be a learning curve. But QQ is a whole other beast.

It's still not really clear where a cyclist turning from the bike lane onto York should wait:

https://goo.gl/maps/Mw9bHy5btwP2

 

[Skeezix]

I witnessed another cyclist/pedestrian collision at Queens Quay and Lower Simcoe today. It's become so routine that I've just stopped caring. The pedestrian had the green, the cyclist in full racing gear sped through the intersection against a red light. Both got tangled up on the bike. I just shook my head and continued on.

On the way back less than 10 minutes later, they were gone, confirming the theory that these kinds of accidents don't get reported which is why there are no real stats. The lack of official numbers leads some to argue that people don't get hurt by cyclists so policing cyclist traffic violations shouldn't be a priority. There's a study that was done in New York that does have stats to back up that pedestrians get routinely injured by cyclists. About 500 of them a year badly enough to require hospital treatment.

Cyclists rightfully complain about motorists endangering them but when it comes to endangering pedestrians, cyclists have the same attitude as drivers and don't think that their disobedience of traffic laws poses any risk to those lower on the food chain. They're wrong.

I have had this discussion with others on threads here before, and while most people agreed that cyclists need to respect pedestrians, I did get a couple of people who seemed to think cyclist-pedestrian collisions were sufficiently rare that we should not care about them. The usual nonsense about how cars are the bigger problem. One guy seemed to think that since there were few pedestrian deaths caused by cyclists, we shouldn't care about cyclist-caused injuries at all.

I am a big supporter of expanding cycling infrastructure in this city and making it much, much safer to commute by bicycle in this town. I think it's key to making Toronto a more liveable city. I also recognize that many of our stop signs, one-way streets, etc. were designed with solely automobiles in mind and are not always necessary for safe cycling (by safe cycling, I refer to all road users). However, as much as I support the Idaho Stop (to name just one measure), cyclists need to understand that while they don't need to stop, they still need to treat the stop sign as a yield sign (it's this last step a good number of cyclists seem to disregard) and give priority to other road users who have the right-of-way at an intersection. And don't get me started about how so many cyclists seem to have no regard for pedestrian crossings and the need to stop.

So while I think that we should be drastically improving the cycling (and pedestrian) infrastructure in this city, it needs to go hand in hand with better education and more effective enforcement.

 

[MisterF]

After spending some time on the waterfront on the weekend, it occurred to me that simply making the bike path at a different grade from the sidewalk and streetcar tracks would make the separation of modes a lot more clear. The streetcar tracks a step up from the car lanes, the bike path a step down again, and then back up to the sidewalk. Sure would clear up some of the confusion.

I have had this discussion with others on threads here before, and while most people agreed that cyclists need to respect pedestrians, I did get a couple of people who seemed to think cyclist-pedestrian collisions were sufficiently rare that we should not care about them. The usual nonsense about how cars are the bigger problem. One guy seemed to think that since there were few pedestrian deaths caused by cyclists, we shouldn't care about cyclist-caused injuries at all.

Quite the straw man you've constructed there. I remember that conversation, and nobody was saying that we shouldn't care about cyclist-caused injuries and collisions at all. Why the need to misrepresent what people said?

 

[Skeezix]

[...]Quite the straw man you've constructed there. I remember that conversation, and nobody was saying that we shouldn't care about cyclist-caused injuries and collisions at all. Why the need to misrepresent what people said?

I'm not misrepresenting what was said at all. The person in question, who was not you, said (and I quote a bit of it):

"The car is a far greater threat to all of us - let's spend our time thinking about that instead."​

"All the evidence we have suggests it is NOT a serious problem."​

And in response to my suggestion that the safety of all road users is paramount and there is no need for us to pick and choose, we got this little gem:

"Yes, we should all work for greater safety in our own lives and behaviour. But, no, when it comes to discussing policy there is only so much money, time and attention. There IS a need to pick and choose. And we should choose to focus on cars. [...]"​

Sadly, none of that is taken out of context. Because the number pedestrian deaths caused by cyclists were, in his/her opinion, quite low, (s)he very clearly stated that pedestrian safety generally vis-a-vis cyclists was a non-issue. The discussion starts roughly on page 134 of the General Cycling Issues thread if anyone is interested.

If you want to further debate who said what, I'm happy to have that discussion in the General Cycling Issues thread where that discussion took place.

 

[aquateam]

I have had this discussion with others on threads here before, and while most people agreed that cyclists need to respect pedestrians, I did get a couple of people who seemed to think cyclist-pedestrian collisions were sufficiently rare that we should not care about them. The usual nonsense about how cars are the bigger problem. One guy seemed to think that since there were few pedestrian deaths caused by cyclists, we shouldn't care about cyclist-caused injuries at all.

I am a big supporter of expanding cycling infrastructure in this city and making it much, much safer to commute by bicycle in this town. I think it's key to making Toronto a more liveable city. I also recognize that many of our stop signs, one-way streets, etc. were designed with solely automobiles in mind and are not always necessary for safe cycling (by safe cycling, I refer to all road users). However, as much as I support the Idaho Stop (to name just one measure), cyclists need to understand that while they don't need to stop, they still need to treat the stop sign as a yield sign (it's this last step a good number of cyclists seem to disregard) and give priority to other road users who have the right-of-way at an intersection. And don't get me started about how so many cyclists seem to have no regard for pedestrian crossings and the need to stop.

So while I think that we should be drastically improving the cycling (and pedestrian) infrastructure in this city, it needs to go hand in hand with better education and more effective enforcement.

I agree 100% with what you're saying about cyclist behaviour. Cyclists need to be more respectful of pedestrians. I'm guilty of that myself sometimes when biking. And as a pedestrian it's infuriating to have a cyclist speed past me on the sidewalk out of nowhere. Especially when there are bike lanes on the same street... My second biggest pet peeve is fast-moving cyclists at night without bells or lights.

But at the same time, I don't think we should change the focus from cars vs. pedestrians to cyclists vs. pedestrians. Cycling infrastructure benefits pedestrians in many ways: by reducing the speed of traffic through road diets, by reducing the number of lanes needed to cross to cross the street, by providing a buffer between the sidewalk and fast-moving diesel-fume belching trucks, by sensitizing automobilists to other road users. Speaking from personal experience, it also seems as though any cycling infrastructure is appropriated by joggers, women with strollers, dog-walkers, etc. who benefit from the reclaimed road space. "Complete streets" and a shift away from car-focused road planning usually results in widened sidewalks and improved walkability.

Focusing on conflicts between cyclists and pedestrians draws an equivalence between those conflicts and conflicts between vehicles and pedestrians. While those conflicts exist, physics means that a 160 lb cyclist + bike going 20 km/hour is nowhere near as dangerous as a 3000 lb vehicle going 70 km/hour. 35 000 people die a year in the US in collisions involving cars, more than the population of Juno Alaska (or Stratford Ontario), about a third of which are from collisions with cars and pedestrians. Shifting people from cars to bikes will bring the death rate down and improve safety for pedestrians.

 

[W. K. Lis]

... One guy seemed to think that since there were few pedestrian deaths caused by cyclists, we shouldn't care about cyclist-caused injuries at all...

There are even fewer deaths caused by pedestrians crashing into other pedestrians.

(Almost..., except for those with a weapon on them.)