[Whoaccio]

Couldn't really find a thread which fit the general topic of bike infrastructure, so here it is.

http://www.thestar.com/News/GTA/article/482631

Theresa Boyle
Staff Reporter

Toronto is getting the wheels in motion to roll out a high-tech rent-a-bike program next year, not unlike a wildly successful one in Paris, says the head of the city's cycling committee.

"It will be announced sometime in the late fall and launched in the summer of 2009," Councillor Adrian Heaps said.

Heaps said Toronto plans to emulate the best aspects of programs in other jurisdictions and would include automated stations, with swipe-card access, with a subscription that would give access to a uniform style of bicycle "that is tried and proven around the world."

"It can be a one-speed or three-speed bicycle with a kind of mousetrap rack on the back where you can put books or a briefcase," he added.

But other details are up in the air, he said.

"We need to determine where the best locations (for hubs) are. How many bicycles could work? Do we do it in the downtown core? Do we do it (where there are) subways and intermodal transportation hubs?" Heaps asked.

Such programs are gaining in popularity around the world with the rise of gas prices and environmental consciousness. Launched just a year ago, Paris's Velib program already has more than 211,000 subscribers who have taken 31 million trips. Denver, Minneapolis and Washington, D.C., are kicking off similar programs this summer. Montreal is starting a trial program next month with full service due to be offered next spring.

Portland, Seattle, Chicago and San Francisco are looking at launching similar programs, while Copenhagen, Lyon and Barcelona already have such bike-sharing programs in place.

The Paris program has about 20,000 bikes and 1,400 self-serve rental kiosks. It's known as Velib, a hybrid of the French words vélo (bike) and liberté (free).

While the program is not exactly free, the fee is nominal. For $29 euros (about $45) a year, cyclists can swipe their credit card at a kiosk, unlock a bike, ride it across town and drop it off at another kiosk. The first 30 minutes are free with fees starting at 1 euro (about $1.60) for each additional half hour.

The bikes have a distinct appearance making them hard to steal. A penalty fee is applied for lost or damaged bikes. Nevertheless, about 3,000 Velib bikes have been swiped.

Bikes in the Washington program are equipped with radio frequency devices to help track them and thwart thieves.

Heaps said a bike-share program would be a "huge" draw to visitors in Toronto.

"There's a great demand already. Our office gets all kinds of phone calls from hotels asking where to get bicycles," he remarked.

Tourism Toronto would market the initiative to potential visitors, said senior vice-president Joel Peters.

"We welcome and support the tourism-related businesses and initiatives that cater to visitors in the city. ... When a new service such as the Velib cycling program develops in Toronto we encourage them to become part of our industry association so we can promote this new service as a part of the visitor experience in Toronto," he said.

Heaps said the new program will be self-financing. It could be supported by "advertising possibilities in a very modest form," he said.

Toronto's Community Bicycle Network ran a Bikeshare program with its distinct yellow bikes from 2001 until last year, but it died because of lack of funding.

Network chair Herb van den Dool said his research has shown him that all bike-sharing programs around the world are subsidized with public funds. He said Toronto failed "where other bike-sharing programs succeed" because of a lack of public funding. "Whereas all the other programs got subsidized by municipal governments in one way or another," he said.

The Community Bicycle Network has been investigating the possibility of reviving its Bikeshare program by putting advertising on the bikes and hubs. Meantime, van den Dool said the organization is renting out old Bikeshare bikes "as cheap as possible" at $10 per day ($15 on the first day).

The Community Bicycle Network and Toronto Coalition for Active Transportation are holding a public forum on bike sharing on Sept. 18 at 7:30 p.m. at Innis Town Hall.

Seems like a good enough idea, and a 2009 start is practically light speed for Toronto projects.

 

[RedRocket191]

Make the bike stations Presto compatible and you get two thumbs up from me.

 

[299 bloor call control.]

Here's the Montreal one they are launching later this year:

http://www.publicbikesystem.com/

 

[TKTKTK]

Awesome! Even more bikes on the road without adequate infrastructure, or training initiatives!

I do believe it's about time I got a brush guard for the front of my car

 

[dunkalunk]

This will definitely go a long way to improve bicycle infrastructure around the city, but I'd rather see indoor, gated bike parking for people who already use their bikes to get around.

 

[xtremesniper]

Here's the Montreal one they are launching later this year:

http://www.publicbikesystem.com/

A little odd how it is entirely outdoors. I can only imagine what kind of vandalism those bikes and their stations will go through. I was kind of hoping for a service that calls up bikes from underground or indoors somewhere, instead of just sitting around outside 24/7.

 

[wyliepoon]

Some of the stations could be modeled after the McDonald's Cycle Center in Chicago's Millennium Park...

http://www.thestar.com/News/article/220307

RIDING RIGHTS
TheStar.com | News | Bike station in Windy City should show T.O. the way
Bike station in Windy City should show T.O. the way


Chicago's Cycle Center offers parking, showers; similar plan envisioned for Toronto's downtown
Jun 01, 2007 04:30 AM
Be the first to comment on this article...
Tess Kalinowski
Transportation Reporter

Urban cyclists revere it as a kind of Shangri-La.

The McDonald's Cycle Center at Millennium Park, a jewel-like glass building on the Chicago waterfront, has many of the amenities of an upscale health club, including full-time staff, showers with fluffy towels and, best of all, secure parking for up to 300 bikes, close to the heart of the city.

"It's not heaven, but it's close," says Oakville-based cycling advocate Gil Penalosa, of Walk & Bike for Life.

There's a repair shop, tools for do-it-yourselfers, bike rentals, snacks and toiletries, and a seating/cafe area. Not surprisingly, there's also a waiting list for the 500 membership spots, which cost $149 (U.S.) annually or $20 a month. Last year 50,000 commuters and tourists visited the bike station.

In Toronto, all of that is still on the to-do-when-there's-money list.

A similar concept was part of the winning design in a competition for a re-imagined Nathan Phillips Square. "It is a huge part of our scheme," said Chris Pommer, of PLANT Architects Inc., which envisions a rental kiosk, repair facilities, secure bike parking, even showers and change rooms near the Queen and Bay entrance to the square.

Bike stations already have arrived elsewhere, particularly on the west coast, says Andrea White, executive director of the California-based non-profit Bikestation coalition.

The coalition has helped launch six bike stations, and 30 more, including one in Vancouver, are "well on their way. "

Still, it's a challenge persuading North Americans to view bikes as transportation, not just recreation. Communities that get bike stations have one thing in common, according to White. That's leadership.

Although she's had calls from Toronto cycling advocates, media and city staff, "So far we haven't heard from a Toronto leader," she said.

As much as he loves the bike station concept, it's not the priority, says Penalosa. People can live without showers, but they're never going to ride their bikes to the bus or train station if there's no safe route and no secure parking that assures them their wheels will be waiting at the end of the day.

Yesterday, Toronto's Cycling Committee announced that it's expanding one solution to the parking problem. It's adding 70 new bike lockers to the 82 installed last year, which have already proved popular.

About 50 people are on a waiting list for one of the existing pilfer-free boxes, which rent for $10 a month, said the committee's chair, Councillor Adrian Heaps (Ward 35, Scarborough Southwest).

The plan is to have 150 boxes in place by the end of the year. About 30 kilometres will be added to Toronto's existing 370 kilometres of dedicated bike lanes, shared bike paths and park routes, says Heaps. Last year only 7 kilometres were built.

The biggest problem with bike lockers is getting property owners to give them space and overcoming so-far unfounded security concerns, says Toronto's bicycle promotions manager and avid cyclist Sean Wheldrake.

Still he has dreams: "I think there's lots of spots in Toronto that (bike stations) could be successful. Maybe Yonge and Bloor even."

Less luxe accommodations are already on the map.

TTC chair Adam Giambrone points to the mobility hub at Exhibition Place, where GO and TTC routes intersect and there are six existing bike lockers,wireless access and plus space for bike rentals and car sharing.

 

[Whoaccio]

From Monday's Globe and Mail

August 25, 2008 at 8:16 AM EDT

Canada's cities are, for the most part, dominated by cars. Even in vibrant, fairly densely populated ones such as Toronto and Montreal, the great majority of personal trips are taken by automobile, a habit with a myriad of negative consequences for the environment and the urban fabric.

That's why the news this week that Toronto's city council is considering providing its constituents with a new transport option by setting up a bike-sharing scheme, similar to a planned pilot project in Montreal, is so encouraging and should be matched by cities across Canada.

The concept is simple, and has been wildly successful in Europe:

A city government allows a private company to set up a network of bicycle stations in key locations, where anyone with a credit card can pay a small fee to pick up a bike and return it elsewhere, usually at no cost to the municipality.

Its implications, however, are significant. Bicycles available throughout a city can take over where the public transit network leaves off, making journeys that might have seemed daunting without a car suddenly feasible, at least in clement weather. In Paris, 2.1 million people used the Vélib program's 10,000 bikes in its first year of operation, taking considerable stress off the road and transit networks.

Many drivers will be alarmed at the prospect of more bicycles on crowded streets, especially as some of their riders habitually flout traffic laws. Police should keep a close eye on such behaviour, and punish it accordingly. But a greater role for bicycles, along with pedestrians and transit vehicles, in the transportation mix of Canadian cities is a highly worthwhile goal for public policy; the most desirable and economically successful cities in North America - Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver among them - are those that partly resisted the urge to make room for automobiles, and such places will have the least difficulty adapting to a world of scarce oil and restricted carbon emissions.

It's not necessary to punish motorists to achieve that goal, but in a modern society citizens should be offered a range of travel options beyond driving. Although no place in Canada offers nearly as wide a choice as European cities, providing cheap, durable, shareable bicycles would be a good start.

http://www.urbantoronto.ca/newreply.php?do=newreply&noquote=1&p=213965

I'm surprised Vancouver hasn't done more on this, they are by far a more cycling hospitable climate than either Toronto or Montreal. That and they fancy themselves saviors of the earth and all.

 

[CGM]

This is a great idea... I have a bike, but it's an expensive one and I don't always want to lock it outside. This will be a great way for people to get around downtown if the bikes are maintained properly. I'd like us to pass a mandatory bike helmet law as well, as I can see a higher incident of preventable injuries

 

[W. K. Lis]

Sometimes biking is just the ticket - to the tune of $110

From the Star of Friday, September 26:

Getting pulled over by police a first for cyclist
September 26, 2008
John Karastamatis
special to the star

"Hey, you," the cop said from inside his car. "You just broke the law."

It was the morning rush and I was on the sidewalk on King St. W., a U-lock in my hand, about to secure my bike to a post in front of my office. The "hey, you" startled me. The "you just broke the law" was incomprehensible. In all the years I had been cycling on the streets of Toronto – more than 30 – I had never been stopped by a police officer.

He noticed my confusion and probably sensed my fear. "Come closer to the car," he said. His voice was not friendly.

I felt like a kid being called to the principal's office.

"You failed to fully stop as you were turning right at the corner at Duncan," he said after I had walked over to his open car window.

Duncan ends at King. I believed I had stopped long enough to assess the situation: There were no cars or bikes coming along, so I completed my right turn. I didn't hit anyone, I didn't cut anyone off. But in this officer's opinion, I hadn't stopped long enough at the stop sign.

He was a young guy, early 20s, and I noticed he was in one of three patrol cars at King and Duncan that morning.

"Let me see your ID," he said.

"What kind of ID?" I asked.

"Licence," he said.

"I don't have one."

"You don't have one?" He would have used the same tone if I had said I was from another planet.

There was a pause while, I assume, he assessed whether I was telling him the truth.

"Health card," he demanded.

I fished inside my wallet and found my cracked and peeling card from 1975. Handling it as if it were contaminated, he typed the name from my card into his car computer. He looked at the screen with disbelief.

"I can't find you on our system. Have you've never had a licence?"

"I chose never to learn to drive a car."

He may have sighed in frustration but I couldn't tell, because at that moment a streetcar clanged by on King.

He asked for my address and phone number and wrote the information on a yellow pad of paper attached to a clipboard. "$110 fine," he said, handing me the first ticket I have ever received.

"And you'll lose six points off your licence," he added.

What licence? Or was this his idea of a joke?

He drove off, making a sharp U-turn to join the other two patrol cars down the street, leaving me in his dust to try to figure out what had happened.

"The cops are on a cyclist-busting mission," said a friend, another lifelong cyclist. "They're targeting bikes."

As if we didn't have enough obstacles to overcome, like the persistent threat of having your bike stolen or of being mowed down by some SUV. Now this fine.

"Wasn't $110 the same amount a driver was fined after he opened his door and killed a cyclist a few months back?" my friend asked.

I canvassed more cyclists, looking for moral support. The consensus was, cars, bikes and pedestrians have to share the road but one set of rules doesn't fit all. For instance, coming to a full stop on a bike is not realistic. If the bike fully stops, the cyclist will lose his balance and fall. A rolling stop is the thing to do.

There should be traffic laws that make sense for bikes. And there would be, along with licensing and cycling tests, if society were serious about encouraging alternative forms of transportation.

I also talked to a committed car driver who thought it was about time that police started ticketing bikes. "Cyclists think they can break all the rules and get away with it – going the wrong way down a one-way street, zigzagging through traffic, hogging entire lanes, riding on sidewalks."

The custodian of the building at Duncan and King, who had witnessed my getting the ticket, told me that corner is heavily patrolled.

"They are there because you can't make a left from King onto Duncan before 9 a.m., so it's easy for the cops to fill their quota of tickets in one morning," he said. "But in August, traffic was very low because of summer holidays. The morning you were ticketed the cops hadn't given out a single ticket. You were it."

I consulted a lawyer. "If you really feel you weren't in the wrong, you can fight it," she said.

So that's what I did. I waited two hours at a busting-at-the-seams court office to register my intention to dispute the charge. When it was my turn at the counter, I was told I would receive a letter in six to eight months and a trial would likely be within two years.

A woman who was also waiting at the court office (she had mistakenly been charged after she had already paid her ticket many months before) listened sympathetically to my story.

"The entire system is broken. Nobody seems to know anything," she said. "There are more and more cars on the roads, and bikes and skateboards and mopeds and motorized wheelchairs. It's chaos.

"You're lucky you don't drive. I'm thinking of giving it up and using a bike. Even if I occasionally get a ticket."

 

[carrefour]

Ya, the cop is an idiot. That kind of hard-headed police makes the community against them.
However. The point is, there's a STOP sign, you must stop.
But the article brings up an interesting point about traffic law - in that the same law that applies to a car should not be the same law that applies to a bicycle should not be the same law that applies to a pedestrian. There should be specific guidelines set appropriately to each mode of transport.
There are too many stop signs anyway - in Europe there are hardly any; you just learn to always yield at any intersection. Because we have too many signs here, when drivers don't see one, they gun through the intersection.

p.s. can someone tell me what 6 demerit points will do for someone who has no driver's licence?

 

[RedRocket191]

p.s. can someone tell me what 6 demerit points will do for someone who has no driver's licence?

I'm no lawyer, but doesn't that infringe on Section 12 of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms

12. Everyone has the right not to be subjected to any cruel and unusual treatment or punishment.

 

[TKTKTK]

Ya, the cop is an idiot. That kind of hard-headed police makes the community against them.
However. The point is, there's a STOP sign, you must stop.
But the article brings up an interesting point about traffic law - in that the same law that applies to a car should not be the same law that applies to a bicycle should not be the same law that applies to a pedestrian. There should be specific guidelines set appropriately to each mode of transport.

Our traffic laws are about creating predictable interactions between many different modes of traffic. If cyclists feel they should have an entirely different rule book, perhaps they should be on entirely different roads?

There are too many stop signs anyway - in Europe there are hardly any; you just learn to always yield at any intersection. Because we have too many signs here, when drivers don't see one, they gun through the intersection.

Agreed, but this is really a different issue than a cyclist balking at being held accountable to the letter of the law (which I think is funny).

Oh, maybe I'm being mean, the guy doesn't have any feet after all: "For instance, coming to a full stop on a bike is not realistic. If the bike fully stops, the cyclist will lose his balance and fall. A rolling stop is the thing to do."

p.s. can someone tell me what 6 demerit points will do for someone who has no driver's licence?

If he gets a licence in the future (or I guess in the next two years) they will be applied to it.

 

[TKTKTK]

I'm no lawyer, but doesn't that infringe on Section 12 of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms

No, you're no lawyer.

 

[DarnDirtyApe]

The yield sign is a great invention - just slow down as you approach an intersection and look both ways before continuing. I support traffic rules that force people to pay attention while driving.

The problem with North American traffic engineering is that driving has become too easy and too fast for drivers to react when other drivers do dangerous things. When accidents happen they're often serious ones because of high speed and driver negligence. If everyone slowed down and paid a little more attention we would have fewer accidents.

Of course my favourite street is the one beside my apartment building that also doubles as a sidewalk... our own little woonerf.

BTW to get back on topic, as a driver and cyclist I think the best way to promote cycle is to reduce the speed limit on desired routes to 40km/h (and enforce it) and to increase the number of through routes that don't involve arterial roads. What makes cycling scary for people is all those cars whizzing by at high speeds.