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W. K. Lis
Superstar
Meanwhile, in Europe:
[video=youtube_share;FlApbxLz6pA]http://youtu.be/FlApbxLz6pA[/video]
[video=youtube_share;FlApbxLz6pA]http://youtu.be/FlApbxLz6pA[/video]
salsa
Senior Member
Today there was a live discussion on the Toronto Star about improving cycling in this city.
http://www.thestar.com/bigideas/201...oes_torontos_bike_strategy_need_a_tuneup.html
http://www.thestar.com/bigideas/201...oes_torontos_bike_strategy_need_a_tuneup.html
salsa
Senior Member
Toronto’s cycling plan: One pedal forward, one back
Less than 10 kilometres.
That’s the total length of new bike lanes that were planned to be painted in 2014. But with an election less than five months away and the year half over, they have yet to be approved.
Part of that plan is adding lanes to Harbord St. and Hoskin Ave. and approving a pilot project for Richmond and Adelaide Sts. Together those new lanes, totaling nearly seven kilometres, are the most action downtown lanes have seen in the past four years. The proposal is set to go before council June 10.
If you’re a cyclist, there is not much to cheer about.
Step back to 2001, when the Toronto Bike Plan was endorsed by council and released to much fanfare. It promised to make the city a bicycle-friendly haven. Though ambitious, the feeling at the time was it could be done.
The plan set out to build by 2011 a 1,000-kilometre network, of which 495 kilometres would be on-road bike lanes.
Thirteen years on and well past the plan’s 10-year objective, 1,000 kilometres remains the city’s target — but only on paper. Today the network spans 571 kilometres but includes just 114 kilometres of on-road bike lanes. Since 2010, when Mayor Rob Ford took power, the city has actually lost three kilometres of bike lanes.
And under Ford, there has been a shift in focus from on-road bike lanes to off-road trails — a change cycling enthusiasts say is great for recreation riders but does little for commuters.
“Where it really took political will, which is the on-street stuff, we kind of fell flat on our face,” said Cycle Toronto’s executive director, Jared Kolb, about the past eight years.
What advocates are really after, separated bike lanes — the kind that divide car and cycling traffic with some kind of added barrier, like a planter box, poles or curbs — have seen little real consideration in Toronto.
The city’s first separated lanes, on Sherbourne St., opened after the existing track was updated in 2013.
In 2014, the public works committee approved additional lanes on Harbord and Hoskins and the first lanes on Richmond and Adelaide. Both must first be approved by council on June 10 before they are installed.
After the vehicle-friendly Rob Ford was elected, he killed the approved light rail transit plan and declared “the war on the car is over.” His mayoralty politicized any proposal for transit, particularly streetcars, and cyclists, who he argued impede traffic.
Still, Ford promised to build cycling infrastructure, using $50 million, but he wanted bikes off the roads. He proposed building 100 kilometres of cycling trails, something the city was already doing.
The following year, council would approve 77 kilometres of trails, to bring the total over 100 kilometres. Those projects are still underway.
In 2009, the number of Torontonians who biked to work or school was closing in on 400,000, according to a city study. Since then, there have been very small successes when it comes to on-road lanes. Some grew from their proposed lengths, like an extra half kilometre on Wellesley St., while other plans disappeared altogether.
While bike lanes have seen a reverse under Ford, his predecessor David Miller did not do much better — despite a bigger push to create grand plans for a downtown network.
Although there were budget increases year-to-year for infrastructure, the pace of actual planning was slow. Under Miller the 2001 bike plan deadline was moved twice, to 2012 and then again to 2013.
Councillor Denzil Minnan-Wong, who chairs the public works committee that approved the Richmond-Adelaide project, said he’s proud of the progress gained in the past four years.
“Anyone can draw lines on a page, but it is about getting it done,” he said. “It hasn’t been easy.”
He claimed the previous administration should be blamed for the removal of lanes like those on Jarvis St. — even though Miller put them in and Ford took them out — since Miller, in his view, didn’t do sufficient consultation first. But he also said the environmental assessment process outlined by the province needs to be streamlined. Council approved the lane removals on Jarvis in 2012.
Daniel Egan, manager for cycling infrastructure and programs, said the Richmond-Adelaide project was one of the “most complex” the city has ever pursued.
“If it was a simple thing, we would have done it years ago,” he said of criticism that project was conceived more than 10 years ago. “I think it’s always been more complicated here.”
In cities such as Chicago, bike lanes can be established by planning staff after evaluation and implemented.
In Toronto, the process is closely scrutinized from beginning to end with mandatory assessments, pilot projects and other checks-and-balances that can slow implementation down.
Looking to other major cities for comparison on our progress, the differences can be staggering.
In Chicago, actual on-road bikeways outstrip Toronto’s nearly threefold, with 320 kilometres.
Montreal — consistently named to the Copenhagenize Index of bicycle-friendly cities — has a 650-kilometre cycling network and plans to exceed 800 kilometres by 2017.
By Toronto standards, which tallies lane lengths on both sides of the street, Montreal has nearly 800 kilometres already, said Montreal’s Aref Salem, who is in charge of transportation on the executive committee.
Meanwhile, in cycling super-cities like Copenhagen, there are now “bicycle highways” stretching from the core to the suburbs more than 20 kilometres away. The city itself has a 443-kilometre network in a city one-eighth the size of Toronto.
More cycling-friendly cities may be getting a bigger economic boost.
A 2012 study out of bike haven Portland, Ore., revealed that convenience store, bar and restaurant patrons who arrived at these establishments on bikes spent more there on average per month than patrons who drove, and returned more often.
Kolb said he hopes that experimenting with the Richmond-Adelaide lanes will shift perception about cars and bicycles co-existing safely and seamlessly downtown.
“I don’t think mayor Miller achieved a lot for cycling; I don’t think Mayor Ford has achieved a lot for (on-street) cycling,” Kolb said. “We’ve got to get back to work at building out the on-street grid.”
Bike lanes
A city-by-city comparison of on-street bike lanes vs. city size
Toronto: 114 kilometres (630 sq. kilometres)
Chicago: 320 kilometres (606 sq. kilometres)
Copenhagen: 443 kilometres (86 sq. kilometres)
Montreal: 730 kilometres (365 sq. kilometres)
(Data from City of Toronto, Chicago, Copenhagen and Montreal)
Less than 10 kilometres.
That’s the total length of new bike lanes that were planned to be painted in 2014. But with an election less than five months away and the year half over, they have yet to be approved.
Part of that plan is adding lanes to Harbord St. and Hoskin Ave. and approving a pilot project for Richmond and Adelaide Sts. Together those new lanes, totaling nearly seven kilometres, are the most action downtown lanes have seen in the past four years. The proposal is set to go before council June 10.
If you’re a cyclist, there is not much to cheer about.
Step back to 2001, when the Toronto Bike Plan was endorsed by council and released to much fanfare. It promised to make the city a bicycle-friendly haven. Though ambitious, the feeling at the time was it could be done.
The plan set out to build by 2011 a 1,000-kilometre network, of which 495 kilometres would be on-road bike lanes.
Thirteen years on and well past the plan’s 10-year objective, 1,000 kilometres remains the city’s target — but only on paper. Today the network spans 571 kilometres but includes just 114 kilometres of on-road bike lanes. Since 2010, when Mayor Rob Ford took power, the city has actually lost three kilometres of bike lanes.
And under Ford, there has been a shift in focus from on-road bike lanes to off-road trails — a change cycling enthusiasts say is great for recreation riders but does little for commuters.
“Where it really took political will, which is the on-street stuff, we kind of fell flat on our face,” said Cycle Toronto’s executive director, Jared Kolb, about the past eight years.
What advocates are really after, separated bike lanes — the kind that divide car and cycling traffic with some kind of added barrier, like a planter box, poles or curbs — have seen little real consideration in Toronto.
The city’s first separated lanes, on Sherbourne St., opened after the existing track was updated in 2013.
In 2014, the public works committee approved additional lanes on Harbord and Hoskins and the first lanes on Richmond and Adelaide. Both must first be approved by council on June 10 before they are installed.
After the vehicle-friendly Rob Ford was elected, he killed the approved light rail transit plan and declared “the war on the car is over.” His mayoralty politicized any proposal for transit, particularly streetcars, and cyclists, who he argued impede traffic.
Still, Ford promised to build cycling infrastructure, using $50 million, but he wanted bikes off the roads. He proposed building 100 kilometres of cycling trails, something the city was already doing.
The following year, council would approve 77 kilometres of trails, to bring the total over 100 kilometres. Those projects are still underway.
In 2009, the number of Torontonians who biked to work or school was closing in on 400,000, according to a city study. Since then, there have been very small successes when it comes to on-road lanes. Some grew from their proposed lengths, like an extra half kilometre on Wellesley St., while other plans disappeared altogether.
While bike lanes have seen a reverse under Ford, his predecessor David Miller did not do much better — despite a bigger push to create grand plans for a downtown network.
Although there were budget increases year-to-year for infrastructure, the pace of actual planning was slow. Under Miller the 2001 bike plan deadline was moved twice, to 2012 and then again to 2013.
Councillor Denzil Minnan-Wong, who chairs the public works committee that approved the Richmond-Adelaide project, said he’s proud of the progress gained in the past four years.
“Anyone can draw lines on a page, but it is about getting it done,” he said. “It hasn’t been easy.”
He claimed the previous administration should be blamed for the removal of lanes like those on Jarvis St. — even though Miller put them in and Ford took them out — since Miller, in his view, didn’t do sufficient consultation first. But he also said the environmental assessment process outlined by the province needs to be streamlined. Council approved the lane removals on Jarvis in 2012.
Daniel Egan, manager for cycling infrastructure and programs, said the Richmond-Adelaide project was one of the “most complex” the city has ever pursued.
“If it was a simple thing, we would have done it years ago,” he said of criticism that project was conceived more than 10 years ago. “I think it’s always been more complicated here.”
In cities such as Chicago, bike lanes can be established by planning staff after evaluation and implemented.
In Toronto, the process is closely scrutinized from beginning to end with mandatory assessments, pilot projects and other checks-and-balances that can slow implementation down.
Looking to other major cities for comparison on our progress, the differences can be staggering.
In Chicago, actual on-road bikeways outstrip Toronto’s nearly threefold, with 320 kilometres.
Montreal — consistently named to the Copenhagenize Index of bicycle-friendly cities — has a 650-kilometre cycling network and plans to exceed 800 kilometres by 2017.
By Toronto standards, which tallies lane lengths on both sides of the street, Montreal has nearly 800 kilometres already, said Montreal’s Aref Salem, who is in charge of transportation on the executive committee.
Meanwhile, in cycling super-cities like Copenhagen, there are now “bicycle highways” stretching from the core to the suburbs more than 20 kilometres away. The city itself has a 443-kilometre network in a city one-eighth the size of Toronto.
More cycling-friendly cities may be getting a bigger economic boost.
A 2012 study out of bike haven Portland, Ore., revealed that convenience store, bar and restaurant patrons who arrived at these establishments on bikes spent more there on average per month than patrons who drove, and returned more often.
Kolb said he hopes that experimenting with the Richmond-Adelaide lanes will shift perception about cars and bicycles co-existing safely and seamlessly downtown.
“I don’t think mayor Miller achieved a lot for cycling; I don’t think Mayor Ford has achieved a lot for (on-street) cycling,” Kolb said. “We’ve got to get back to work at building out the on-street grid.”
Bike lanes
A city-by-city comparison of on-street bike lanes vs. city size
Toronto: 114 kilometres (630 sq. kilometres)
Chicago: 320 kilometres (606 sq. kilometres)
Copenhagen: 443 kilometres (86 sq. kilometres)
Montreal: 730 kilometres (365 sq. kilometres)
(Data from City of Toronto, Chicago, Copenhagen and Montreal)
Rock
Banned
Fab post, salsa. Tks for that.
W. K. Lis
Superstar
Don't you know that bicycles can be very, very harmful to the environment. Toronto has to be very, very slow before putting harmful bicycle lanes on the wide suburban arterial roads.
...not
Kitsune
Senior Member
Can someone explain this to me ... according to this: http://app.toronto.ca/tmmis/decisio...on=doPrepare&meetingId=7853#Meeting-2014.CC52 ... the Pilot project was adopted. That means its live and happening for sure now correct?
bartekci
New Member
That's correct. Chris Bouchard from Transportation Services said this on the Facebook Cycle Toronto group:
"The first elements to be installed will be Phoebe, Stephanie, and Richmond W. Adelaide, will come next, because the lanes are already somewhat in the right place, while Richmond has some surface maintenance work done."
There's been some words about a lot of this being done by July, but I'm not sure how confirmed that is. If that's the case, looks like they have a busy but exciting month ahead of them!
salsa
Senior Member
I was in NYC recently and I brought my bike with me. As crazy as it sounds, I actually felt pretty safe thanks to their excellent separated bike lanes. Unlike Sherbourne St in Toronto, I didn't see any cars encroaching on these bike lanes. Seriously Toronto, is it really that hard to get it right?
ehlow
Senior Member
Great photos. What NYC has done to their streets has been amazing. Not just bike lanes but public squares everywhere.
junctionist
Senior Member
They have the advantage of wider streets. None of the major streets in those photos saw their car lanes reduced to one in each direction, as would be the case with the standard 4 lane arterial in Toronto. I found the quality of NYC's landscaping improvements accompanying the bike lanes to be impressive. Trees and shurbs planted in spots on the actual former roadway give the bike lanes a sense of permanence. The wide bike paths with ornamental granite blocks along the sides look great--that's European quality.
salsa
Senior Member
Yes they have wider streets, but most importantly they have the political will. With the insane amount of traffic in Manhattan, you would think that the car idiots would be yelling about the impending traffic chaos, like they do here. But the smaller streets in Toronto shouldn't prevent us from building separated bike lanes. If Sherbourne had a proper barrier, either bollards or concrete curbs, then this wouldn't be happening. It's so simple.
junctionist
Senior Member
One councillor made a mistake in voting and it failed. University Avenue should have bike lanes as soon as possible.
James
Senior Member
A related article in the Toronto Star discussing the rising popularity of cycling in Montreal and some of the issues they're dealing with in their efforts to accommodate.
http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/...eep_up_with_rising_popularity_of_cycling.html
Montreal shifts gears to keep up with rising popularity of cycling
The number of cycling enthusiasts in Quebec’s largest city is growing so fast that city officials can’t keep pace.
A cyclist rolls down a bike lane in downtown Montreal. The rate at which Montrealers are hopping on their bikes to get around the city has created a whole new problem, as the city's infrastructure can't keep pace with the popularity of cycling.
By: Allan Woods Quebec Bureau, Published on Fri Jun 13 2014
MONTREAL—This city is famed for its potholes, its brutal winters and, paradoxically, its status among North American cities as a cycling haven.
Montreal brought the Bixi bike-sharing program to Toronto, New York and Paris, where it has been a financial flop but a popular success. It was the only city on the continent and one of just four non-European cities to crack the top 20 of the popular Copenhagenize ranking of bicycle-friendly cities.
Nothing unusual in Montreal to see hipsters, couriers and two-wheeled commuters of all ages sharing the roads. Here, they laugh dismissively when Toronto Mayor Rob Ford’s pro-car administration comes up in conversation.
But the rate at which Montrealers are hopping on their bikes to get around the city has created a whole new problem in a place haunted by infrastructure projects that never seem to end or, when they do, are stained by the dirty legacy of corruption.
“The challenge is that we have asked people to start using their bicycles and they’ve done it so much faster than we’ve been able to change the city,†said Aref Salem, who is responsible for municipal transportation on the city’s executive committee.
“In the 1950s, ’60s and ’70s we gave all the place to cars and left nothing for anyone else. The challenge now is to give back space to pedestrians and cyclists on the roads. It’s being done, but we don’t have the money to change the city in two years. It takes much longer than that.â€
The city has a $10-million annual budget dedicated to the creation of bike paths, painting cycling lanes onto the roads and making the most dangerous strips of road and intersections more secure. The addition to the network this year is the plan for a 14-kilometre bike path that will run alongside railway tracks from the highway in the north to the shores of the St. Lawrence River in the south, passing through six of the city’s 19 neighbourhoods with not a speeding car or imposing truck along the way.
It’s a cyclist’s dream, but such measures are also increasingly viewed as a city’s legal responsibility. The provincial coroner took up cycling safety after the deaths of three representative riders in the summer of 2013. Two riders were “doored†— knocked from their saddles by drivers who opened the car door without looking for traffic. But it was the fate of 42-year-old Christian Brulotte, crushed by a tractor trailer after falling from his bike at a downtown intersection, that put a renewed onus on municipal authorities.
The coroner cited both the “recklessness of the cyclist†and the absence of an accessible sidewalk (it was blocked off at the time) or a bike path and urged Montreal to rapidly address the most dangerous areas of the city for cyclists and to plan and complete a network of bike lanes for safe and efficient cycling.
That may explain the spirited intervention of Luc Ferrandez, the charismatic mayor of the Plateau-Mont-Royal arrondissement in central Montreal. Ferrandez summoned reporters to an announcement in late May following a string of cycling deaths including that of 33-year-old Mathilde Blais, who was struck by a truck while riding under a bridge.
“We can no longer tolerate this situation,†Ferrandez said. “I think the mother or father of the next victim is going to sue the city and they’ll win — they’ll win the $10-million that it will cost to change the situation.â€
He announced a plan to add 20 kilometres of new bike lanes, cut speed limits and restrict the movements of heavy vehicles. Then he promised to resign if he couldn’t accomplish the task and reduce cycling deaths and injuries within two years.
Suzanne Lareau, president of the advocacy group Vélo Québec, welcomes the political support, even while noting that the boom in the city’s cycling population has been accompanied by an absolute reduction in the number of people killed and injured while riding.
But she won’t stop pushing for greater safety in this Valhalla of cycling. The organization, which counts a staff of more than 100 people, has been working for three decades to instill the bicycle culture in Quebec by pushing for changes to traffic laws, offering urban planning expertise, giving travel advice and organizing events like the recent Tour de l’Île, a ride around the island city that drew some 30,000 cyclists.
The Tour de l’Île started in 1985 as a “festive lobbying†event to show politicians that cycling advocates were more than just a fringe element. When the numbers for the annual event hit 15,000, “it was as if the authorities in Montreal and Quebec said, ‘Whoa, something’s happening here,’ †Lareau said.
It takes time to change the thinking of city engineers and bureaucrats used to viewing traffic flow from the driver’s seat of a car.
While Montreal has had relatively supportive municipal administrations, the city is now facing a space crunch that offers no easy solutions.
“The problem we have in Montreal is that we decided to densify the city and once you densify a city you can no longer widen the streets. You have to live with the same streets,†said Salem. “There’s a certain accommodation that must be done and that has to happen with the car.â€
Now, he said, every road resurfacing job is coupled with debate about how to give pedestrians more leg room on the sidewalk or bike lanes for cyclists.
“Each time we can do something, we do it,†he said.
Montreal was No. 11 on the Copenhagenize index in 2013, far behind Amsterdam (No. 1) or Copenhagen (No. 2). Lareau said there are many areas in the city’s downtown core that remain a “black hole†for cyclists, even though data shows most bike trips pass through the city centre. Given Quebec’s harsh winter climate, it may be unrealistic to dream of closing the gap.
But it doesn’t seem to have prevented Montrealers from trying. Thanks to management and technology problems Bixi, the bike rental service created in 2009, bled cash and declared bankruptcy earlier this year, but not before instilling a deep affection for biking in the hearts of the city’s residents.
A 2014 Vélo Québec survey estimated that 730,000 people — half the adult population — now ride a bike at least once a week. There are young adults, there are retirees and there are road-racing types, as well as tie-wearing business folk more interested in the rat race.
“I thought it would be difficult to sell the concept of a cycling city, but we see that the reaction of people is not what we thought,†Salem said. “It’s a paradox that people are welcoming what we’ve offered.â€
http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/...eep_up_with_rising_popularity_of_cycling.html
Montreal shifts gears to keep up with rising popularity of cycling
The number of cycling enthusiasts in Quebec’s largest city is growing so fast that city officials can’t keep pace.
A cyclist rolls down a bike lane in downtown Montreal. The rate at which Montrealers are hopping on their bikes to get around the city has created a whole new problem, as the city's infrastructure can't keep pace with the popularity of cycling.
By: Allan Woods Quebec Bureau, Published on Fri Jun 13 2014
MONTREAL—This city is famed for its potholes, its brutal winters and, paradoxically, its status among North American cities as a cycling haven.
Montreal brought the Bixi bike-sharing program to Toronto, New York and Paris, where it has been a financial flop but a popular success. It was the only city on the continent and one of just four non-European cities to crack the top 20 of the popular Copenhagenize ranking of bicycle-friendly cities.
Nothing unusual in Montreal to see hipsters, couriers and two-wheeled commuters of all ages sharing the roads. Here, they laugh dismissively when Toronto Mayor Rob Ford’s pro-car administration comes up in conversation.
But the rate at which Montrealers are hopping on their bikes to get around the city has created a whole new problem in a place haunted by infrastructure projects that never seem to end or, when they do, are stained by the dirty legacy of corruption.
“The challenge is that we have asked people to start using their bicycles and they’ve done it so much faster than we’ve been able to change the city,†said Aref Salem, who is responsible for municipal transportation on the city’s executive committee.
“In the 1950s, ’60s and ’70s we gave all the place to cars and left nothing for anyone else. The challenge now is to give back space to pedestrians and cyclists on the roads. It’s being done, but we don’t have the money to change the city in two years. It takes much longer than that.â€
The city has a $10-million annual budget dedicated to the creation of bike paths, painting cycling lanes onto the roads and making the most dangerous strips of road and intersections more secure. The addition to the network this year is the plan for a 14-kilometre bike path that will run alongside railway tracks from the highway in the north to the shores of the St. Lawrence River in the south, passing through six of the city’s 19 neighbourhoods with not a speeding car or imposing truck along the way.
It’s a cyclist’s dream, but such measures are also increasingly viewed as a city’s legal responsibility. The provincial coroner took up cycling safety after the deaths of three representative riders in the summer of 2013. Two riders were “doored†— knocked from their saddles by drivers who opened the car door without looking for traffic. But it was the fate of 42-year-old Christian Brulotte, crushed by a tractor trailer after falling from his bike at a downtown intersection, that put a renewed onus on municipal authorities.
The coroner cited both the “recklessness of the cyclist†and the absence of an accessible sidewalk (it was blocked off at the time) or a bike path and urged Montreal to rapidly address the most dangerous areas of the city for cyclists and to plan and complete a network of bike lanes for safe and efficient cycling.
That may explain the spirited intervention of Luc Ferrandez, the charismatic mayor of the Plateau-Mont-Royal arrondissement in central Montreal. Ferrandez summoned reporters to an announcement in late May following a string of cycling deaths including that of 33-year-old Mathilde Blais, who was struck by a truck while riding under a bridge.
“We can no longer tolerate this situation,†Ferrandez said. “I think the mother or father of the next victim is going to sue the city and they’ll win — they’ll win the $10-million that it will cost to change the situation.â€
He announced a plan to add 20 kilometres of new bike lanes, cut speed limits and restrict the movements of heavy vehicles. Then he promised to resign if he couldn’t accomplish the task and reduce cycling deaths and injuries within two years.
Suzanne Lareau, president of the advocacy group Vélo Québec, welcomes the political support, even while noting that the boom in the city’s cycling population has been accompanied by an absolute reduction in the number of people killed and injured while riding.
But she won’t stop pushing for greater safety in this Valhalla of cycling. The organization, which counts a staff of more than 100 people, has been working for three decades to instill the bicycle culture in Quebec by pushing for changes to traffic laws, offering urban planning expertise, giving travel advice and organizing events like the recent Tour de l’Île, a ride around the island city that drew some 30,000 cyclists.
The Tour de l’Île started in 1985 as a “festive lobbying†event to show politicians that cycling advocates were more than just a fringe element. When the numbers for the annual event hit 15,000, “it was as if the authorities in Montreal and Quebec said, ‘Whoa, something’s happening here,’ †Lareau said.
It takes time to change the thinking of city engineers and bureaucrats used to viewing traffic flow from the driver’s seat of a car.
While Montreal has had relatively supportive municipal administrations, the city is now facing a space crunch that offers no easy solutions.
“The problem we have in Montreal is that we decided to densify the city and once you densify a city you can no longer widen the streets. You have to live with the same streets,†said Salem. “There’s a certain accommodation that must be done and that has to happen with the car.â€
Now, he said, every road resurfacing job is coupled with debate about how to give pedestrians more leg room on the sidewalk or bike lanes for cyclists.
“Each time we can do something, we do it,†he said.
Montreal was No. 11 on the Copenhagenize index in 2013, far behind Amsterdam (No. 1) or Copenhagen (No. 2). Lareau said there are many areas in the city’s downtown core that remain a “black hole†for cyclists, even though data shows most bike trips pass through the city centre. Given Quebec’s harsh winter climate, it may be unrealistic to dream of closing the gap.
But it doesn’t seem to have prevented Montrealers from trying. Thanks to management and technology problems Bixi, the bike rental service created in 2009, bled cash and declared bankruptcy earlier this year, but not before instilling a deep affection for biking in the hearts of the city’s residents.
A 2014 Vélo Québec survey estimated that 730,000 people — half the adult population — now ride a bike at least once a week. There are young adults, there are retirees and there are road-racing types, as well as tie-wearing business folk more interested in the rat race.
“I thought it would be difficult to sell the concept of a cycling city, but we see that the reaction of people is not what we thought,†Salem said. “It’s a paradox that people are welcoming what we’ve offered.â€