by Colin Fast
Winnipeg has made a lot of progress as a cycling city in recent years.
New multi-use trails have been built, on-street bike lanes have been painted, more bike parking has been added, and bike routes are even plowed in the winter.
It’s no surprise that making it easier to get around town has boosted interest in cycling.
While the two-wheel crowd is enjoying the new infrastructure, there are still several holes in the system that can make it confusing and dangerous to get from one pathway to another.
Take the example of a group of cyclists trying to make their way from River Heights to the new rapid-transit line. They head east on the pathway along Taylor Avenue, make a right on to Harrow, and then …
“OHMYGOD! That’s Pembina! We’re all going to die!“
You see, to your average cyclist, Pembina Highway is like Kryptonite: You avoid it at all costs, because eventually it will kill you.
At this particular juncture, our cyclists have two choices: White-knuckle it under the rail bridge and the Jubilee overpass, or ride up the embankment of the rail bridge, jump over the tracks, then scramble across traffic onto the overpass.
Obviously, neither option is particularly safe.
This is why local cycling advocates call this “the Pembina Gap,” and have identified it as one of the critical missing links in Winnipeg’s cycling network.
Yet when the city released concepts for an overhaul of the Pembina underpass recently, only one of three designs included a safe, direct way for cyclists or pedestrians to get across the street.
It’s this gap in transportation planning that disappoints Janice Lukes of the Winnipeg Trails Association, who has been pushing the city to improve connections between different pathways.
“We’ve built a lot of multi-use trails and on-street infrastructure in the past few years, and there’s more and more people wanting to use them,” she says.
“So we need to fill the gaps now, purely from a safety perspective.”
In addition to the Pembina Gap, Lukes points to other problem areas along Osborne Street, St. Mary’s Road and throughout northwest Winnipeg.
She says bridges are bad chokepoints for bike traffic, and wonders why the Osborne Bridge rehabilitation didn’t include a separated bike lane.
However, there are some encouraging signs.
New pedestrian/cycling bridges over the Red River and the Perimeter will allow people to ride all the way from The Forks to Birds Hill Park on dedicated trails within five years.
And the city begins construction next month on what Lukes calls “the Holy Grail of bike infrastructure” in Winnipeg: A bike lane that separates cyclists from traffic by using bollards along several blocks of Pembina Highway.
“This is by far the most important piece of the puzzle,” says Lukes, who hopes the new bike lane can be a model for other high-traffic roadways, like Portage Avenue.
“The safety it’s going to provide for users is incredible, and we know that improving safety is essential to getting more cyclists on the road.”
http://metronews.ca/voices/urban-compass-winnipeg/258040/closing-gaps-in-winnipegs-bike-network/