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Calgary Bike Lanes and Bike Paths

potatopizzafan said:
The bike lockup at city hall yesterday, love to see it, city workers with a collective middle finger to gas prices
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Below is a cut and past from a post I made in another thread, but very much coinciding with your comments.

I'm feeling bullish on pretty much anything inner city these days. Two different people I work with are both looking into moving to an inner city neighborhood, moving from Legacy and Airdrie, the main driver being cost. Both have to come into downtown and pay 20 some odd bucks for parking, and quite a bit for gas to boot. I don't know how much it costs them for gas, but given they drive SUVs, I wouldn't be surprised if it was $10 per day.
Not to mention the time commuting. A few of us at work ride our bikes in, and we're all between 10-20 minutes commute, with no gas or parking costs. I can't help but wonder how many others are looking at this scenario.
 
Surrealplaces said:
Good props for Cowtown. Second only to Montreal in Canadian citties...at least going by their rankings. Calgary had a high 'network' rating which I suspect comes a lot from the extensive river pathways. Still good to see.
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Calgary's off street pathway network is a major achievement that few cities will ever be able to match due to fragmented land ownership. Sure Calgary still has much work to do on the dedicated bike lane front, but in most parts of the city, an off street pathway is not far away. I can't think of many remaining gaps in the off street network. It has come a long ways since 10 year old me rode from Canyon Meadows to Sikome Lake on the pathways, and around Glenmore Reservoir. Opening the path all the way to Cochrane would be impressive, but I doubt it would every become much of a commuter route due to the distance.

Long winters and sprawl are still the biggest barriers to cycling in Calgary, not infrastructure.
 
DougB said:
Calgary's off street pathway network is a major achievement that few cities will ever be able to match due to fragmented land ownership. Sure Calgary still has much work to do on the dedicated bike lane front, but in most parts of the city, an off street pathway is not far away. I can't think of many remaining gaps in the off street network. It has come a long ways since 10 year old me rode from Canyon Meadows to Sikome Lake on the pathways, and around Glenmore Reservoir. Opening the path all the way to Cochrane would be impressive, but I doubt it would every become much of a commuter route due to the distance.

Long winters and sprawl are still the biggest barriers to cycling in Calgary, not infrastructure.
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It's all been said before, but the river pathway is a total gem and really is unmatched in most cities, particularly in North America.

It's already started in places, but I think the logical next step is to continue to lean into the river pathway system backbone and actually start thinking of it as a holistic transportation network with capacities and demands. There's lots of areas even in the centre city that are too narrow, have pinch points, or are too busy for mixed traffic. There also doesn't appear to be a mechanism to automatically widen these stretches to allow for more capacity short of "placemaking" urban design projects (e.g. Eau Claire).

These projects are good and welcome too of course - just that capacity is often a simpler, cheaper concept and considers areas that are not really destinations in themselves (e.g. widen a 3m path to 4m for 5km, add a second path for pedestrians to separate traffic etc.) Consider the pathway system as a primary transportation network element that has capacity, consistency and quality requirements like a major highway.

On the point of sprawl - a big difference between Calgary today and Calgary 30 years ago is the increase in connections, density and spread of destinations in the inner city . Overall this has increased the relevance of cycling as the distances are stretching past comfortable walking distances but the cycling network quality is solid enough to make it an optimal choice to get around the inner city.

Inglewood's explosion in popularity in the past decade is the perfect example - it's a bit far to walk from other areas but it's a perfect bicycle distance.
 
CBBarnett said:
That's the way to do a bicycle cage - some degree of weather protection, huge amounts of space, right up front of the building instead of through a bunch of awkward doors near a back entrance, or in a basement near the dumpsters.
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What we actually need is a public network of bike cages like this; buy a subscription and get an access card that grants you access to all of them. RFID doorway (like the City cage), security cameras and help button, a bit of a roof. They don't need to be tied into the grid, just bolted down. (My bad rendering below -- it parks almost 90 bikes in the space of 5 car parking stalls)

1656023145364.png


The key is that there needs to be a network of cages so that there's value in the subscription. There are some places I won't go to by bike because I'm worried about theft, and monthly cage access is good for work or someplace you go to all the time, but there's a lot of places like high streets that people visit from time-to-time where occasional, unplanned access to a secure storage would be helpful. We'd probably need 20-30 to get good coverage.
 
ByeByeBaby said:
What we actually need is a public network of bike cages like this; buy a subscription and get an access card that grants you access to all of them. RFID doorway (like the City cage), security cameras and help button, a bit of a roof. They don't need to be tied into the grid, just bolted down. (My bad rendering below -- it parks almost 90 bikes in the space of 5 car parking stalls)

View attachment 409471

The key is that there needs to be a network of cages so that there's value in the subscription. There are some places I won't go to by bike because I'm worried about theft, and monthly cage access is good for work or someplace you go to all the time, but there's a lot of places like high streets that people visit from time-to-time where occasional, unplanned access to a secure storage would be helpful. We'd probably need 20-30 to get good coverage.
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Drop one of these in surface parking lots across the city.
 
CBBarnett said:
It's already started in places, but I think the logical next step is to continue to lean into the river pathway system backbone and actually start thinking of it as a holistic transportation network with capacities and demands.
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100% agree. We have a really good backbone, and just need to leverage more.
 
GoVertical said:
livewirecalgary.com

Calgary scores near the top in annual North American cycling rankings - LiveWire Calgary

The backbone of Calgary’s high score in a recent North American ranking of bike-friendly cities is built on the city’s extensive multi-use pathway network, said one city councillor. The sixth annual PeopleForBikes city ratings had Calgary ranked fifth in the large city (300,000+ population). In...
livewirecalgary.com livewirecalgary.com
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I’m glad to see Calgary get some recognition for its bike system. While not perfect, it is a good system and getting better all the time. As @DougB said earlier the river pathway system has been years in the making, and is very underrated.
The heavy lifting has been done, now all we need is to properly tie these new cycle lanes into it. 5th street anyone?

I’ve lived and cycled in San Francisco and Dallas as well as Calgary. Calgary is easily the best of the three to cycle in. Yes, better than SF.
 
Mountain Man said:
The city needs to separate more of the river pathway into walking and cycling lanes, too many people discovered the system during Covid and aren't great at following the rules lol.
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Definitely. I agree with this from a cyclists and pedestrian perspective. There are some real idiot cyclists out there, aaaand some real idiot pedestrians. Unfortunately it makes it difficult sometimes, would great to see more separation.
 
Col du Edworthy said:
Had a chance to use the new 24th ave bike lanes this morning, I think it's been mentioned before but they are quite good. I was skeptical of the ups and downs across driveways and roads but they did a pretty good job at keeping those smooth. I also really enjoyed having priority all the way from 14th st to Crowchild (only have to stop at 19th)

It's been a long time since I biked around U of C but for my trip this morning I needed to get to the Childrens hospital to connect to a pathway and it seems glaringly obvious that 24th between Crowchild and the Childrens Hospital needs a bike lane. There is so much space to accomodate one - are they any plans for that?
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I rode that stretch for the first time recently, and agree with you. It’s a solid setup.
 
Surrealplaces said:
The first time I rode it, I wasn't crazy for it, but now I like it. I'd still prefer the lane be at road level and separated, but the 24th ave style setup works well.
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So I drove 24th yesterday in my car and I think something that is overlooked with that project is the impact narrowing the road has had on vehicle speed. So not only have we added bike infrastructure we also have effectively dropped the average speed to ~40 km/h improving the experience for all users (cars too IMO)
 
Mountain Man said:
The change to 40km/h happened before the bike lanes no? That was the citywide change last spring.
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I'm not speaking to the speed limit but the speeds drivers actually go. With proper road design like this you drive the a speed that feels safe and appropriate - I don't even remember what the speed limit was but with the narrower lanes, parked cars and curb extensions I didn't want to be going any faster than 40.
 
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