Bike lanes need a physical barrier or they aren't any use. Is the only thing Cars/Trucks understand.

ah, Canada Post...good old (read: lazy) government employees.

"Where should i park?" he asks.

umm...try using your turning signal and turn down a side street. park in a loading zone. that 10 second walk will not kill you. neither will turning your truck off while you make a delivery.

that also goes for you, Cab Drivers (their steering wheel doesn't work and allow them to parallel park into a spot to let someone off. instead, block traffic and/or bike lanes to pick up or let out a fare), UPS drivers and delivery trucks.

Right, Parking in the bike is reckless.

Ben - uhhh, no. That is not what I meant at all.

Were an accident to happen wherein a car was parked in the bike lane, uh, yeah, that car would be fucked. But whatever, bet on anything you like.

Applauded? For rerouting traffic without permission? For endangering cyclists and drivers alike with a little PR stunt? Are you fucking kidding?

I want to comment, as I am able to see both sides of the coin here. I ride my bike to work (along College Street) and when I get to work I hop into a delivery truck and go to work, making deliveries across town and often along College Street.

On my way to work, I often find myself yelling at shaking my fist at motorists, and once I get to work and start my deliveries, I yell and shake my fist at bikers. It is a peculiar position that I am in. It isn’t a biker vs. delivery truck or biker vs. motorist issue; it is a ‘people can be inconsiderate ’ issue. There are rude, inconsiderate car drivers/delivery people, but guess what, there are just as many rude, inconsiderate bikers out there too. Sure, a delivery person parking in a bike lane is not being very considerate, but neither was the gang of bikers taking over the Gardner Expressway a few weeks ago.

The driver of the Canada Post has a legitimate question. Where would you expect him to park? If you look at the Canada Post truck, he/she is even trying to make an effort to stay out of the bike lane by parking on the sidewalk. From my own delivery experience, parking on the sidewalk warrants a $60 ticket, where just parking illegally on the road is only $30. Delivery trucks are a necessity. You know the beer you drink at bars, the pop you buy at the corner store, the stuff you order in eBay? These things don’t deliver themselves.

I love bike lanes and use them daily, but I also realize that most bikers need to chill out. My bicycle is equipped with handlebars that will allow me to steer around objects. Delivery people aren’t bad people; they are just trying to do their job as fast as they can. In the delivery world, some times it is possible not to park in the bike lanes, but most of the time is it only because there is nowhere else to stop. Sure I could park on a side street instead of the bike lane to make my delivery, but now my delivery takes 15 minutes instead of 5. That may not sound like a big difference, but on a day where you need to make 25 separate stops, it is a huge difference.

Biker/Delivery guy

The real problem is that painted bike lanes on the street are not safe and, in my opinion, may actually increase the danger for cyclists as we are lulled into a false sense of security. In Montreal they at least separate this kind of lane from the motor traffic with pylons, why not here?

I am not a driver (though I can drive) and have often wondered whether cars, and Canada Post delivery trucks, are allowed to park in the traffic lane OUTSIDE the bike path. and if so why don't they? Delivery trucks DO need to park somewhere close to the delivery address, maybe when cycle lanes are built/painted the City needs to create more (aome?) very short-term delivery parking spots.

as a biker and driver, i will tell you something:

i avoid bike lanes at all costs.

why?

because some asshole (or usually multiple assholes) park in the bike lane, which means that i have to shouldercheck and move back into traffic. and then move back into a bike lane. and then shoulder check and move into traffic.

when you are driving at 25-30 km/hr and you approach a car parked in a bike lane, its not a lot of fun to manouver around it.

i will also be the first to argue that most bicyclists have ZERO clue on how to bike properly/safely. biking on sidewalks, weaving in and out of traffic, running red lights. just yesterday, i had a girl swerve from the right lane to drive around 2 TTC buses that were stopped at a red light, and swerve into the left side of the left lane as the light turned green. i almost hit her because her move was stupid and unexpected (i was in my car). i then watched in my rear view mirror as she swerved from the left lane BACK into the right line which had a bike lane...and cars were dodging her! all of this on the Millwood bridge during rush hour!

if bikers want respect, they should learn the rules and follow them.

Wade I must agree.

The problem I have is that you never hear or read about bike advocacy groups telling cyclists to be responsible. You don't hear them telling cyclists to stay off sidewalks.

A little civil disobedience is called for sometimes, and I applaud these bicycle activists for their creative idea. Likewise the Gardiner Ride a few weeks ago was brilliant.

There will come a day when such action would be just a nuisance, because Toronto has finally seriously improved infrastructure where drivers and riders don't have to fight it out in the streets. The City is shirking its responsibility to the public with regards to bike AND pedestrian safety, and needs to get serious.

Cheers,
Tuds

I've seen bike lanes in other cities that are more a part of the sidewalk then the street, separated by a curb and sometimes with their own streetlights (one of the few times I've seen cyclists actually stop at lights). The bike lane is very obviously not part of the sidewalk at the same time.

I've seen lanes like this in Australia and in different parts of Europe, Germany and Spain for example. I managed to find this pic of one in Berlin (source).

It makes a lot more sense but requires the extra effort and expense it's hard to imagine the city being able to afford. Using higher contrast paving would be a start, I've seen bike lanes marked in bright blue or brick red.

i'm all for this if for no other reason than to put the issue on the radar. most of the cyclists I know are in the atomeyes camp. between swerving out of the bike lane into traffic and the possibility of winning a door prize, we'd rather just take dundas to get across town where at least everyone knows what the rules are. if bike lanes were safer we'd use'em, but as is, no way jose.

davedave, i'm going to respond to your poorly thought out blog comment with an intelligent and inflammatory objection. my points will be better than yours, jerk but will still fall within the category of "stupid internet flame war ranting", as will your eventual response. this will escalate until we are bored and this article falls off the first page. one day i will see another comment by you and the great cycle of stupid internet debate will continue.

What non-bike lane users don't understand well (and I didn't either until I started using bike lanes) is that when someone parks in a bike lane, it forces a bicycle into traffic, often with little notice, which is especially dangerous when other drivers on the road are used to bike lanes and not expecting a bicycle to pop into the traffic flow.

I agree with a previous commenter that delivery vehicles should just stop in the middle of the rightmost lane, like they would if there wasn't a bike lane. But they won't because drivers would despise it and they'd be likely to get a ticket. Hmm...

The issue always degrades to people complaining that cyclists don't obey the rules of the road properly (which many don't), but the bottom line is that motorized vehicles do not belong in a bike lane. Including delivery trucks. But because cars rule this city and ticketing isn't enforced, people generally don't give a shit.

The most important thing I want people to keep in mind is that forcing cyclists out of a bike lane and into traffic is extremely dangerous and potentially life threatening (see the PDF graphic at the bottom of this post). Parking in bike lanes is incredibly selfish and inconsiderate, and in this case, cyclists have the right to be furious.

"A little civil disobedience is called for sometimes, and I applaud these bicycle activists for their creative idea. Likewise the Gardiner Ride a few weeks ago was brilliant.

Cheers,
Tuds"

actually, i thought those people were complete idiots. i would have felt little pity for them if they were hit by a car.

what point did they prove? oh yes, that we should teach bike safety to people before they hop on a road.

its like the Gardiner bikers were cutting off their noses to spite the faces of other Torontonians. didn't make sense.

davedave, that guaranteed bike lane looks pretty safe to me...orange cones, two guys standing there with a big yellow sign...not sure why you think its so dangerous. Maybe its cause it's unusual? It's not a good idea to conflate safety with the status quo, especially when the status quo is so friggin dangerous.

"Ever see a film or commercial shoot take up part of a street?"

yup. they just throw a bunch of pylons around their trucks, and pretty well never leave a space for bikes. But since they are representatives of a big industry, I guess we're supposed to assume that's "proper and safe?"

I'm not sure I understand your grievance davedave. Those guys have simply marked out the path that cyclists would be forced to take anyway because of the postal truck. Now, the new path around the truck is simply easier to see. The truck is the only dangerous obstacle in the picture. It's the only thing that is forcing bike traffic into the street. The cones don't do that.

Permits! now I feel nice and safe.

Judging by google maps there appears to be a loading zone at the back of that building. There's always a purolator parked in the bike lane on Prince Arthur right next to the loading zone when I bike to work in the morning.

Why can't they just use the loading zones? When I was a (bike) courier I would always use the loading zones if possible.

Gloria, cyclists usually make a shoulder check before they go around vehicles using the bike lane as a parking lot. But there will be the odd cyclist who may approach the parked vehicle, and when surprised by its presence there will swerve around to avoid it, and into traffic. This is why pedestrians don't stand around on the road. Most drivers would avoid a person standing on the road -- by stopping, signalling, going around, etc. But eventually there will be a driver who will be surprised by the presence of a person standing there, will not go through the various steps of polite driving, and will plow right into the pedestrian. You're a walker, so you would understand that. That's why you don't walk around in traffic. You would, though, if you weighed one tonne and were made of steel. That's why motorized vehicles camp out in our bike lanes...

Gloria,

A bike is different than a car. braking and accelerating isn't the same as a car's gas pedal and a brake. the more a biker brakes, the more energy he/she uses up, the longer their trip is, etc.

also, braking time on a bike is a lot longer than a car's braking time. and if you panic and brake too quickly, you can lock your front tire and flip over your bike. internal bleeding, broken collar bones, possibly falling into oncoming traffic. yikes. but it happens. quite a bit.

shoulder-checking: depends how fast you're going. if you ar