Snow clearing policy

[Al King]

It would be great to see some recognition of the bike lanes in the
snow clearing policy. It is noticeable absent from this page.
http://www.winnipeg.ca/publicworks/Snow_Clearing_Policy/default.asp

The last couple of days (Nov. 21 & 22, 2010) I could not ride in the
bike lanes due to the amount of snow in them. The city had plowed the
streets after the snow fall, but left the bike lanes unusable.

On the Maryland bridge the snow is plowed into the bike lanes and left
there until they do the occasional major cleanup.

The bike lanes on the Sherbrook and Maryland between Portage Avenue
and the Assinibione river have also had too much snow in them to be
safe.

[Daniel Gravenor]

On a different note, I biked down the Assiniboine bikeway yesterday and it was cleared and showed obvious signs of other cyclists using it as well.

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[Anders Swanson]

Al, 

While I agree completely and hope that policy is amended soon, we will eventually have to recognize that winter usage will always be one of the downsides of simple painted bike lanes. Because they are only on the surface, (and because they are white) there is no guarantee that more plowing will reveal them, esp. to those who don't know of/remember their existence from the summer. Since perceived lane width is a big factor in determining vehicle speed, wider lanes can encourage cars to go faster, so it's hard to say what's best. IMO, I would like to see some of the bike lanes eventually upgraded to curb-protected bi-directional facilities, just like Assiniboine.  I think that once cyclists get used to Assiniboine, this is the level of service (and comfort and convenience) they people will come to desire. 

The issue of leaving snow in the winter (and salt/sand/glass in the spring) on the shy lanes and in curbs is a persistent one. I was hoping the city had solved that issue by getting contractors to do one more pass to do a better job of clearing choke points like bridges, but maybe not. . . . I think they're working on it. Unfortunately, esp. on bridges like Osborne, cleaning the "shy lane" next to the curb results in snow piling up on the sidewalk right next to it . . so if there is a gap between when the fast-moving truck plows come by and when the slower moving sidewalk plows come by, you knock pedestrians out of commission. 

If we did the right thing and, on principle, prioritized emergency vehicles first, pedestrians second, bikes third, buses fourth and cars last - like a growing number of North American cities - this might happen naturally. 

Anders

[Kevin Miller]

Cyclists should contact 311 about things like this.
Also contact them when they do a great job clearing snow from bicycling
facilities, as I did on Saturday after riding on a plowed Transcona
Trail.

To help cyclists, I just inserted a "311" Feature Item at
http://biketothefuture.org (look for the 311 icon near the top of the
screen).

You might be interested in this news item:
http://biketothefuture.org/news/archives/2010/06/09/winter-cycling-prior
ity-routes

Here's a written presentation we made to the City:
http://biketothefuture.org/design-for-the-future/bttf-publications
(it's linked-to under "2010 City of Winnipeg")

And we discussed this at our May Monthly Meeting (item 3):
http://biketothefuture.org/about/meetings

Kevin Miller
Bike to the Future Co-Chair
http://biketothefuture.org