Addressing Bike Lane Obstruction Risks

As you probably already know, a 24-year-old female cyclist was killed on Bloor Street east of Avenue Road last Thursday; making it a record-breaking five cyclists killed this year so far. A likely cause of death was the placement of a construction bin at the end of the bike lane which forced the cyclist to exit the bike lane early to get around before being hit and killed. Since then, there have been a fair number of reports of motor vehicles blocking bike lanes which prompted me to write about how we can address such bike lane blocking risks.

A blocked bike lane on Davenport at Bartlett on Saturday, July 27

Discontinuities at Intersections

One thing that annoys people who bike the most is how protection of bike lanes disappears before intersections. There are two treatments the City of Toronto has pursued which need to be called out. The first exists right near the recent crash site in which sharrows are placed next to the curb with the right turn lane. This presents a conflict risk involving crossover traffic between right turning vehicles and people biking straight.

Another example of a conflict zone exists on Annette Street just west of Dundas Street where the bike lane is placed between the right turn and thru traffic lanes.

To eliminate this crossover conflict presented by both scenarios, there is a need to extend the bike lane protection all the way to the intersection. If a right turn lane is present, separate bicycle and right turn signals are needed. Toronto has already done both of these with Bloor and Parkside (below), as well as the Danforth-DVP on-ramp. What they need to do is to copy and paste this treatment everywhere, as well as adopt Dutch style protected intersections as what will be coming at Bloor and St. George.

Extra Wide Bike Lanes

One thing I love about the recently redone southbound University Avenue cycle track is how wide it is! It’s something I argued for a while back when I applied Maslow’s hierarchy of needs to bike lanes. However, the extra width also means they can easily be blocked by motorists per this photo from Dafydd Hughes.

When developing wider bike lanes, there is a need to put in centre bollards at the access points to prevent motorists from driving in them. However, there is also a need to avoid overdoing it as what happened on Pottery Road with three P gates placed on each side of the railway tracks per this tweet from Sean Marshall in 2021. Fortunately, this problem has since been rectified.

Curbside Parking and Loading

While Toronto has gotten better in recent years by placing bike lanes curbside and parking in between the bike and traffic lanes, there are still sometimes when the city has forgotten this message. Case in point is the loading area on Bloor west of Sherbourne in front of the Canopy Hotel. I don’t know who with the city approved this setup, but it’s an unacceptable risk to those who bike and is something that needs to be reversed before another tragedy happens.

Take Action

If you end up attending a bike lane consultation in the near future and see any of these design flaws, please flag it to the city staff present and your councillor as soon as possible. The more people who call out these flaws, the more likely staff will change the design as was done for Bloor and Parkside in 2020.

A memorial ride for the fallen cyclist will be held tomorrow; gathering 6:00 PM at Bloor and Spadina for 6:30 PM departure. It’s critical we get a large turnout to send Mayor Olivia Chow and City Council a message enough is enough. Dave Shellnutt issued this open letter highlighting five calls to action including calling out the lacklustre bike plan which was approved last month. Cycle Toronto has their construction zone safety petition with almost 1000 signatures at the time of writing, while Community Bikeways has issued a letter of its own which it called on individuals and community groups to sign on. Please message me should you wish to sign onto Community Bikeways’ letter on behalf of an organization or as an individual.

This crash has gotten a lot of media attention including this Toronto Star editorial.