Walking in Waterloo Region

[danbrotherston]

I am unsure about the markings.

Part of the planning process? I think I see the same colours on the actual trees as on the plans.

As for sidewalks, out of curiosity, what streets do you feel do not need sidewalks? Longfellow is not meaningfully different to my eye than the thousands of other residential streets that do have sidewalks.

As a pedestrian, I have walked along many unsidewalked residential streets--including this one and I really do not feel safe doing so...you can blame dangerous drivers for that all you want, but until we are willing to do something about dangerous drivers, we're going to need sidewalks.

Woonerfs are the new hotness, but they need to be built as such — very hostile to fast motor vehicle traffic. Right now we have a de facto woonerf on Longfollow, which I don’t see as appropriate, for exactly the reasons you give. Looking at the map, Longfellow is not a deadend and is part of the pedestrian route for many destinations. I think it should have sidewalks for sure on the south side and preferably on both sides.

My question would be why they’re only considering 7m and 8m width. According to the MTO:

http://www.mto.gov.on.ca/english/trucks/...-3-7.shtml

… transport trucks are limited to a width of 2.6m. So a 6m right of way would allow two trucks to pass each other and would of course further encourage appropriate speeds.

Additionally, whether parking is allowed should be part of the design. If it is, as is currently the case, then intersections should be narrowed compared to the rest of the street, because parking is not allowed at intersections so the space for parking does not need to be available. Actually the provision of parking suggests that the 7m width might actually be appropriate — but still not at intersections.

What about corner radius? The plans show 6m radius, which isn’t huge like at the intersection of two major streets, but for a residential street with low speeds even that might be more than is needed.

Agree in theory with Woonerfs, but you're right, none of our designs (except maybe Larch) are actually woonerfs by design.

For parking, you could probably even allow parking on a street with a 6 meter cross-section, if traffic and parking were both infrequent.

For corner radii, you're right, the Kitchener Complete Streets Guide would recommend a 3 meter turn radii at most of these intersections.