Winter Walking and Cycling

[Acitta]

Having found myself with a health issue that prevents me from cycling and necessitates that I hobble around with a walker, I am confronted with the difficulties that even a small amount of snow causes for navigation, especially getting on and off a GRT bus. Even when a property owner does a reasonable job of clearing the sidewalk, along comes a plow clearing the bike lane and throwing the snow onto the sidewalk. Even an inch of snow at the curb cut makes crossing intersections a chore. Today, coming back from the Kitchener Market, the bus driver put down the ramp for me at the Stirling/Mill stop, but it didn't go all the way past the snow, so even getting off the ramp to the sidewalk was difficult. In past winters, even when I was normally ambulatory, getting over a snowbank to enter a bus could be a struggle. I am not going to have a good winter. Even without the snow, navigating uneven sidewalks and poor transitions between the sidewalk and the road at intersections is not so easy.