Cycling Outside Waterloo Region

[Canard]

The end of the Gardener, turning onto the DVP:

   

   

If you look close, you can see the subway!

   

Back onto the Gardener...

   

Awesome vantage point for train watching. I knew someone on that particular train, which was super cool!

   

[Canard]

   

Finish line!

   

They gave out these really nice medals to everyone who participated.

   

   

[danbrotherston]

Well Canard has beaten me to posting about Ride for Heart, but I too took part this morning.

While quarter to 5 is not my favourite time to awaken, it was worth it (the 75K started at 6 AM). Great weather, overcast, but that just means it was cool and not sunburny. Not too windy, no rain. Really couldn't have been better.

This was my first time riding, last year I tried, but was waylaid by my injuries after being hit on my way to work. This year, we made it! Really awesome ride, it's quite an experience riding on the highways in Toronto, and certainly no other opportunity to ride such a long route with so little interruption within the city.

There are options for all abilities, 25, 50, 75K rides, and 5 and 10K run/walks. Definitely something to try. And interesting things to see, a couple riding Toronto Bike Share bikes, a triple tandem, even a back-to-back recumbent tandem towing a trailer with children to boot (Not my video, but here's what that looks like: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0MjAK5bcjqg). And of course, it's for a good cause.

Sadly, I didn't stop to take any pictures, but y'all can content yourselves with a map:

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1brgL26...sp=sharing

[panamaniac]

Not sure if this is the best thread, but there's an interesting piece (with eyebrow-raising video) in yesterday's Toronto Star about cars and bicycles turning right (or proceeding straight in case of bikes) from the shared right turn lane on Richmond at Bay.  As a driver, I sometimes hug the curb, especially when I'm first in line in a right turn lane to avoid having a bike alongside me not knowing whether it will also turn right or proceed straight.  Some bicyclists, however, are not amused by being "cut off" in that fashion.  

https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2018/06...wrong.html

[jamincan]

You're using it as intended.

[Markster]

The lane is not terribly intuitive, for either party. Just one big green free-for-all zone, with two sharrows that vaguely hint at what the expected usage is.

[panamaniac]

I think what surprised me most was the number of cyclists willing to go straight from the right when they knew (I'm assuming they knew) the car would be turning right. I'd like to say that the cars turning right from the centre lane were also a surprise but, sadly, they were not.

[danbrotherston]

Finish line!



They gave out these really nice medals to everyone who participated.

I think I'm just out of frame in the second picture...I was there just after that crash on bayview, we stopped and I remember seeing some of the groups stopped there. I remember thinking on the first pass through that section, that it was poorly designed, very narrow given the rest stop there, and sure enough on the second way through, a crash.

Also, I do love that double decked Bloor St. bridge.

[danbrotherston]

I think what surprised me most was the number of cyclists willing to go straight from the right when they knew (I'm assuming they knew) the car would be turning right.  I'd like to say that the cars turning right from the centre lane were also a surprise but, sadly, they were not.

This isn't surprising at all. Just think of how many people thought WRPS's advice to always keep right was perfectly reasonable. The fact is, our roads are designed so badly, the using them properly feels incredibly unsafe.

[timc]

Nothing about the video surprises me, except that someone would OK that design. From what I can tell, it is easy to see that it is confusing for everyone, and it looks like a dangerous situation.

[danbrotherston]

Nothing about the video surprises me, except that someone would OK that design. From what I can tell, it is easy to see that it is confusing for everyone, and it looks like a dangerous situation.

The design isn't even remotely surprising in context of all the other things that get approved.

[JoeKW]

Posted without comment: https://youtu.be/55Wb8exPj3o

[jamincan]

That group is certainly riding poorly; occupying two lanes is inexcusable, as is blowing through stop signs. I strongly feel, however, that riding two-abreast is both safer for a group of cyclists, and less disruptive for motorists. Lets say that group was riding single file on the edge of the road. Could the motorist safely pass then? If there was a gap in oncoming traffic so that she could move into the oncoming lane, yes, but that is equally true when riding two-abreast, except that she doesn't require as large of a gap to safely pass the group. The only thing they are stopping her from doing is squeezing by while there is oncoming traffic and making an unsafe, and illegal here in Ontario, pass. She might feel she can safely do that, but no cyclist will agree with her. From her spot in the drivers seat she is going to naturally want to make more space for the oncoming car, and so encroach further on the cyclists, likely driving them off the road.

For what it's worth, here in Waterloo Region, you are allowed to ride two-abreast. Wellesley and Woolwich Townships have by-laws against it, but WRPS consider the behavior consistent with the HTA and don't enforce those by-laws. The safety benefits for the group should be reason enough.

[clasher]

I rode a tiny stretch of River road in Richmond. Compared to riding in Vancouver (of which I did maybe 50km), Richmond compares poorly. No shoulder on that road, but in the 10km or so riding in Richmond I didn't get any attitude despite it being rush hour.

Despite being near the city it's also an agricultural area, I ran into tractors on these roads so it's probably something a driver would encounter too. Sharing the road means drivers gotta wait sometimes and to me the person in the video just seems to think it means they get to first all the time.

There's a person running for mayor of Vancouver on a anti-bikelane platform so I guess there's people that blame automobile congestion on all the bikes out here.

[ijmorlan]

… the person in the video just seems to think it means they get to first all the time.

…

Not clear to me. It looked like the bicycle group was just going at their speed for as long as they want. It’s not appropriate for slow-moving traffic (of any kind) to slow down all traffic to their speed indefinitely. It’s reasonable for motor vehicles to have to slow down as they approach and wait for the bicycles to pull over or change their configuration but not reasonable to expect motor vehicles to simply drive at 30km/h until the cyclists make a turn, however long that might take. The roads in question are engineered for traffic running at 60-90km/h for a reason.

And I say this as somebody who generally agrees with the cyclists’ view of a situation. I’m no friend of the motorist, in general.