General Road and Highway Discussion

[tomh009]

Thanks. So, they know who was driving, and were working on arresting that person. An arrest may or may not have been made since then, I could not find any news later than the article above.

[danbrotherston]

Is the perpetrator known, then? But insufficient proof to charge him or her?

Generally the police will throw the book at any hit-and-run driver, but that does assume they can identify the driver, and have sufficient evidence to chare that person.

Yes, they are known, others have been charged for obstruction of justice, but I have not heard anything since then.

As for "throwing the book at"...I mean...the police generally treat hit and runs more seriously than other vehicular crimes, I still think they treat them too laxly....

[KW65]

Thanks. So, they know who was driving, and were working on arresting that person. An arrest may or may not have been made since then, I could not find any news later than the article above.

https://www.therecord.com/news/crime/202...crash.html

[jeffster]

Thanks. So, they know who was driving, and were working on arresting that person. An arrest may or may not have been made since then, I could not find any news later than the article above.

https://www.therecord.com/news/crime/202...crash.html

Interesting that he made bail, knowing that he had fled Canada after the incident. Obviously having money helps. I've known of people not making bail for trivial reasons....good grief.

[Rainrider22]

You cant compare making bail anymore to the past. The Sol Gen instituted a new bail review process in an effort to reduce the amount of people held in. In addition to this, COVID has many people receiving bail that might not normally be released to reduce the inmate population.

[tomh009]

https://www.therecord.com/news/crime/202...crash.html

Interesting that he made bail, knowing that he had fled Canada after the incident. Obviously having money helps. I've known of people not making bail for trivial reasons....good grief.

He did have to surrender his passport, at least.

[jeffster]

Unsure if this is the best spot for this, not really WR related, but it could be, eventually.

https://www.guelphtoday.com/local-news/c...on-2698951

Will be interesting to see the outcome and how well it works.

[bgb_ca]

Not sure if this has been previously posted or not, but it looks like union from king to Moore is being torn up next year

https://www.engagewr.ca/union-reconstruction

[tomh009]

Not sure if this has been previously posted or not, but it looks like union from king to Moore is being torn up next year

https://www.engagewr.ca/union-reconstruction

While I personally don't mind MUTs, especially the way they are twinned here (one on each side of the road) I don't like the cycling infra changing every few blocks as it is bound to cause confusion.

Is there really no room on the road to continue the on-road bike lanes? What is the current road width?

[ijmorlan]

Not sure if this has been previously posted or not, but it looks like union from king to Moore is being torn up next year

https://www.engagewr.ca/union-reconstruction

While I personally don't mind MUTs, especially the way they are twinned here (one on each side of the road) I don't like the cycling infra changing every few blocks as it is bound to cause confusion.

Is there really no room on the road to continue the on-road bike lanes? What is the current road width?

First, we’ll look at the King St. end of the block. I measured the curb-to-curb distance at the left-turn-lane stop line and got 15.4m.

I measured the straight through and left-turn lanes (west/southbound) as 3.3m and 3.2m respectively, so let’s average this out and say that assuming the existing infrastructure is acceptable (which it clearly was just a few years ago when it was created), 3.25m is sufficient width for a traffic lane at this location.

So the four total lanes (right turn, straight, left turn, other direction straight) need take a total of 3.25m * 4 = 13m. This leaves 2.4m to re-purpose as bicycle lanes without moving the curbs even 1cm.

Now, consider the Mary St. end. The curb-to-curb distance is 11.1m, and there are 3 lanes: straight, left turn, straight; as before assume 3.25m is enough and get 9.8m required, leaving 1.3m without moving the curbs. This is not enough and there is a challenge because the house at the corner of Mary and Union is inconveniently far forward on its lot. But there is space on the other side of the road, and the proposal already contemplates eliminating various left turn lanes off of Union, so it should be possible to fit the bike lanes in.

So right at King there is definitely room for the bike lanes. There is a bit more of a challenge closer to Mary St., but it should still be doable, although slightly more property taking and/or compromise on traffic lanes (specifically, turn lanes) will be needed. For that matter, while I’m not really a fan of knocking down houses for road space, we wouldn’t let one house get in the way of an actual road widening; why should it be different for bike lanes? So overall, I conclude that there should be bike lanes the whole way, even if a bit more creativity is needed in the last block at King St.

Also, I reject the excuse that there is a lack of connectivity. Basically they are using the massive screw-up in leaving out cycling infrastructure from King St. to excuse the smaller but still quite significant screw-up in leaving out cycling infrastructure from at least one block of Union St.

Finally, did anybody else notice how they are playing off pedestrians against cyclists? I’m not going to accuse anyone of malice, but I hardly think that coming up with a pedestrian focussed alternative that completely omits bicycles and a bike lanes version that doesn’t do anything for pedestrians and making us choose between those alternatives is a good way of promoting active transportation in general.

BTW, for reference, the width of a wide but still standard semitrailer is 8½ feet, or 2.6m, so 3.25m should be enough — that leaves over 30cm on each side for maneuvering. This is not enough on a road whose main purpose is moving trucks and other motor traffic, but it’s clearly fine on a neighbourhood road where speeds and truck traffic volume should be limited.

[tomh009]

Thanks. Avoiding quoting the whole response it seems that they would need to expropriate only 1.1m from two properties at Mary St to get the 2.4m for two bike lanes. It does not seem excessively expensive, although I don't know how much length would need to be expropriated.

In my mind, Union is an excellent street for bike lanes, as it provides E-W (or N-S, depending on the city you are in) connectivity all the way from Westmount to Margaret, and yet the traffic volumes and speeds are already relatively low. This is where we SHOULD have bikes!

[ijmorlan]

Thanks. Avoiding quoting the whole response it seems that they would need to expropriate only 1.1m from two properties at Mary St to get the 2.4m for two bike lanes. It does not seem excessively expensive, although I don't know how much length would need to be expropriated.

In my mind, Union is an excellent street for bike lanes, as it provides E-W (or N-S, depending on the city you are in) connectivity all the way from Westmount to Margaret, and yet the traffic volumes and speeds are already relatively low. This is where we SHOULD have bikes!

Not only that, but further east there is tons of space — east of Moore it is four lanes when two plus turn lanes is ample. Actually it would move traffic better than the four lanes with no turn lanes we have, so taking the space of one traffic lane for bike lanes would improve motor vehicle traffic flow while simultaneously providing improved bicycle facilities. Some space might be needed for parking but since turn lanes are needed only at intersections there is plenty of space for that between intersections.

[jwilliamson]

Here's a blog post comparing how traffic signals are controlled in Toronto and in the Netherlands.

https://ontariotrafficman.wordpress.com/...ion-works/

[danbrotherston]

Here's a blog post comparing how traffic signals are controlled in Toronto and in the Netherlands.

https://ontariotrafficman.wordpress.com/...ion-works/

It is truly amazing how bad our signals are. And I also mean locally within the region.

This is what happens when you only measure one metric, and a pointless one at that...basically, we measure LOS, which is how the signal operates at peak hour for cars only. And there is also only one playbook..."LOS < desired LOS, add lanes or convert to roundabout".

[ijmorlan]

Here's a blog post comparing how traffic signals are controlled in Toronto and in the Netherlands.

https://ontariotrafficman.wordpress.com/...ion-works/

It is truly amazing how bad our signals are. And I also mean locally within the region.

This is what happens when you only measure one metric, and a pointless one at that...basically, we measure LOS, which is how the signal operates at peak hour for cars only. And there is also only one playbook..."LOS < desired LOS, add lanes or convert to roundabout".

What’s weird is that they don’t even do a good job of optimizing LOS for cars. Look at all those 4-lane roads with no turn lanes (Union, Belmont, Westmount, …). They build lanes that aren’t needed, but omit the turn lanes that are required to get the benefit of the additional lanes (compared with a 2-lane road).

One comment I have about LOS: I think the issue is not with the metric itself, but with how it is used. The idea of grading how well motor traffic is served at an intersection is fine; what’s not fine is the idea that reducing from LOS A to LOS B because of an added bike lane is some sort of disaster that must be averted.