How do other western cities reconstruct major areas of their inner urban core? I set off to visit 7 such major urban renewal projects in Europe. I added a few more neighbourhoods on the way, bringing the total to over … Continue reading A Walk in Paris
Miwate is the new autumn light show on the Chaudiere Falls. It is by the same folks who brought us the Kontinum, the light show in the underground subway station at Lyon Street. Like Kontinum, its all about the lights, … Continue reading MIWATE, dazzled by the lights
As west side portions of the Confederation Line advance in construction, more fall landscaping is going in, like these trees planted on the north side of Bayview Station: I vaguely recall that the terms of the NCC lending the rail … Continue reading Confederation Line Forest
When the Ottawa Humane Society left Champagne Avenue there was some sort of contractual agreement they had to offer the land to the city. For parkland. Nothing said the city had to buy it. So they didn’t. And as a … Continue reading City sleeps while mystery bridge decays
Back in 2012 I showed you the picture below. The first apartments on the current rebuild of LeBreton Flats (Claridgeland) had been occupied for a year or so, and baby toys were starting to appear in windows. I asked, how … Continue reading Tot Lot Not
The existing Trillium multi user pathway (MUP) on the EAST side of the OTrain tracks has been a hit with the commuting and recreational public. Its popularity grows weekly. Less well known is the planning “win” when the community obliged … Continue reading Bit of new west side Trillium MUP opens
It is good to be (still) living, in a time when transportation is finally focusing on people who walk, people who cycle, and not just people who drive. Yet to come, of course, is any concern for the people living … Continue reading Some real ped improvements, and some not
The temporary LeBreton transit station requires many transferring people and station walk-ins to cross one or more intersections. Some of the crossings, or repeated crossings, are because the city was too cheap to provide sidewalks even paved shoulders on both … Continue reading Contempt for Pedestrians at Transit Station and some Unworthy thoughts as to how it came to be that way
As promised by the City, the extension of the Trillium (OTrain) pathway from Young to Carling Avenue is essentially complete. I think it is wonderful. Multi-user pathways (MUP’s) get better with every new build. The most significant new feature for a MUP is a physical separation of people who cycle from people who walk, or animals who walk their humans. The bike path portion remains full width; the pedestrian portion is additional, bonus width. There is a very low curb between the two paths to separate them. The lowness of the curb prevents a pedal from getting caught. The separated … Continue reading Trillium Path Extended to Carling Avenue
Alas, for those people walking or cycling east towards the downtown, there won’t be a separated multi-user path, nor as direct a path as along the north side of Scott and Albert. Starting near Tunney’s, there is a south-side east-bound painted bike lane, which I suppose it a wee tad better than cycling with sharrows in the “50KMH” lanes: The cycling lane is “buffered” from cars, trucks, and buses by a 2′ painted median, but the cycling lane is also the right turn lane and driveway access lane. And boy, are there ever a lot of those: There are many … Continue reading Navigating Scott-Albert (east bound)
People who drive westwards from the downtown using Albert and then Scott have big flashing traffic signs, painted arrows, and scrupulously scraped bare pavement. While the lane markings are new, the learning curve should be short. My only bugbear on this so far is the sudden merge of the two westbound traffic lanes around Brickhill Street (just before Good Companions). People who cycle and people who walk face some more challenges. To RTG’s credit a few small ped directional signs have appeared near Bayview Station. So maybe it is worthwhile to follow the route for people who walk or cycle … Continue reading Navigating Albert-Scott (westbound)
In the last year or so, steel plates have begun appearing where walkways meet roads at intersections. These steel plates have a tactile surface to warn pedestrians that they are at an intersection. I have heard city engineers refer to them as Lego dots or Lego blocks, due to the similarity of the tactile bumps to the popular children’s toy. As evidenced by the above picture, the plates can rust. The dots get ripped open by sidewalk and road plows in winter. In the example above, a number of the dots “stood up” like ripped open bits of tin cans, … Continue reading Steel “Lego” crossing markings have gotta go
Like in any entrenched religion or philosophy, internal contradictions eventually create cogitative dissonance in civil engineering standards. That people who walk must always defer to people who drive is one such encrusted rule slowly crumbling in the face of pedestrian revolt. Occasionally we see examples of people who walk getting the right of way over people who drive, but there very scarcity makes them noticeable. At selected road crossings, after much lobbying and pressure, the engineering staff may, with many caveats, permit a walkway to cross a minor road with priority going to the people who walk. Scarcely common. Cambridge, … Continue reading Harbinger of New Walkway Design
In the West End, the Confederation Line LRT will eventually extend to Lincoln Fields, then along Pinecrest Creek (where the transitway is) and it will split into two directions from a point north of the Queensway. One leg will carry on to Algonquin College. The other leg vers westward under a city park and emerges from its underground tunnel between the Queensway and the west end bus garage on Queensview Drive. The in-an-open-cut Queensview Station ( much like Westboro and Tunney’s Stations) will replace the lawn directly in front of The Brick. Directly opposite The Brick is The Ottawa Citizen plant, and … Continue reading Queensview Station Crossing (part iii)
I do occasionally get out of my WestSide stomping grounds. A recent trip took me to the near East Side where I had the opportunity to use the new Coventry bridge for people who walk and people who cycle, over the Queensway. It’s also useful to look at it in light of the similar proposed Queensview bridge. I took the transitway to the Tremblay Station (in the hole in front of VIA Rail Station). The formerly landscaped slopes around it have been clearcut for construction starting later this year of the realigned roadbed and new Confederation LRT Line station location … Continue reading Coventry Active Transportation Bridge (part i)
The City has decided some time ago not to engage transit users for feedback on the design and use of its new LRT vehicles and stations. Instead, users are stuck until they can “try out” a PR model of the new trains, or watch PR Videos cheerleading the project. At Lansdowne Park, a mock-up LRT vehicle reveals numerous shortcomings, from entanglement points, very hard seats, to the lack of footroom at some seats that will make winter riding uncomfortable and exiting the window seats acrobatic enough to challenge cirque de soleil performers. It’s a shame these details are coming … Continue reading Ottawa’s LRT: Sifting Commercials for Info
Rochester Field, now to be a condo development site with a green corridor to the parkway along its western (left) edge, is shown on the above map just above the word Richmond [Road]. The new LRT line, in a shallow cut-and-cover tunnel, with the eastbound traffic lanes of the Ottawa River parkway piggybacking on top, is shown as a thick orangey line extending straight along the parkland. This kilometer-long straight section I find very alarming. The “Parkway” is already derisively known as the Ottawa River Commuter Expressway because of its current high volumes and speeds that rarely descend to the posted … Continue reading Westward ho ! (part ii) Western LRT along the parkway
People who walk or cycle want infrastructure improvements. Fortunately these improvements are cheap compared to facilities for people who drive motor cars. More cycling and pedestrian infrastructure isn’t an extravagance or luxury in a city budget, it’s a bargain. Repeat: people who walk or cycle are cheap dates. Pretty much all residential streets in the US and Canada built since the 1940’s lack facilities for people who walk. We just decided to ignore them and their needs in favour of people who drive cars. In the west side of Ottawa, this is generally true anywhere west of Churchill Avenue. Now look … Continue reading Proof People Who Cycle are Cheap Dates
Yesterday, we looked at the car-first infrastructure at the Lyon LRT station entrance. Money appears to be available to spend on cars, but not pedestrians, even when building transit infrastructure. This save-a-penny attitude, when it comes to pedestrians, prevails in the city’s rail implementation office. Down on the Flats, Preston was recently extended out to the War Museum. The extension is temporary. It is wise to be frugal when building throw-away infrastructure, as this road will be rolled up and trashed in two years. But the penny pinching didn’t include narrower car lanes. No siree, they are full width, and the … Continue reading Temporary transit station puts cars first, part 2
Seattle and its suburbs had an abundance of drainage swales. That might reflect the high seasonal rainfall. In a suburban industrial park (in Redmond or Bellevue, I’m not sure) , about half populated with businesses and the other half being vacant lots, the existing roads had been retrofitted to accommodate swales. The existing infrastructure looked to me to be about a decade old. At each half block, a pair of bulbouts had created a “neckdown” or pinch in the road. A crosswalk was installed, simply marked with a zebra stripe and fluorescent sign (Ottawa traffic engineers are horrified at this … Continue reading More exciting drainage swales, in industrial parks
OK, I’ve wondered (and bitched) bit about the cacophony of crossing markings at Fifth and the QED. So what are other options? In the above pic, there is a bi-directional bike path leading to the intersection in the foreground. A lateral shift, what laypeople might call a severe jog, in the bike path encourages cyclists to slow down at the intersection. Built in traffic calming. The cross street sidewalk is brick, so there is a colour and texture identification. And for the cyclists and pedestrians on the street we are standing on, there is one giant zebra-striped crossing. Not a … Continue reading Example of a simple big-crosswalk
Is it just me, or is there a fresh proliferation of new symbols and signs we are supposed to recognize and obey? I find a lot of them not very clear at all. The new pedestrian crosswalk and cyclist crossride at Fifth and the Canal is an overdue intersection improvement and I am grateful that it is there. And I look forward to a lot more safe crossings in our road-traffic-dominated city. But the proliferation of symbols and signs is a sight to behold. Look at the above pic. The nearest crosswalk is marked with solid white lines and … Continue reading Complexity confuses
Yesterday I self-indulged in a bit of bitch about how the City makes intersections safer for motor vehicles at the expense of pedestrians: Look at almost any intersection. The City locates the signal posts back from the curb line, for the safety of motorists. But then directs pedestrians to stand in the same spot where they deem it too dangerous to place a wooden or steel post. Allright, the natural question is what could be done to make it better? My first response is Amsterdam, like many European cities, puts real bollards (set deep into cement bases, designed to repel … Continue reading Putting pedestrians first at intersections
The City of Ottawa claims it cannot possibly design the new section of Booth Street running north from Albert, serving Pimisi Station and the LeBreton Flats area, to include motorists, buses, transit, and bikes. The cyclists just don’t fit. So they are being thrown under the bus. As for their partner in crime, the NCC’s vision for their new urban downtown showpiece doesn’t seem to include complete streets or cyclists. Dusk a few weeks ago, I noticed this lovely bike path – walkway – bus stop combo in Montreal, on the side of Park Lafontaine. Everyone approaching the place gets ample visual … Continue reading Bike Path, Walkway, Bus Stop: all together now
Churchill Avenue running north from Carling Avenue towards Westboro is being rebuilt today as a complete street. In addition to the regular car / truck traffic lanes on the street, there will be concrete walks and at the same level as the walkway, a cycle track. A cycle track differs from a bike lane, which is a painted zone on the street just off to the side of the car traffic. Road traffic can readily intrude into the bike lane (hello FedEx). The cycle track is separated from other vehicular traffic by a curb and buffer zone. The opening … Continue reading Churchill Cycle Track takes shape
