...my journey with #way2narrow Victoria, BC
"All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident."
(Arthur Schopenhauer)
When I first moved to Victoria, back in 1994, I immediately got involved in cycling advocacy. I'd been doing it for years in Vancouver, Marin County, and Edmonton; I'd always opposed the view of cycling as a spawn of demon destroying forests and obstructing motor vehicles; a dangerous activity that required heads to be covered in plastic covered compressed styrofoam cups.
My first cycling experience in Victoria was a (1995?) GVCC AGM held in James Bay, and it was bizarre. As soon as someone saw me speaking with John Luton I was inundated with repeated sales pitches from various cyclists in attendance. It seems the GVCC was in a state of disarray; opposing factions were fighting for control, and I was led to believe that Luton was some sorta defacto radical revolutionary, a seemingly clean-cut peaceful version of a Che' Guevara of the cycling community, at odds with the status quo. It turned me off from the GVCC, as did the divisiveness of compromise from the zealous status quo tweed-covered "cycling advocates".
When I volunteered with the Victoria Cycling Advisory Committee back in 2002(?) I saw this same dysfunctional safety-compromise status quo dogma dominate. I was considered radical for advocating for; LRT; giving the Galloping Goose right of way over vehicle traffic on side streets; cyclist and pedestrian right-of-way enforcement campaigns instead of helmet law compliance campaigns; a car-free Government Street; and bike lanes that meet and exceed industry standard safety guidelines. Can you imagine the uproar if the new Johnson Street Bridge was built below the weight-bearing requirements of safety guidelines?
I discovered the unsafe bike lanes in committee meetings when the narrow widths were talked about as okay; and when I queried, nobody knew how wide Victoria bike lanes were. So I went out and measured them. I know how a tape measure works, but most of the Victoria Cycling Advisory Committee insisted I was wrong, so I measured it again. I was right.
The committee opposed any efforts I made to make the city rectify this cyclist safety issue, so I did what I do 2nd best, I wrote about it and had it published in a local paper during the Pro Walk/Pro Bike Victoria 2004 Conference.
The article was called "Victoria, the Cycling Liability Capital of Canada" and I revealed how municipalities can be sued for failing to provide safe infrastructure. When the editor was fact checking my piece, he asked me why nobody else in town was complaining about the narrow bike lanes, and why nobody supported my efforts. I told him to ask them, but my facts were spot on; it was published verbatim with only a minor title change.
I even held a very public and promoted contest, with real prizes; the winners needed to identify a narrower more dangerous bike lane than the intersection I selected. 😎 I was trying to shame the city into doing the right thing; and it sorta worked but my dream of safe bike lanes for Victoria was still violently opposed.
At the "Pro Walk/Pro Bike Victoria 2004 Conference" MP Denise Savoie very loudly publicly reprimanded me over the article and the contest, while we were standing in front of the GVCC booth. I wasn't wrong, she just expected me to be happy with baby steps, even though we were both adults.
The Cycling Advisory Committee reaction was to hold a special meeting with guests, lawyers, and mystery committee members I'd never seen in attendance. They spoke with great dismay about my article, upset with what I said. The most beautiful part of the meeting was when level headed committee member Susanna Grimes spoke up, making my opponents admit that I had not said anything untrue in the article. 😎
I was not invited back on the Cycling Advisory Committee for the next term when it died ...BUT; the next two major cycle lane projects in Victoria (Fort Street, and the Government and Hillside intersection I used for the contest) were great improvements. I consider it a win for #way2narrow, even though they sorta screwed up those projects, too.
"The further a society drifts from truth the more it will hate those who speak it." (George Orwell)
..through all of this I discovered what I believe to be the primary reason for the opposition to my crusade for safe bike lanes in Victoria; the cycling advocates, in their desperation to have the city install bicycle infrastructure protected by lines painted on the road; in consultations with the City of Victoria, the GVCC and other local cycling advocates like Luton agreed to a compromise; 1.2m bicycle lanes; and none of them like to admit it, or they rationalize it, ad nauseam.
"[Victoria] bike facilities are safe." (John Luton)
"I had a look at a copy of TAC's 2012 today: it clearly says you can go to 1.2m." (Corey Burger)
(NO, it doesn't, Corey.)
“I regularly almost get killed almost on a daily basis as cycling is my main way of getting around the city.” (Mayor Lisa Helps)
"Transportation Assoc. of Canada (TAC) Bike Lane Widths: 1.5m (MINIMUM) - 2.75m (recommended)"
The "minimum" does not allow for increased widths recommended by TAC when; traffic is high; curbs are tall; road has parallel seams in the bike lane: sewers grates and other obstructions in the lane; tall obstructions beside lane; road curves; intersections...
...now, I didn't make these numbers up. They are in print, published by the Transportation Assoc. of Canada (TAC), the city has at least one copy, yet I was vehemently opposed.
And so, when the City of Victoria announced their #biketoria intentions, I amped-up the volume on my #way2narrow campaign; and I remeasured the city and regions bike lanes. Instead of being buried in the city archives like the two previous surveys I conducted, this was photo-documented and published on line.
...and when I promoted this I was roundly dismissed, much like Pullman, a member of a newer generation of the Victoria cycling advocacy scene, said today;
"I just do more than rant about it on social media like Bruce does."
(Edward Pullman)
Yet, try to find anything significant from the GVCC or Pullman strongly opposing Victoria #way2narrow bicycle lanes, or promoting wider bike lanes than the dangerous status quo; or try to find a post of theirs linking to the #way2narrow bike lane survey; one of only three safety surveys of the Victoria bicycle lane infrastructure in existence.
What I did with the ignored survey was send it directly to the "Dream Team" of cycling experts and the local consulting firm, hired by Victoria to develop #biketoria, and I followed up to confirm they received the info. I sent it to all(?) of the Victoria Council. I also attended the #biketoria consultation process and spoke with all the key players I could. The info got to the people who mattered.
...and now, in 2017 and on, in-spite of the majority of the GVRD bike lanes remaining #way2narrow; we are getting safer cycling infrastructure in Victoria, BC, the city is no longer installing narrow bike lanes, and the need and priority for safe bicycle lanes is starting to be "accepted as being self-evident."
Finally! ...I was getting exhausted.
...my journey with #way2narrow Victoria, BC
"All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident."
(Arthur Schopenhauer)
When I first moved to Victoria, back in 1994, I immediately got involved in cycling advocacy. I'd been doing it for years in Vancouver, Marin County, and Edmonton; I'd always opposed the view of cycling as a spawn of demon destroying forests and obstructing motor vehicles; a dangerous activity that required heads to be covered in plastic covered compressed styrofoam cups.
My first cycling experience in Victoria was a (1995?) GVCC AGM held in James Bay, and it was bizarre. As soon as someone saw me speaking with John Luton I was inundated with repeated sales pitches from various cyclists in attendance. It seems the GVCC was in a state of disarray; opposing factions were fighting for control, and I was led to believe that Luton was some sorta defacto radical revolutionary, a seemingly clean-cut peaceful version of a Che' Guevara of the cycling community, at odds with the status quo. It turned me off from the GVCC, as did the divisiveness of compromise from the zealous status quo tweed-covered "cycling advocates".
When I volunteered with the Victoria Cycling Advisory Committee back in 2002(?) I saw this same dysfunctional safety-compromise status quo dogma dominate. I was considered radical for advocating for; LRT; giving the Galloping Goose right of way over vehicle traffic on side streets; cyclist and pedestrian right-of-way enforcement campaigns instead of helmet law compliance campaigns; a car-free Government Street; and bike lanes that meet and exceed industry standard safety guidelines. Can you imagine the uproar if the new Johnson Street Bridge was built below the weight-bearing requirements of safety guidelines?
I discovered the unsafe bike lanes in committee meetings when the narrow widths were talked about as okay; and when I queried, nobody knew how wide Victoria bike lanes were. So I went out and measured them. I know how a tape measure works, but most of the Victoria Cycling Advisory Committee insisted I was wrong, so I measured it again. I was right.
The committee opposed any efforts I made to make the city rectify this cyclist safety issue, so I did what I do 2nd best, I wrote about it and had it published in a local paper during the Pro Walk/Pro Bike Victoria 2004 Conference.
The article was called "Victoria, the Cycling Liability Capital of Canada" and I revealed how municipalities can be sued for failing to provide safe infrastructure. When the editor was fact checking my piece, he asked me why nobody else in town was complaining about the narrow bike lanes, and why nobody supported my efforts. I told him to ask them, but my facts were spot on; it was published verbatim with only a minor title change.
I even held a very public and promoted contest, with real prizes; the winners needed to identify a narrower more dangerous bike lane than the intersection I selected. 😎 I was trying to shame the city into doing the right thing; and it sorta worked but my dream of safe bike lanes for Victoria was still violently opposed.
At the "Pro Walk/Pro Bike Victoria 2004 Conference" MP Denise Savoie very loudly publicly reprimanded me over the article and the contest, while we were standing in front of the GVCC booth. I wasn't wrong, she just expected me to be happy with baby steps, even though we were both adults.
The Cycling Advisory Committee reaction was to hold a special meeting with guests, lawyers, and mystery committee members I'd never seen in attendance. They spoke with great dismay about my article, upset with what I said. The most beautiful part of the meeting was when level headed committee member Susanna Grimes spoke up, making my opponents admit that I had not said anything untrue in the article. 😎
I was not invited back on the Cycling Advisory Committee for the next term when it died ...BUT; the next two major cycle lane projects in Victoria (Fort Street, and the Government and Hillside intersection I used for the contest) were great improvements. I consider it a win for #way2narrow, even though they sorta screwed up those projects, too.
"The further a society drifts from truth the more it will hate those who speak it." (George Orwell)
..through all of this I discovered what I believe to be the primary reason for the opposition to my crusade for safe bike lanes in Victoria; the cycling advocates, in their desperation to have the city install bicycle infrastructure protected by lines painted on the road; in consultations with the City of Victoria, the GVCC and other local cycling advocates like Luton agreed to a compromise; 1.2m bicycle lanes; and none of them like to admit it, or they rationalize it, ad nauseam.
"[Victoria] bike facilities are safe." (John Luton)
"I had a look at a copy of TAC's 2012 today: it clearly says you can go to 1.2m." (Corey Burger)
(NO, it doesn't, Corey.)
“I regularly almost get killed almost on a daily basis as cycling is my main way of getting around the city.” (Mayor Lisa Helps)
"Transportation Assoc. of Canada (TAC) Bike Lane Widths: 1.5m (MINIMUM) - 2.75m (recommended)"
The "minimum" does not allow for increased widths recommended by TAC when; traffic is high; curbs are tall; road has parallel seams in the bike lane: sewers grates and other obstructions in the lane; tall obstructions beside lane; road curves; intersections...
...now, I didn't make these numbers up. They are in print, published by the Transportation Assoc. of Canada (TAC), the city has at least one copy, yet I was vehemently opposed.
And so, when the City of Victoria announced their #biketoria intentions, I amped-up the volume on my #way2narrow campaign; and I remeasured the city and regions bike lanes. Instead of being buried in the city archives like the two previous surveys I conducted, this was photo-documented and published on line.
...and when I promoted this I was roundly dismissed, much like Pullman, a member of a newer generation of the Victoria cycling advocacy scene, said today;
"I just do more than rant about it on social media like Bruce does."
(Edward Pullman)
Yet, try to find anything significant from the GVCC or Pullman strongly opposing Victoria #way2narrow bicycle lanes, or promoting wider bike lanes than the dangerous status quo; or try to find a post of theirs linking to the #way2narrow bike lane survey; one of only three safety surveys of the Victoria bicycle lane infrastructure in existence.
What I did with the ignored survey was send it directly to the "Dream Team" of cycling experts and the local consulting firm, hired by Victoria to develop #biketoria, and I followed up to confirm they received the info. I sent it to all(?) of the Victoria Council. I also attended the #biketoria consultation process and spoke with all the key players I could. The info got to the people who mattered.
...and now, in 2017 and on, in-spite of the majority of the GVRD bike lanes remaining #way2narrow; we are getting safer cycling infrastructure in Victoria, BC, the city is no longer installing narrow bike lanes, and the need and priority for safe bicycle lanes is starting to be "accepted as being self-evident."
Finally! ...I was getting exhausted.