Since I did so much riding that first week - and taking loads of pictures, I decided I ought to split it up into weekly updates... and then... that didn't happen... So, here is what happened for the rest of June...
That Second week started off with good intentions...
Monday morning I headed out down Spadina south to head out of town..
Made it out of town and started rolling along past farmland and pastures...
and got another fucking FLAT!?
and again, despite all the tools I'm hauling along... for some reason the key for the security skewers isn't in there... so I can't take my rear wheel off and repair it...
f-bomb.
YOu'd think I would have learned the last time this happened... you know... a week or so ago...
Well I got to admire all the pretty flowers along my walk home.
Marvel at both old and new bridges...
Check out the mama and baby duckies on the river.
I don't know what these guys were planning, but I'm pretty sure they were sizing me up and considering their chances!
Sand gushing out of the Water Treatment Plant.
I didn't change that flat until this morning, almost three weeks later... Good thing I have a few other bikes..
Sunset on Tuesday evening
Riding home with Keira on Tuesday evening.
Heading downtown to the Ortodontis with Keira - NOT IN A BIKE LANE!!
Oh, I guess the paint was still there, but the dividing post had all been removed and, temporarily replace with traffic cones.
There were notices in the doors of buildings about the bike lane coming out.
Every other city in the world has figured it out and can't get bikes lanes in fast enough... we're taking them out... sigh...
Heading home...
On Tuesday it was Finnegan's turn to visit the Orthodontist - and they were actively removing the paint off the street on his block that day... despite dozens of bikes locked to just about every sturdy vertical post on this block alone... what was the fucking rush?! Why not wait until fall!?
Heading home - the block south still had the lanes marked out.
Riding home from getting groceries one evening.
heading downtown in the rain.
this guy too.
Stopping to get glasses adjusted.
heading home...
Dowtown to the library on Saturday. Bye-bye bike lanes.. Again, bikes locked up all over the place.
Heading out to the Carlysle King Branch Library with Keira for a Knowlympic event..
Over a bridge...
Through a tunnel.
It was Saturday, so I checked... down 6Kg in two weeks...
It ws Father's Day and I felt like I needed a Treat Day - so we wandered over to Darkside Donuts to pick up some donuts to take over to my folks place for a Father's Day meal they were planning.
Riding over to my folks.
Had a couple days the next week where I didn't really go anywhere... but then my friend Susan got me off my ass and out for a ride.
This is me trying out her new ride!
Keira came along too.
We rolled from Susan's to the South Bridge, up the other side of the river to the Circle Drive Bridge, and then back to Susan's - where Keira played with her dogs for a bit. So good to get out again..
Had a record drought in April-may... June seems to be trying to make up for it...
Rainy day riding.
Out with Susan we rolled past another dude with a recumbent trike of the same make (though with not-so-fat tires)
It was kind of like when two strange dogs meet in public... but with less butt-sniffing...
For those that think we shouldn't spend more money on cycling infrastructure because "no one rides bikes..." I can only assume they haven't tried locking a bike up anywhere in town lately...
Baby geese getting older... perhaps they're adolescent geese now...?
I have no idea...
Bike computer having a bit of a brain-fart.
More brainfarts.
I'm not sure...
dragged finnegan out for a ride with us.
BEAVER!
it was dusk and this critter was dragging a big stick along side the trail towards it's lodge.
Again with the beavers dragging large branches - totally different beaver - totally different part of town.
Clearly the Beavers pay no heed to the No Swimming in the River bylaws...
Chief Mistawasis Bridge
Looking back towards downtown from Chief Mistawasis.
Big lookout areas on the Chief Mistawasis Bridge.
This seems like false advertising - there has never been wildlife on the road when I've ridden by!
New development... empty fields awaiting development....
thought I'd go to Super Store on a Sunday evening - it'll be quite there... the bike rack that is usually only one or two bikes was full! There were other bikes locked up to other things nearby!?
Hauling some new drawers home.
AGAIN with the beaver!
lost almost 10Kg (22lbs) in one month! Woo! Now if only I could keep this up for the next two months!
What was the official line for removing the bike lane? "No one uses it?"
ReplyDeleteIs there a bike advocacy/activist group in Saskatoon?
-Shawn
https://urbanadventureleague.wordpress.com/
I asked one of the councillors who voted to remove them (who sits on the Active Transportation Advisory Group) and she said there's been a lot of "push back" against them....
ReplyDeleteI don't know... Sounds like horse shit to me...
Sure, every time there was an article about them posted online by the Star Phoenix (local paper) there would be maybe twenty-five or thirty comments by raving lunatics about how they're a waste of money and no one uses them and they're ruining downtown and bringing traffic to a standstill and making downtown WAY more dangerous and... and... and... But that's twenty-five or thirty people... out of 273,000... Sure there would be only one or two trying to engage them and typing in favour of the bike lanes. If one were to take that as the actual ratio of those fore and against, I guess that might be how one might think there's a lot of "push back"...? I rather think it's more of a cast that there are loads of rational people that are in favour of them that just can't be bothered to engage with the haters because... well they just have this irrational hatred of all things relating to bicycles and no matter what rational arguments you make, they're just not going to believe them or change their minds, so what's the point.
The city did piles of engagement and surveys and found that there were more people in favour of them and the in favour and neutral were the overwhelming majority. They did studies before and after installing them and found that the increase in travel time along the FOUR BLOCKS that they installed the bike lane was "negligible"... They put up counters and found hundreds were using them daily - year round - with over a thousand on peak days in the summer...
It feels like a cynical political stunt - as the specifically put off reconsidering bike lanes until AFTER the next election. I feel like it's going to backfire on them, though. The haters are still going to think of this council as the ones that put them in. The proponents of bike lanes are going to think of them as the ones that took them out.
Don Atchinson tried to politicize the bike lanes in the last civic election - promising to take them out if re-elected - guess what he's doing now? NOT BEING MAYOR - THAT'S WHAT!?
Well, it definitely sounds like bullshit. But it also definitely sounds like Saskatoon desperately needs some sort of bike advocacy/activism group. City-sponsored advisory committees don't always cut it. It needs to be an independent group that will be able to push-back against these things, organize protests, garner support, all that. Did Saskatoon ever have that?
ReplyDelete-Shawn
https://urbanadventureleague.wordpress.com/
Oh, there is - Saskatoon Cycles:
ReplyDeletehttps://saskatooncycles.org
They did let people know that there was going to be a discussion and potentially a vote on whether to keep them or not and 116 people wrote letters in favour of keeping them. (I think there was 10 that wrote letters opposing the bike lanes).
Maybe it's their major campaign donors that told them to vote them down... I don't know!? It just seems so crazy!
That's cool that they encouraged folks to comment, but obviously it didn't do jack this time around. (I also see that the bike lanes were listed as "pilot" bike lanes, which generally means a lack of faith by the city gov't and a willingness to remove if they get pushback.)
ReplyDeleteSometimes it takes more of a direct action protest, something AT the endangered bike lanes. Something to get the local news out.
I realize saying all this that I live several thousand kilometres away, so I don't really know the lay of the land. But from what you've said, it doesn't sound like there's much political will about actual urban bike lanes when push comes to shove.
-Shawn
https://urbanadventureleague.wordpress.com/