A new bike is as good an excuse as any to explore. It was a solo ride, so apologies in advance for all the bike pics… This ride is inspired by our recent BC Bike Infrastructure index and the mapping for it, as I realized there were a few local trails I hadn’t ridden before. I’ve also been thinking about how gravel trails fit into our active transportation network as we shift from a focus on all ages and abilities to levels of comfort in BC…

Do you ever look at the various bike network rankings that come out and think they don’t make much sense? That’s been my perception every time such lists come out, so I was curious if a simpler analysis would tell a different story. Who has the most All Ages and Abilities (AAA) bike infrastructure in BC? Will the usual suspects come out on top?

In Calgary for our (ISL) staff conference on what I think was one of the first hot days of the year, many people were out enjoying the weather on two wheels. Like any time I ride around a city, there’s always some interesting new things to see, and on this occasion, that included interesting lane width observations, intersection treatments, traffic calming, and tactile surfaces amongst other things…

Is a quick-build protected bike lane with no space to pass still better than a painted lane? What is the right protected bike lane width and how does it affect the user experience? This might seem simple, just pick a number within the recommended range from a design guide, but this post looks at a range of bike lane widths and the practical experience of riding in them.

Whenever over in Victoria, I usually try and take a few photos of some of the bike projects I’ve had a chance to work on with the City. This time, I experimented with some film clips to try and capture the experience a little better. If you’ve never biked from the ferry down to Victoria, or around Victoria itself, below are some photos as I’d normally take and a couple of short films…

Just as we thought the winter was over, a final blast of snow snuck in… We all know that the “nobody bikes in the rain or snow” argument is a myth, but it never hurts to show that once in a while… So with snow in the forecast and a need to be downtown, I took the camera out hoping for some epic people riding bikes in the snow shots…

Canals, windmills, bike paths… What more is there? A colleague said he would have a few days free in and around Amsterdam and asked for some recommendations. He could of course just read fietspad, an excellent and quite comprehensive tale of Cycling in the Netherlands… But it also seemed like a useful blog post, so if you have a few days in and around Amsterdam, here’s what I'd probably do if I wanted to geek out on the transportation network for the first time…

A protected intersection is about more than just corner islands and two-stage left turns. A truly protected intersection is safer for all modes… Essential elements include the dedicated left and right turn lanes on all vehicle approaches and signal phasing that combines to eliminate all conflicts… Let’s pick it apart a bit…

The City of Victoria on Vancouver Island has done so much in the last decade to enable people of all ages and abilities get around the city by various types of micro mobility that today, it feels close to having Dutch levels of connectivity… And they’re not done yet… I was excited to see Nic’s take on it…

My Fujifilm X100VI is a great small fixed-lens camera, it’s the only camera I've taken on the last few trips to Europe when traveling light, I love the Fuji colours that come out of it, and I never thought I needed anything else, or anything smaller... Then Fujifilm announced the X half and I grew curious about an even smaller camera with those same Fuji colours, and the potential to travel even lighter…

Most people might associate Canmore with access to the Rockies… The hiking, the biking, and the climbing… But I love it for what they’re doing from an urban transportation perspective… The bike paths, the continuous sidewalks, and the much safer intersection designs… The choices this mountain town is making to build a more sustainable future provide lessons for others…

With senior ISL staff in Vancouver for the management retreat, it was an opportunity to take some time out and show Dan Zeggelaar, our Sustainable Transportation Lead in Edmonton, around some pedestrian and bike-related things old and new in Downtown Vancouver. We ticked off a number of protected bike lanes and intersections of course, the Granville Bridge bike lane (and benches), and some local street bikeways and the plazas along them…

To make riding a bicycle safer and more comfortable for more people, there are many things we can do beyond just protected bike lanes, and each little thing combines to create a bigger picture that starts to look a bit more like the Netherlands. I’m pleased to say that in the last few days, the City of Burnaby took a step beyond most other cities in North America, and rebranded one of their local street bikeways a bicycle street complete with fietsstraat inspired pavement markings!

Metral Drive, and the engineering standards behind it, remains a highlight project for me and for ISL and the others that worked on it. It’s been a few years now, but it’s still one of the best examples of continuous sidewalks and bike paths in North America. Chatting with Nic in Eindhoven during our Lessons from the Dutch video, I was keen for him to experience Metral Drive for himself…

The thought was just to enjoy the city for a few days at the end of the trip, but it’s hard to leave the camera in the bag when you’re watching the busy scenes unfold on Vredenburg… This is what can happens when you build a city for bicycles (and walking and transit)…