Follow @theurbancountry on Twitter Find us on Facebook Subscribe to theurbancountry.com via e-mail Subscribe to theurbancountry.com via RSS
Follow @theurbancountry on Twitter Find us on Facebook Subscribe to theurbancountry.com via e-mail Subscribe to theurbancountry.com via RSS

Bicycle Infrastructure Ignorance 62

Bicycle Infrastructure Ignorance
Photo of Vancouver’s Hornby St Bike Lanes courtesy of Paul Krueger An article in the Toronto Star newspaper yesterday brought to light a plan to bring a modest segregated bicycle network in Toronto’s downtown core. This news would have been significant even with Toronto’s previous mayor, the “bike-friendly” David Miller. What makes this news drastically ...

Dreaming of Segregated Bicycle Facilities 6

Dreaming of Segregated Bicycle Facilities
Photo by James D. Schwartz / The Urban Country In bike-unfriendly cities all over the world, politicians slap some paint down on the streets to carve out some space for bicycles so they can claim “mission accomplished” – as if painted bike lanes are the “be-all end-all” answer to urban bicycling. Unfortunately, most of these ...

Montreal Bicycle Ridership Up 35-40% 22

Montreal Bicycle Ridership Up 35-40%
Photo courtesy of zmtomako / Flickr A new study finds that bicycling is on the rise in Montreal. In 2010, the city experienced a 35-40% growth in ridership over its 2008 bicycle ridership counts. This is an encouraging sign that the city’s significant infrastructure investments and bike sharing scheme have contributed to an increase in ...

Stifling Urban Bicycling 8

Stifling Urban Bicycling
All photos by James D. Schwartz / The Urban Country This website normally focuses on the positive things happening around the world with respect to improving conditions for urban bicycling. This post however is going to focus on the negative aspects that we see in many North American cities that end up stifling urban bicycling. ...

New York Bike Lanes Explained 2

Photo by James D. Schwartz / The Urban Country New York developed 320km of bicycle routes in just 3 years – and bicycling is on the rise. Ridership has increased by 26% between 2008-2009 and more than doubled since 2005. New York City had announced its ambitious plan in 2006 – and completed its implementation ...

Safe Left Turns for Bicycles 24

Photo by James D. Schwartz / The Urban Country  Left turns are one of the most dangerous manoeuvres to execute on a bicycle in North America. Of course, this doesn’t have to be the case. Many cities have engineered infrastructure to make left turns safe and comfortable for bicyclists. But here in Toronto – and ...

Complete Streets in China 3

Photo by James D. Schwartz / The Urban Country  When it comes to sharing – the Chinese lead the world. Whether in a restaurant, or on the streets, the Chinese share their resources without the sense of entitlement that we feel here in North America. Perhaps our sense of entitlement comes from a sense of ...

4-Year-Old Guilty of Negligence on Bicycle 7

Photo courtesy of Michelle Ress (via Flickr) In April 2009, a 4-year-old girl and her friend were racing their bicycles under the supervision of their respective mothers in New York. The children ran into an 87-year-old lady which caused the elderly lady to fall and fracture her hip. She then underwent hip surgery and died ...

Motorists Against Bicycle Infrastructure 11

Photo courtesy of Alastair Smith After posting an article about the City of Vancouver passing a vote to build a two-way protected bicycle track across downtown I decided to search Twitter to see what people thought of these new bike lanes. One particular tweet caught my eye (and no, it wasn’t because it was tweeted ...

Vancouver Approves Hornby Street Dedicated Bike Lanes 6

Dunsmuir street bike lanes – Photo by Christopher Porter Despite some opposition from motorists, the City of Vancouver approved new dedicated bike lanes along Hornby street late Tuesday evening – with installation to be completed by the end this year. The Hornby lane would cross the entire downtown area to create a barrier-protected connection to ...