Category: ACTBiPed

ACTBiPed Meeting Report for March 8, 2017

Another month, another ACTBiPed meeting. At March 8’s meeting we got to talk about pedestrians and accessibility, bus shelters, cycling, and a neighbourhood transportation plan. Let’s go!

First up was a report from a city planner about a pedestrian and cycling overpass at Sixth Street over Front Street and the train tracks to connect with Pier Park. This doesn’t seem to be a critical piece of infrastructure to put in right now, but the construction at 660 Quayside Drive is going to close the entrance to Pier Park along the waterfront, leaving the only access at the 4th Street elevator and stairs. City staff were asking for comments from ACTBiPed on whether this overpass should include an elevator or be an accessible ramp. Overwhelmingly the response was an accessible ramp. I think (and with good reason) people in New Westminster are hesitant to recommend outdoor elevators, and an accessible ramp means people with mobility issues (or cyclists) can get to and from Pier Park at any time. Look for this overpass to be in place hopefully before construction at 660 Quayside starts in Spring 2018.

Next came a report and update on New Westminster’s Bus Shelter program. New West has a goal to have shelters at 75% of feasible bus stop locations by 2020. A bus stop is considered “feasible” if there’s enough room — a shelter needs a 1.5m x 4.5m concrete pad, and that has to be a minimum of 1.3m from the curb. To hit the target, New West needs to have an additional 35 shelters put in place. Now, Pattison Outdoor Advertising has a contract with the city to install, operate, maintain, and repair bus shelters with advertising, but they want to put shelters in locations that are feasible for them — high traffic areas. (Side note: the city gets back a percentage of the ad revenue, about $100/month/shelter!) The city has compiled a list of feasible high priority locations based on ridership numbers and demographics, and of this list 7 are also on Pattison’s “good advertising potential” list. I don’t know where those are, but they’ll be going in in 2017. Additionally, Ewen Avenue is going to get a “public art inspired” bus shelter. If you’re into designing bus shelters, check out the call for artists. Another non-ad shelter is going to go in somewhere on Quayside Drive. (Mad props to Max Leung, a co-op student, who crunched all the numbers that went into the report and answered the questions we threw at him!)

If you have suggestions on where bus shelters might be needed, please do let the city know! Also, if you have any suggestions on providing shelter at the Police Station stop on Sixth Street, let the city know as well!

After the bus shelter report came a report about the ‘listen and learn’ workshop held in Sapperton as one of the initial stages for the development of the Sapperton Transportation Plan.  Given the report was largely based on input from the community, there were some… interesting ideas that won’t actually see the light of day (like the Stormont Connector). The report gave good insight into what Sapperton residents see as important in their neighbourhood. From a cycling point-of-view, the gap in the Central Valley Greenway between Cumberland and Brunette was noted as a huge deficiency, and there’s also some talk towards making Keary Street the official bike route between Columbia and Richmond instead of Sherbrooke Street.

Days are still early, so if you have any interest in transportation in Sapperton (and most importantly, pedestrian transportation) definitely follow the city’s news. The next workshop is scheduled for April 8, 2017.

We then got an update on the public consultation for the Rotary Crosstown Greenway improvements. About a dozen people showed up, and the response was largely positive. Some people thought that the plans don’t go far enough and the bike lanes should be properly separated with curbs! Look for paint to go down on the street sometime this summer. It’ll be New Westminster’s first AAA (all ages and abilities) walking and cycling path!

And to finish things off, Mary Wilson announced the Walk New West Challenge that’s happening from April 3 to May 28. Form a team, register, and discover just how walkable New Westminster is!

ACTBiPed Meeting Report for February 15, 2017

I’m a member of New Westminster’s Advisory Committee for Transit, Bicycles and Pedestrians (aka ACTBiPed), and we had our first meeting of the year on February 2017. Since they’re open to the public and only one member of the public routinely attends (the always awesome Mary Wilson), I’ve decided to post a little report after each meeting outlining the things that we do and learn in these meetings to help shed some light on the City’s efforts to make sustainable modes of transportation safer and more appealing.

Because last night was the first one of the year, we had to deal with the administrivia first: Oath of Office, don’t be a jerk, that sort of thing. Did you know that as a member of an advisory committee I’m not allowed to take bribes? Shocking, I know!

The first proper committee work we did was to receive and endorse the 2017 ACTBiPed Transportation Work Plan, which gives a summary of the things that the Transportation Section of the City is planning on bringing to the committee in 2017 for our consideration. Our work is largely guided by the City’s Master Transportation Plan, which has the following four targets to achieve before 2041:

  1. Increase sustainable transportation such that the proportion of trips by sustainable modes will be 40% by 2021, 50% by 2031, and 60% by 2041;
  2. No additional increase in regional through traffic;
  3. Reduce distance driving from 10km per person per day to 6.5km per person per day;
  4. Increase safety so that there will be no traffic-related fatalities or serious injuries most years.

Since we’re concerned with sustainable modes of transportation (transit, cycling, and walking) a lot of what the city is planning to hit targets 1, 3 and 4 fall under ACTBiPed’s remit. In 2017, some of the areas they’re planning on bringing to us include:

We endorsed this work plan, and I’m looking forward to seeing more details on a number of these items.

We then received a report from Engineering Services about the 2017 Pedestrian Crossing Improvement Program. The first thing to note about this is that the budget of $250,000 for this program has not yet been approved by council, so it’s subject to change.

Engineering Services has identified 9 locations in the city that would benefit from some sort of improvements to make crossing the street safer for pedestrians. The procedure to identify these locations is a little complicated, involving vehicle traffic counts, pedestrian traffic counts, vehicle speeds, distance from another control device, number of collisions, and the demographics of pedestrians in the area (is it on a Safe Route to School, are there a significant number of vulnerable pedestrians such as seniors or people with disabilities, and so on). They also use these statistics to determine what kind of improvements are warranted — it makes no sense to put a pedestrian activated traffic signal on a quiet street with very few pedestrians.

Punching in all of the numbers and doing some analysis, Engineering Services came up with these proposed improvements:

There are another two that Engineering Services hopes to improve in 2018:

Judging from the discussion around the table, the last one is going to be a little controversial. It’s fairly close to the pedestrian crossing at Royal Avenue and Stewardson Way, and there isn’t a lot of pedestrian traffic at Royal and Eleventh. It has a lot of vehicle traffic, and that vehicle traffic is moving quickly (67.5km/h in a 50km/h zone). But importantly, of all the crossings analyzed this crossing had the second-highest number of collisions, and even worse, it had a pedestrian collision. Pedestrians surveyed say they do not feel safe at the Royal/Stewardson crossing, and this crossing would make pedestrians feel and be safer crossing Royal at Eleventh.

We endorsed the 2017 Pedestrian Crossing Improvement Program, and since that was the last item on the agenda, we wrapped up the meeting.