Lachine Canal: a big detour for cyclists
The detour offered to cyclists on a 1.5-km segment of the Lachine Canal is nine times longer than the regular route, involving a 13.5-km ride.
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Kate
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Joey 09:48 on 2019-08-07 Permalink
If only we had a municipal government that saw value in encouraging cycling as an alternative to car- and transit-based commuting, we wouldn’t have to rely on Parks Canada to design our bike paths.
Blork 16:13 on 2019-08-07 Permalink
The real story here is the stupidity of bureaucracy. Zero people will take that 13.5km detour. Instead, people will go down rue Senkus (as per the detour) then turn on to rue Cordner (which has a bike path) all the way to Dollard Ave, where the bike path runs out. From there they will either run the 880 meters back to the canal on Dollard — which is trafficky and maybe intimidating to some — or will cross Dollard to Bédard then take rue Clément back to the canal. (Clément does not have a bike path, but it’s a much calmer street.) That detour adds a bit less than 3 km to your ride, which is still a lot, but much better than 13!
So yeah, the bureaucracy. Obviously someone was told to create a detour that must be 100% bike path. If that had sent people via Vermont, then that’s the detour that would be published, because the bureaucrat making the call has to fit within the requirements.
Side note: the first 500 meters of the detour on Senkus (assuming you’re going from east to west) is not marked as bike path on Google Maps, but that street has recently been resurfaced and Google does show a bike path on Senkus starting at Cordner. I suspect the whole thing is bike pathed but Google hasn’t gotten the memo yet. Can anyone here confirm (or deny)?
qatzelok 18:18 on 2019-08-07 Permalink
The sidewalk on St Patrick works, though it’s not as safe at intersections as the bike path. Not appropriate for the thousands of young kids that bike the Lachine Canal, but okay for adult commuters and forewarned families with adult surveillance.
qatzelok 18:20 on 2019-08-07 Permalink
(The idiotic detour makes it look like Parks Canada is run out of a Mister Muffler in Moncton)
Kate 19:20 on 2019-08-07 Permalink
Blork, that reminds me of earlier this summer, the night of the Tour la nuit. It was past 11 and I was simply going home – not by bike – and went to get the 55 bus north at Sherbrooke. A detour notice on the bus stop told me the stop was cancelled for the whole evening and that the closest stop was at de Castelnau station.
Which is 5 km away, a considerable hike at the end of a long day.
The obvious thing would have been to direct northbound transit users to Sherbrooke metro, so it made me wonder, as in the case of this bike detour, whether the people administering it ever use the routes involved or know how they actually work, on the ground.
Chris 19:27 on 2019-08-07 Permalink
Kate, the difference with your analogy is that Tour la Nuit is a detour that lasts 12 hours or so, while this Lachine Canal one lasts a year. You expect less effort for the former, and for them to try harder for the latter. (Both suck of course.)
Kate 19:36 on 2019-08-07 Permalink
Yes, Chris, it’s not a perfect analogy, I never implied the difficulties were on the same scale. It’s that there’s a similar literal bone-headed bureaucratic thinking behind both.
Chris 22:11 on 2019-08-07 Permalink
Agreed.
Mitchell 07:17 on 2019-08-08 Permalink
I’ve done that detour twice now (fortunately, I’m on vacation, so I have time). On the one hand, it’s a pretty ride along the canal, then through the park. On the other hand, the path isn’t in great shape. I was afraid something was going to be jiggled loose on my bike. And it’s not a route I’d want to take as a daily commuter.
Kate 07:41 on 2019-08-08 Permalink
Mitchell, you make a good point. The detour tends to imply cyclists are just goofing around, but I know a lot of people use the canal path to commute downtown, normally. But nobody wants to add an additional 13 km to their commute – not at both ends of their working day, every day.
Blork 09:53 on 2019-08-08 Permalink
No kidding. 13km is my whole commute (13.5, actually) and that’s enough. A 13km detour would double my cycling commute and probably put me on a bus or some other means.