Montreal City Weblog

Kate 11:55 on 2023-09-06 Permalink Reply  

• carswell 12:33 on 2023-09-06 Permalink

  Count me among them. The vehicles have become a nuisance on the Lachine Canal bike path in the last year or two. Used to be you only encountered the occasional one, usually driven by (I’m guessing) a resident of one of the nearby seniors’ homes. But lately there are many more, especially the type featured in the article, driven by much younger people, usually at high speed and without concern for other path users (in particular, the drivers don’t like to slow down). Many of them also have radios blaring, not a safety hazard but an undeniable nuisance.

  Have also started frequently (1 or 2 per trip) seeing electric unicycles, whose maximum speed is, I suspect, not regulated because they often go really, really fast (guessing 40 kmh, double the path’s speed limit, tho’ I see some models are capable of twice that).

  The Lachine Canal path isn’t designed for this type or amount of traffic and, especially during sunny Sunday afternoons and other peak periods, the scooters and electric “bikes” and unicycles are a hazard, an accident waiting to happen. And when it does, it probably won’t be the scooter driver who’s badly injured.

  Oddly, I don’t recall seeing a single scooter or electric “bike” or unicycle on the riverside bike path between Lachine and Verdun, which I’ve been riding a lot latelyh. Maybe because, in contrast to the Lachine Canal path, it’s not a commuter route? Unless I’ve missed it, there’s no signage banning them.

• Em 12:53 on 2023-09-06 Permalink

  I don’t mind the smaller pedal-assist e-bikes (and can even tolerate the size of the ones pictured in the article), but I do have a problem with the fully motorized vehicles that we’re seeing more and more of on bike paths, including two-wheel motorcycle-like ones, and three-wheel electric scooters, These are heavy, don’t have pedals at all and don’t belong on bike paths, and especially not on multipurpose paths like Lachine Canal which also has pedestrians. These drivers prefer to whizz by people rather than slowing down and waiting for a good time to pass.

• DeWolf 13:11 on 2023-09-06 Permalink

  Parks Canada’s management of the Lachine Canal is a disaster. It’s dangerously overcrowded and there needs to be a total rethink of how the paths are arranged.

• Daniel 13:13 on 2023-09-06 Permalink

  As a frequent user of the Lachine path between Atwater and Old Montreal, by far the most dangerous interactions with modes of transport that I’ve witnessed or been involved in are with road bikes. I actually like seeing a wider variety of transportation on the paths as I believe (in the case of that stretch at least) that it’s best use is as a mixed corridor, not a bike highway. It is my impression that the folks on the futuristic unicycles are a lot more considerate and aware of fellow users than road bikers flying along in near silence and an assumed right-of-way.

• Nicholas 18:55 on 2023-09-06 Permalink

  In the Netherlands they have two kinds of mopeds: generally, one speed-limited to 25 km/h (with a blue licence plate) and one with a higher limit (yellow plate). Yellow plates are treated like cars, and banned from all bike lanes and paths, and shared use paths. Blue ones are allowed, but some areas ban them (especially in dense parts of Amsterdam). You have to get a driving licence for both of them (like the moped SAAQ licences here), and have to wear a helmet for both (until this year the blue plates didn’t require them). Pedal assist ebikes with limited speed assist are different and don’t require licences, plates or helmets. People have been known to remove the speed limiters and enforcement is tough, but it’s very illegal. I think we really need to better categorize all these things, because more is coming and it is the wild west.

  As well, it’s completely ridiculous that you can’t put earbuds on while on any vehicle but you can blast your radio in your car as loud as you want with or without the windows open. I don’t play my spoken word podcasts during quiet hours when biking, but I would much prefer tiny earbuds with low volume than maxing out speaker phone.

• EmilyG 19:31 on 2023-09-06 Permalink

  I really hate it when they’re being ridden on sidewalks. It doesn’t make me feel safe as a pedestrian.

• Andrew 20:30 on 2023-09-06 Permalink

  I got an ebike last year and I love it. As a car alternative for commuting its almost seamless. All I do is check if it’s going to rain before going out the door. Same schedule, same clothes, more fun and less gas. Hopefully we can come up with rules and infrastructure to support more personal electric vehicles, not restrict them or treat them like dangerous toys.

• Chris 21:45 on 2023-09-06 Permalink

  These newfangled ‘vehicles’ should be encouraged IMNSHO. The problem is where to put them. Some don’t want them on sidewalks, some don’t want them on bike paths. To me, the solution is easy: reallocate road space *away* from cars, and *for* everything else. If bike lanes were car lane sized, they could be shared easily with these new things.

• Tim S. 23:04 on 2023-09-06 Permalink

  Whether it’s giant pickup trucks or little motorized scooters, the policy of “if you can invent it you can use it” seems like a really bad idea for a dense urban environment. Sooner or later we’ll have to make choices which will make some people unhappy. I personally would vote for bikes/pedal-assist bikes/reasonably sized cars/medium delivery trucks and tough luck to everyone else.

• Chris 07:51 on 2023-09-07 Permalink

  Tim, so you’re against, for example, those electric unicycle things, but for ‘reasonably sized cars’? Why? The latter is so much worse for the environment.

• Tim S. 07:59 on 2023-09-07 Permalink

  Because they can carry more than one person, and in winter too.

• Daniel 08:33 on 2023-09-07 Permalink

  They can carry more than one person, but 95% of them that I see do not.

• Chris 08:52 on 2023-09-07 Permalink

  I’d wager 4 electric unicycles is less environmentally damaging than 1 car with 4 people in it.

• Ian 11:24 on 2023-09-07 Permalink

  Except that for 5 moths of the year they would have to find another way to commute.

  Again, not every lives and works in the city centre – even on the island of Montreal there are lots of places it would be ridiculous to expect someone to commute to with a unicycle all year ’round.

  Unless, of course, they are clowns.

• bumper carz 14:24 on 2023-09-07 Permalink

  You are correct, Ian, that not everyone lives in the urban parts of Montreal.

  For those that don’t, the debate centers around “which brand of SUV do you desire?” rather than “which electrical vehicles do you feel safe around?”

  And that the suburbs force their inhabitants to commute in resource-wasting death-traps… means that another debate could take place about whether to build any more suburbs.

• Ian 17:54 on 2023-09-07 Permalink

  Qatzi, I know you hate the suburbs due to childhood trauma but assuming everyone should live in an urban centre is unrealistic and elitist. Ike you, I did not grow up in the city, I grew up in the country. Let’s not forget that most of Quebec is rural.

  That aside, if you insist that on-island suburbs shouldn’t even exist, I question your urban planning bona fides. In the greater scheme of things north of Mont Royal was basically countryside a hundred years ago. If you wish to return to those halcyon days I don’t know what to tell you – maybe move back to whatever European urban centre your ancestors fled.

• jeather 18:56 on 2023-09-07 Permalink

  Yes, most of Quebec is rural when you look at the geography, but the majority of residents live in Montreal, Quebec city, Gatineau, Sherbrooke, Chicoutimi and Trois-Rivieres, the urban areas that have at least 100,000 residents each.

• bumper carz 21:14 on 2023-09-07 Permalink

  Ian, the post-war suburban form is a product of a cartel of car makers, oil companies and highway construction companies. It is not a naturally-occurring urban form at all. Former Gazette journailist Henry Aubin reveals this in one of his books.

  And Quebec has ruined many rural areas with suburban developments.

  https://plus.lapresse.ca/screens/162403e1-fd33-4cac-9c35-fa1fbf2e86f6%7C_0.html

• Ian 08:58 on 2023-09-08 Permalink

  @jeather on-island suburbs don’t count as “real” Montreal, apparently – at least according to Qatzi and some otehr guy who used to write for the Gazette, which Qatzi usually doesn’t like but this time someone agrees with his prejudices against peopel that lie near smoke trees.

  SO … if you want to go by that “rule”, if only areas with at least 5k/km(2) density count as “urban”, it leaves only 13 Montreal boroughs. Even if you allow 1k/km(2) Quebec City & Gatineau barely scrape by.

  Baie d’Urfé has a higher population density than Sherbrooke.

• Orr 16:44 on 2023-09-09 Permalink

  And for those keeping track, the city of Sherbrooke has more people that the province of Prince Edward Island.

• Ian 20:32 on 2023-09-09 Permalink

  CDN has more people than PEI.

  That said, the issue under discussion is population density and what counts as “urban” in Quebec. I stand by my statement:

  Assuming everyone should live in an urban centre is unrealistic and elitist (.)

  … and most of Quebec’s population is not “urban” if we assume that on-island “suburbs” are not the “real” city, because smaller cities still don’t have density even close to that of central Montreal, or sometimes even of Montreal’s on-island “suburbs”.