According to the Globe and Mail, only 33% of Vancouver voters disapprove of council’s handling of the Hornby Bike lane while almost half (49%) approve. 20% are neutral or don’t know.
But as the civic election gets closer, positions firm up. Suzanne Anton, in her announcement that she’s running for Mayor:
… suggested she would revisit the city’s downtown bike lanes, depending on the outcome of a current study on businesses in the area. If the businesses are actually going bankrupt out there on Hornby Street…then the lanes need to be adjusted or moved,” she told reporters. She added that anecdotally she’s heard “very gloomy stories” from businesses along Hornby Street.
The Courier does an extensive piece on business impacts and opinion:
What the Courier discovered in its survey is that operators on Hornby aren’t so much hurting financially from the implementation of the bike lane as they are more philosophically opposed to the idea.
The lane, they say, is also an inconvenience to them and their customers. Add an unstable economy, the HST and new drinking and driving laws and the answer to whether the separated lanes are good for business becomes more complex.
So there’s the problem for Anton. Is her position that negative impacts of the bike lanes, perceived or real, justifies a change to the lanes so signficant that they no longer function as separated rights-of-way? And if they’re to be moved, to where? What street – Burrard, Howe – will have any less impacts? Or would the lane be moved to a street – Granville, Homer – where it no longer has a functional connection to the Burrard Bridge?
Anton is in danger of setting up a nasty conflict between business and cyclists that could degenerate into confrontation. Imagine a scenario where a business claims (like the art gallery on Hornby) that it had to close because of a separated bike lane – and so, given the political commitment by the NPA, it will be removed. Would that be accepted passively, or would the next stage be played out in the streets?
The idea that cyclists might be thrown back into traffic in order to maintain an existing level of car dependence by businesses strikes me as a reversal of policy that goes back to the 1970s. And it invites a confrontation between those who would occupy the lanes physically and the City Hall bulldozers that would only further polarize the conflict. I can’t imagine how that would be good for anybody, regardless of their position.
NPA is going where US Republicans have gone, by pinning themselves too tightly into a fairly extreme position. The true evaluation of cycle tracks is 10 years out, based on a broader array of metrics. Retail, street-level businesses are affected by many things, and it’s a real stretch to say the cycle track is determining business outcomes. And, 10 years later, there’s likely to be a different sort of business mix. Businesses adjust, politicians should do the same.
One problem with partisan politics at local level is this sort of ‘no battle too small’ that makes every decision a fight.
Agree with Tom. Would hate to see the NPA morph from balanced, cycling-entreprenneurial types like Anton and Ladner into party that sounds more like what Rob Ford in Toronto would support.
Also, in evaluating business impacts, who is to say that all change is bad? For example, is it really a bad thing that donut sales are down on Dunsmuir since the bike lane came in? What if a convenience store sees cigarette sales down too? should we stop the bike lanes because people are buying fewer donuts and cigarettes?
Also, maybe businesses beyond Hornby and Dunsmuir are negatively effected by those bike lanes — gas stations, for example; or car dealerships. Do we shut down the bike lanes to protect their sales?
We also need to hear what new or other businesses may be benefitting.
I do wish we could keep the discussion on what is the most appropriate form of transportation in given circumstances, and avoid the cultural war. But, as the Courier article found, much of the opposition to the Hornby bike lane is that some people are “philosophically opposed to the idea.” Read that to say they have always operated with a car-centred transportation system; they are familiar with cars, understand how car traffic helps or hurts their business; somehow a city that gives priority to automobile traffic and parking is doing the right thing. This is a feeling unlikely to be changed by evidence. On the other hand, the same “philosophical” factors are at play with cyclists. Many are young, and feel confident on their machines; they feel they are doing their bit to minimize pollution and greenhouse gases; they believe the car is somehow evil, at the root of many urban ills; they feel superior to the smucks stuck in cars in traffic. But, the question should be, not which “culture” should be dominant, but what is the appropriately best form of transportation in a particular situation, weighing all factors — convenience, speed, pollution, health, safety, congestion, cost, freedom of choice, and so on. But it is so hard to get beyond our biases: for a cyclist to grant there is a place for cars, or for a car-oriented person to ever believe the bicycle should take up space on the road.
Two suggested ways to help this city move beyond its cycling and car biases – parking and tolled dedicated infrastructure. Upgraded parking technology could enhance an expanded use of parking meters in residential neighbourhoods. Residents could be givenplastict cards for block street parking. Transponder technology could provide access to and automatic billing for dedicated infrastructure….perhaps starting with bike lanes (nominal annual charge)
David I guess we will have to toll all of the freeways as they are dedicated infrastructure to vehicles. One can not ride a bike through the George Massey Tunnel, ride on the shoulder of Highway 1 or 99 for the majority of the Lower Mainland.
Urban cycling is an ideological argument in only a few places in the world, I would assume, and this happens to be one. That we need to do what is good for businesses now hurts our ability to innovate, grow and be a true leading city. The vision behind the bike lanes is solid and, as Tom said, will take time to evaluate.
David – I wouldn’t ride in bike lanes that charged a fee. I would ride everywhere else because it’s both legal and not entirely unsafe.
What I philosophically disagree with regarding the Hornby bike lane is how it was voted upon and rolled out. The process was too quick and was a bit underhanded – I haven’t read the Courier article in a while, but I think there are a few ways to be philosophically opposed to the Hornby lane, specifically, versus the other lanes in the city.