Petition asks for protected bike lanes in Waterloo

A group of cycling advocates has collected more than 750 signatures on a petition to convince Waterloo city councillors to consider building protected bike lanes from the railroad tracks in the city's uptown, stretching north to University Avenue, as part of a wider plan to improve Uptown Waterloo's streetscape.

"What we're asking for specifically is for the city project team to recommend protected bike lanes specifically on their King Street redesign," Graham Roe, the founder of waterloobikes.ca told The Morning Edition host Craig Norris Monday.

"We're making this investment, it's going to be around for the next 25 years, so why don't we do this right?"

Roe said that the petition seeks to show councillors that there is a groundswell of support for protected bikes lanes to be included in the plan to remodel the Uptown Waterloo streetscape along King.

"What we've proposed to is to swap the parking lane and the biking lane," he said. "So that cyclists aren't protecting a bunch of parked cars, but essentially we can use the parked cars to protect the cyclists."

Roe has criticized the current plan, saying the lanes will discourage cyclists in the Uptown core because they don't inspire a feeling of security.

"There's a principle that we look at, which is designing bike lanes for eight and 80-year-olds. And so you can have an eight-year-old just as confidently riding in a bike lane as well as an 80-year-old. Whereas if you look at the design, you got to be a pretty confident cyclist to take on King Street to have a line of parked cars on one side of you and a 20 tonne bus on the other side."

"The cycle lanes that are being proposed do not look safe," he said.