Jeff Leigh from HUB, responding to the preceding post – Beach Bikeway Gets a Datapoint: 12,700
Jeff:
Some comparisons from CoV data: Highest single-day bike counts on popular City of Vancouver cycling routes, over the past few years:
Burrard Bridge: 8,676
Point Grey Rd at Stephens: 5,852
Seawall at David Lam Park: 7,785
Seawall at Science World: 9,428
12,700 on the Beach Avenue Bikeway signifies overwhelming success at encouraging people to cycle. And recall that this is simply with plastic pylons, temporary signs, no pavement improvements, and so on. Imagine what we could do with a permanent protected bikeway with better signage and markings, connected at both ends.
The Burrard Bridge bike lanes were regarded as the busiest in the City based on the counter data. This blows that number out of the water.
And it wasn’t a one time occurrence.
Looking at the recent data along Beach, there were single weekend days in June with over 10,000. There was a Thursday in June with 9,415. A Monday with 9,294. There were seven days in July with over 10,000 bike counts.
At the HUB Cycling tent last weekend there were 9,993 bikes that passed by – per the counter a few metres away (the hose didn’t get cut until the following day).
It is hard to imagine this number of people cycling on the current seawall path, especially past the restaurant under the Burrard Bridge, or in front of the restaurant at the foot of Denman, both of which are congested.
When the seawall is opened up to people on bikes again, the two routes will naturally balance each other, with slower and more leisurely riders on the water, and most using the Beach Avenue Bikeway.
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