Heading into the core, 10th St. gets congested starting at about 5th Ave. The two traffic lights at Memorial Dr. and Kensignton Rd. is where the bottleneck begins. Coupled with the odd moron who parks in the no-park lane during rush hour and there you have your typical M-F morning rush hour traffic on 10th.
The removal of the southbound lane is not an issue, nor do I think it's going to be. Once drivers become familiar with the bike lanes and the shock and outrage wears off--if it hasn't already--I think it will be a non-issue, especially on this particular road for the reasons I mentioned.
Still, I think things could have been done , maybe not better, but different: I travel on the bike lanes parallel to 14th St., tying into Confederation Park once in a while. It would have been pretty cool if they put a bike path/lane from Confederation Park, south down 12th Ave. N.W. to SAIT, winding through campus (somewhere) and down 10th on the green space adjacent to SAIT. Then cut across 10th to 9A St. (under the C-Train bridge) and tie into the existing infrastructure there.
I know, I know: costs have now skyrocketed; just a thought. Anyway...
As I mentioned in my earlier post, I hope this project is successful and is expanded into the S.W. Cycling into the core is a nightmare from Westbrook.
I'm rather curious to cycle down 10th when it gets warmer. My fiancee lives in Triwood, and I head downtown from there on occasion.
And incidentally, I asked my Transit driver what he thought of the lanes the morning after they appeared, and he said he had no idea where he was supposed to be. I chucked at that--hopefully he's figured it out or has been given some guidance.
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