It’s amazing how polarizing something as seemingly innocuous as bike lanes can be. For my mom and grandad, they are an unwelcome blight on the landscape. A real-life manifistation of Victoria Mayor Lisa’s Helps’ desire to remake the City into her own image.

As a cyclist, I must say that for the most part I support what’s been done. The bike lane on Richardson was illthought out, dispersing traffic in a way that has turned previously quiet streets into busy ones. I’m also not sure that it was needed, given that I didn’t see any issue riding on that street in the first place.

But overall, I think it’s nice to ride in bik lanes, and I also believe that they can help the City move to a more sustainable future. They make cycling easier for current cyclists, and they will likely encourage others to start cycling. One stat, I read on the City’s website, impressed me: Currently, 27% of all trips to, from, and within the City are by walking, cycling or rolling- this is one of the highest rates in Canada. By 2030, the goal is for 55%.

That’s extremely impressive, especially when one considers how much that has changed over time. In 2017, 9% of all trips to, from, and within the City were by cycling- the next measurement will be in 2022

Safety, of course, may be the biggest reason to support bike lanes. According to the City, Betwen etween 2007 and 2016, an average of two pedestrians/cyclists died due to traffic collisions. That’s quite astonishing if you think about it. It also underscores the importance of investing in the bike lanes.

How you do so while not alienating longtime Victoria residents is a difficult challenge, one that it seems that the City has not exactly thrived at.

Perhaps above all what has people off guard is the sheer volume an pace of the builds, the majority of which have been built in the past five years. The project, which is known as the All Ages and Abilities cycling network, aims to build 32 km of bike lanes by 2022.

The following document illustrates the projects that have been build as part of this.

Here is a map of the various City of Victoria bike routes: