THE City and District of North Vancouver will have a combined 170 kilometres of bike lanes and multi-use paths by the end of 2017 if they follow through on plans endorsed by their councils Monday night.
Both municipal governments reviewed and endorsed their collaborative 2012 Bicycle Master Plan at separate meetings. The proposal is an update to various iterations of a plan the two have worked together on since the 1990s. It lays out which bicycle infrastructure improvement projects are most sought by both regular and casual riders.
Among the priorities put forward by the community and agreed to by district council: Main Street from Harbour Avenue to the Ironworkers Memorial Second Narrows Crossing; Mount Seymour Parkway from Riverside Drive to Seymour Boulevard; Lynn Valley Road from Mollie Nye Way to Highway 1; Capilano Road from Highway 1 to Grouse Mountain; Lower Capilano from Marine Drive to Fullerton Avenue; and Mountain Highway from Keith Road to Lynn Valley Road.
The top five priorities for the city: Lynn Valley Road across Highway 1 to Grand Boulevard; linking Third Street from Forbes Avenue to Marine Drive all the way to the Lions Gate Bridge; East Keith Road from Mountain Highway to St. Andrew's Avenue; Low Level Road and the Iron Worker's Memorial Second Narrows Crossing.
While cyclists may applaud the plan, implementing the new goals is another story.
It will fall to both councils to decide which of the projects should be done and when, based on convenience and availability of extra funding from the province, TransLink or developers.
District council endorsed the plan, but not before airing a list of concerns about safety and cost of new infrastructure. Staff estimate it would cost $4 million over five years to follow through on the priorities.
"I don't think, quite frankly, we can afford this bicycle master plan in any other way . . . (except) where we implement opportunistically - when it makes sense," said Coun. Alan Nixon. "We got 50 emails on the cycling thing in the last four or five days (saying) 'Implement the bicycle master plan. Implement the bicycle master plan.' But what else is going to suffer as we implement on the bicycle master plan?" he asked
According to stats gathered by city staff, the number of regular cyclists has gone up by 140 per cent in the last 10 years, and the average distance they ride has gone from 3.8 kilometres to 6.9 - an 80-per cent increase.
The growing popularity of cycling indicates the two governments are on the right track, argued city Coun. Craig Keating, alluding to the "If you built it, they will come" mantra.
"The increase in ridership shows what's happening with bike plans like this. As I was saying earlier to Mayor Mussatto . . . before we had roads, not many people were driving cars either," he said.
