I know it’s a misnomer: the very name crossWALK is pedestrian oriented. And legally, crosswalks are only for pedestrians, a legal point this city (but not some others) wants to honour.
Nonetheless, the City and NCC build bicycle paths (err… multiuse paths, or MUPs) that deliver pedestrians and cyclists alike right to the crosswalk. Even the City’s recent construction of paths around the Baseline Station deliver cyclists to a crosswalk, and then even provide the curb cut so we don’t have to dismount.
The design in the picture is of the path at Carleton University near the Atheletic complex. There path approaching each side of the road is used by pedestrians and cyclists. The raised crosswalk bumps home the message to motorists that this not your regular speed-right-along asphalt motorway. And it is wide, with a painted crosswalk in the centre, leaving lots of room on each side for cyclists to ride across.
Where paths approach a street at a right angle, this is a neat and simple crossing design. It separates pedestrians from cyclists from cars. It has an element of self-enforcement. It calms traffic flow. Nice. Neat. I look forward to the city utilizing this design in other places … well, we can always hope.
Maybe they’ll start making a few crosswalks legal for bikes, with signs that point out this is an exception. [Like angle parking – did you know it is illegal in the city unless specifically marked?] There are road crossings that I use with my bike (like at Baseline) where I want to stay on the pedestrian side. If I behaved as a vehicle, I would have to cross where the cars do, which would put me on Navaho and then I’d have to make a left into College Square. If I stay where the pedestrians can cross, I end up on the north side of Navaho and AT College Square, without having to cross yet another road. Whatever happened to common sense?