Sarnia is eyeing raised bike lanes, with some sections fully separated from the roadway, as part of Wellington Street reconstruction work.
Sarnia is eyeing raised bike lanes, with some sections fully separated from the roadway, as part of Wellington Street reconstruction work.
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HAS $5-million contract for sewer separation work along the east-west artery in the city’s south, between Brock and Queen streets, is up for council consideration Monday.
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Adding one per cent, or about $50,000, to that pending contract with Birnam Excavating Ltd. would buy the bike lanes, a report says.
Doing the work — recommended in the city’s active transportation master plan — as part of the expected April-to-November sewer separation contract would be cheaper than doing it separately, development and transportation manager Alister Brown said.
The add-on work would include bump-outs where Wellington intersects with Brock Street and Vidal Street, narrowing small sections of those decades-old, three-lane, one-way thoroughfares that no longer see the traffic volumes for which they were built, Brown said.
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Raised bike lanes include mountable curbs at a height about midway between the sidewalk and road, he said. “It’s only a few inches, but it does make a good visual separation for cyclists.”
Raised bike lanes have been considered elsewhere in the city, but never recommended or implemented, he said. “It’s just this did present a good opportunity.”
If council approves, the plan would be to continue building similar bike lanes west on Wellington to Front Street as part of future sewer separation and road-rebuilding contracts, he said.
Building this year’s proposed bike lanes would nix three on-street parking spaces on Wellington Street’s south, just east of Queen Street.
“The area is kind of outside of the downtown core (and) we didn’t see a significant impact in losing those,” Brown said, adding larger impacts would require more public consultation.
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There was already consultation on the active transportation master plan that recommends the changes, he noted.
“This modification will allow us to start the recommended implementation of further improvements on Brock and Vidal,” Brown’s report says.
The active transportation master plan also recommends further lane reductions on Brock and Vidal streets and notes fully protected bike lanes are possible.
Council recently approved a lane-reducing temporary bump-out on Brock Street, north of George Street, to be installed on a trial basis this year.
Improvements, including bump-outs and bike lanes, have resulted in fewer crashes at other city intersections, Brown’s report says.
That includes dropping collisions from an average 6.25 a year to 0.75 a year at Michigan Avenue and Colborne Road, and from 2.17 a year to zero at Indian and Errol roadsit says.
The Wellington-Vidal intersection sees more than four crashes a year, and there are nearly three a year at Wellington and Brock, Brown’s report says.
“The data we’ve collected and studied for these intersections certainly makes these proposed changes appropriate, to make both. . . safer,” Brown said.
The proposed sewer separation contract also includes reconstruction work on Victoria Street, between Davis and Wellington streets, and on Queen Street, between Wellington and Talfourd streets.
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