[bikeqld] info (missing) about bikeways

Wed Sep 16 19:50:24 CDT 2009

Hi Michael, You are quite right with your comments about the lack of
information on our various bikeways maps not being detailed or in many
cases just plain incorrect. There are currently three sets of maps from
Council, two sets are on-line and one is available in print only it
seems- each one different. The Active Travel guides they tell me are
the most up to date and they don't seem to be available on line, i
think you can order them online tho to be mailed out. They are very
light on any sort of useful information for a cyclist tho. You can't
tell whether a route is a BAZ, a bikelane or what they call a bike
route (that seems to be the claytons bikeway where you can beef up your
km's of bikeway claim at very little expense). There is no information
about whether routes be they on-road or off, are suitable for night
travel. Similarly at the back end, the ATU does not have any of this
network information available at their finger tips and certainly not
the additional information like usage figures, maintenance and accident
hot spots, all of that is in separate databases, plans and archives and
it is a research operation just to find out when bike symbols were last
painted. Swann Rd at Taringa shows on all flavours of the bikeways maps
as an on-road bikeway between the Gailey Rd roudabout and Moggil Rd,
certainly an important route but what is it in reality? The ATU dont
seem to know when I questioned them. Perhaps its a 'bike route', they
said, but they at the least have blue directional signs, Swann Rd has
nothing but yellow bike on a length of about 50m over one block and a
couple right near the roundabout, the rest has nothing. It will remain
that way because the bikeways map shows its all ok but there are no
plans which show it so there is never a need to maintain symbols.
Outbound on Gladstone Rd the maps and pavement show a bikelane  but you
encounter a bike lane ends sign half way.

I had a meeting with the ATU last Monday, not a meeting of choice as it
was organised by Mayor Newman and Jude Munro and I knew beforehand that
the ATU have zero interest in existing infrastructure, particularly the
on-road stuff. I raised the example of the Bilsen Rd on-road bike lane
on the Northside which only got re painted after I kicked up a fuss
that it had never been re-painted and had been left virtually invisible
for many years. There was no interest in this typical situation from
the ATU but what really got me was when the new Principal of ATU said
that his main problem was the volume of complaints he got from me. I
was told that I needed to be more confident in what Council was doing.
I asked him to point out an example of one of my complaints which was
not important, - he cited the Bilsen Rd example saying - "......it's
only an industrial area". Presumably you are not likely to want to
do some recreational cycling in an area of high employment, crappy
footpath and mixed vehicles. Perhaps you only cycle if you are one of
the white collar demographic not the blue ones. When the head of the
ATU expresses such a blatant disregard for the role of commuter
cycling, there is little hope for Brisbane. 

Even trying to talk about new infrastructure, the ATU idiosyncratically
just defended every single aspect of the Bicentennial upgrade works and
design. As far as they are concerned everything was done by the book
and to the plan, nothing is wrong. That meeting was such a contrast to
the meeting with the Assets Maintenance Manager and his people who were
quite willing to identify problems and short comings and address them.
I cited a recent example of a new BAZ added near a school pointing out
the old bike unfriendly gully grates on the route and asking how it
could get designed and built without ever having been checked. I was
simply told that the ATU does a thorough audit when these are designed
and built and that this thing does not happen. So instead of trying to
identify why it happened and to improve the process, they just pretend
it does not happen. Where's the sense in that? Sadly, I think there is
a false sense of pride in there and they don't want to hear about
failures or problems they may have caused.

With that sort of attitude coming down from the top of the ATU, I have
given up on any more cycling advocacy with BCC. It is not only banging
your head against a wall but its invariably a jagged split face block
wall at that. That should keep the ATU folk happy at least.

One last note, I did ask about the Toowong bus depot/Miskin St design.
I asked what happened there. They told me that the red traffic
calming/crossing point "was put in the wrong place". I asked why the
crossing could not be moved up Miskin to cross straight onto the green
lane and bus thoroughfare. I was told there was no refuge there. Well
as far as I can see the road is just as wide there, perhaps effectively
wider as the two road lanes have merged by then and there would be just
as much room for a 2m refuge. I think they just don't think about the
possibility of building it, easier just to bodge the one that's there.
I pointed out that it is not a designated bus lane either which the QRR
would permit cyclists inbound to use and that it would need some
Bicycles Excepted supplementary signs as well as the current bus
excepted ones. I asked for a breakdown of the $100m - was told to look
it up on the net! Hmmm.

k

Michael Yeates wrote:
The Lord Mayor sends an email Newsletter which usually
provides information about various projects which presumably the Lord
Mayor sees as important.

The September "issue" has a short note under the head "Work commences
on more new bikeways" which sounds OK until it turns out that not only
are they not bikeways, they are shared footpaths, but also and unlike
all the other items and from memory most items in previous editions,
there is no link to any further information.

It is as if the Lord Mayor and/or Council does not want to provide
details about what it is doing and spending in this category perhaps
fearing political criticism.

Perhaps it is simply designed to let the interested and disinterested
community know money is being spent on cycling facilities?

Or is it designed so the details are not made available?

With Council e-maps unable to be adapted to show current conditions (as
indicated in the reply re cycling routes to New Farm), and the cost and
confusion of printing frequent updates of the printed bike maps, surely
it would be useful to know where the new bits are by map rather than
description?

If interested, it appears the e-Newsletter should be available at or
via www.campbellnewman.com.au or by "subscription".

In fact, it would be useful if all cycling-related projects were
similarly reported (not necessarily in the LM's e-Newsletter but in
those of Ward Councillors) and then collated in the cycling section of
Councils website as a reference source.

This might help overcome the problem of Council not having e-maps for
"temporary" works as well as for new work ... a suggestion worth
forwarding to the Chairperson for cycling.

MY.......................................

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