outkastland
Well-known member
Little white dots lined up on the pavement at Toronto intersections are the only visible signs of an innovative but dismally implemented piece of bike infrastructure.
Little white dots lined up on the pavement at Toronto intersections are the only visible signs of an innovative but dismally implemented piece of bike infrastructure.
In 1995 the city began a project to install bike-sensitive loop sensors under the pavement at intersections to allow cyclists to trigger green lights. The idea is that if you roll your two-wheeler to a stop over the three dots, an extra-sensitive pad changes the light in front of you from red to green. The city began with 35 bike-sensitive pads in 1995 and since then all new car-detecting pads have been installed with the sensitivity to detect bikes as well.
The three dots work great. Park your tires over them and in a few seconds you’ll be peddling away. But the system has one fatal design flaw: the sensors only work if you tell people what they are. And because of a complete lack of signage, most bikers don’t even know they exist. In some places the dots appear to have worn off altogether. In others they've been torn up for maintenance and the only indication that the sensors might be there is a line of tar that leaves cyclists guessing.
The city’s only done half the job with this system, and what’s so stupid is they’ve done the difficult, expensive half. The easier and presumably cheaper half—erecting a sign or putting a marking on the pavement to indicate what the dots mean—remains undone. It's the kind of wasteful spending that makes Rob Ford red(der) in the face and compels Mike Del Grande shake his little piggy bank in rage.
Years ago city staff recommended implementing better signage for the sensors, but that doesn’t appear to have been acted on. The new bike plan Rob Ford released this week doesn’t even mention the three-dot system, so it looks like there will be no new bike sensors and the existing ones are destined to remain undetected and underused.
In theory the bike-sensing system is a coup for Toronto cyclists in both a practical and symbolic sense. The sensors make traffic flow more efficient and ensure red lights don’t cause impatient bikers to dash unsafely into traffic. In a nifty instance of civic connection, they also allow the city's infrastructure to literally feel the presence of bikers. Pretty neat. But it’s all useless without a bit of signage.
Source: http://www.nowtoronto.com/daily/news/story.cfm?content=181287
So with all that said these dots should work for our motorcycles too. It's a shame they won't make them for new intersections but there are tons that this helps with currently.
Little white dots lined up on the pavement at Toronto intersections are the only visible signs of an innovative but dismally implemented piece of bike infrastructure.
In 1995 the city began a project to install bike-sensitive loop sensors under the pavement at intersections to allow cyclists to trigger green lights. The idea is that if you roll your two-wheeler to a stop over the three dots, an extra-sensitive pad changes the light in front of you from red to green. The city began with 35 bike-sensitive pads in 1995 and since then all new car-detecting pads have been installed with the sensitivity to detect bikes as well.
The three dots work great. Park your tires over them and in a few seconds you’ll be peddling away. But the system has one fatal design flaw: the sensors only work if you tell people what they are. And because of a complete lack of signage, most bikers don’t even know they exist. In some places the dots appear to have worn off altogether. In others they've been torn up for maintenance and the only indication that the sensors might be there is a line of tar that leaves cyclists guessing.
The city’s only done half the job with this system, and what’s so stupid is they’ve done the difficult, expensive half. The easier and presumably cheaper half—erecting a sign or putting a marking on the pavement to indicate what the dots mean—remains undone. It's the kind of wasteful spending that makes Rob Ford red(der) in the face and compels Mike Del Grande shake his little piggy bank in rage.
Years ago city staff recommended implementing better signage for the sensors, but that doesn’t appear to have been acted on. The new bike plan Rob Ford released this week doesn’t even mention the three-dot system, so it looks like there will be no new bike sensors and the existing ones are destined to remain undetected and underused.
In theory the bike-sensing system is a coup for Toronto cyclists in both a practical and symbolic sense. The sensors make traffic flow more efficient and ensure red lights don’t cause impatient bikers to dash unsafely into traffic. In a nifty instance of civic connection, they also allow the city's infrastructure to literally feel the presence of bikers. Pretty neat. But it’s all useless without a bit of signage.
Source: http://www.nowtoronto.com/daily/news/story.cfm?content=181287
So with all that said these dots should work for our motorcycles too. It's a shame they won't make them for new intersections but there are tons that this helps with currently.
