Innovative Rocky Mountain Streets in Canmore and Banff
From red bike lanes, continuous sidewalks and nearside signals in Canmore, to pedestrian bridges and a new woonerf in Banff. These mountain towns are showing that a bit of snow and winter conditions is no excuse not to do good things with your streets…
Intersection with a view
Arriving to Snow
After an easy drive from Calgary, we arrived in Canmore late at night just as the first big snowfall was occurring. We headed out for a walk into town…
Separate turn lanes and no right on red, we’ll get into that later…
The intersection includes separate pedestrian and bicycle signals and activating one does not activate the other. I think these people either hadn’t pushed the pedestrian button as the walk signal is not activated but the bicycle green is, or they’d pushed the bike button, because the snow was covering the red surface to indicate the bike lane. They could equally be from out of town and not appreciate the nuances of this potential first of its kind intersection in Canada.
Fresh tracks…
On the other side of the intersection, these people are crossing with no conflicting traffic, not just because it’s late at night, but because the signals won’t allow it… Opposite to above, note the bicycle signal hasn’t been activated. Also worth noting that the bicycle signals are orientated in both directions… there are a lot of pathways connecting from various directions and people could be arriving from and going to various locations.
Pedestrians crossing
Wide Roads
Just a reminder that wide roads are often only needed for an hour or two every day, the rest of the time they go under-utilized, often at the expense of the comfort and safety for people walking and riding a bicycle 24 hours per day. The Town is planning to make Railway Avenue work for everyone including red bike lanes, near side signals, and continuous sidewalks to make it safer for everybody to get around. More info on the Town projects page here.
Why are these car lanes so empty…
Accessibility
A major benefit of near side signals and no right on red are the accessibility benefits. This photo below is a prime example of that benefit. With a conventional signal where drivers are free to turn right on red, this driver would have likely proceeded beyond the stop line (more than they already have) and blocked the crosswalk waiting for gap in the cross traffic. The nearside signal also required them to wait further back than a conventional far side signal otherwise they wouldn’t have been able to see their green signal.
Safely crossing with no conflicts
Continuous Sidewalks
I think this is the only continuous sidewalk in town at the moment, but it won’t be for much longer. In preparing the TAC Synthesis of Emerging Practice there were a lot of questions about how they work in the snow. There’s not really an issue in my mind, but one thing that was obvious from this photo is that the bollards really help to define the path of vehicles when it’s not obvious due to snow on the ground.
A continuous sidewalk and bike path in the snow
A Better Protected Intersection
We stayed just along from the relatively new Dutch style protected intersection shown above. Protected intersections are becoming more common, dare I say the standard in North America, but this one is different. It’s gone full Dutch, or at least as Dutch as you can reasonably go in North America at this point in time. I’ve mentioned a few things above but let’s get a bit more into the details…
The next day early in the morning the snow creates challenges in terms of seeing pavement markings and signage. In the foreground, the stop line and stop line sign is obscured by snow, as is the no right on red sign. The lane designations are obscured also, but the signals help convey the intent in that respect.
There’s many new things going on here…
Ride on Red
As I said, the protected intersection part is becoming more common. Canmore I think may be the only place in North America adopting the red surface treatment for bike lanes just like the Dutch do. It all becomes shared space at least until the snow is clear. In places you’ll see pavement markings asking you to ride on red, walk on grey.
Walk on grey, ride on red
There is typically no separation between bike path and sidewalk, other than the pavement colour. I believe this was to make snow clearing easier, but until cleared, it wasn’t easy to know where you should be… on those occasions, maybe it doesn’t matter, it just becomes shared space… still separate from traffic and comfortable for most. Just make sure you look at the push button when you get to the intersection.
A variety of people rolling on red…
Not everybody is aware of the subtleties of bike infrastructure, and like I suspected in the evening photo above, I saw others pushing the bike button by mistake without really paying attention to the bike symbol next to it, only to be disappointed that the walk light didn’t activate. Us arriving just after and not really paying attention, plus assuming they had pushed the correct button, also had a disappointing wait for the next cycle. They (and us) won’t make that mistake twice. New infrastructure can be a learning process.
Now at the correct push button… Still nice view while we wait…
Near Side Signals and Turn Lanes
The really big deal with this intersection is the near side signals and the separate turn lanes that open up a whole bunch of safety benefits. The near side signals should be possible everywhere, and if space permits the separate turn lanes should be included too. However, I often find we’re removing turn lanes to create space for protected and separate pedestrian and bicycle space. It’s always a balance. This intersection has space for both.
Separate lanes for left and right turns creates options for safer signal phasing
Signal Phasing
With the above configuration, the signal phasing allows non conflicting right turns to go at the same time as left turns, then when the through movements go, the parallel pedestrian and bike phases can go. If there’s no conflicting call the through and turn phases may go at the same time too.
It essentially removes all conflicts on the roadway, short of someone jumping a red. Watch a few cycles of the intersection in the video below and pay attention to all the vehicle movements going at once as well as the people walking and biking across the intersection.
It’s all About Safety… For Everyone…
I’m not sure if this intersection is a first in Canada (let me know of others) but it is not common. This location fortunately has the space for the turn lanes which provides flexibility in signal phasing and ability to separate conflicting movements be they vehicle, bicycle or pedestrian. The near side signals and no right on red could be adopted everywhere. The only reason not to, other than cost of change, is simply traffic capacity. Hopefully we see many more in North America.
For some context, In Canada in 2021 (latest data I could find) there were 1,630 fatal collisions on our roads, resulting in 1,768 fatalities on our roads, most occurring at intersections. Furthermore, there were 8,185 people seriously injured (includes persons admitted to hospital for treatment or observation), and 108,018 in total were injured (i.e., minor and serious). A few seconds of your time as a drivers is a very small sacrifice to prevent serious injuries and fatalities on our roads.
One intersection isn’t going to address all of those fatalities of course, but in time, if we’re serious about improving road safety, this is one of the best techniques of safe system design and is badly needed if we truly want to achieve vision zero.
Scramble Crossings
On Main Street, Canmore’s main shopping street, there is a scramble crosswalk that pursues this goal of reducing conflicts in a different way. As a pedestrian, the scramble crosswalk stops all traffic and lets pedestrians cross all legs or cross diagonally in a single signal phase. When combined with the no right on red, it prevents all conflicts at this intersection.
Opposing vehicles have a green and can turn left and right without conflict with pedestrians, albeit they do potentially conflict with each other. Then the perpendicular direction does the same before the pedestrians are given their walk phase and can cross in any direction again.
People everywhere…
The downside as a pedestrian, if you arrive just after the pedestrian phase, is that you’ll wait longer to make a single crossing as you can’t walk with traffic. Again, the focus here is on safety, not capacity. Crossing diagonally is convenient if you time it right, but just miss the light and you might well wait longer than a conventional walk with traffic system.
Another angle…
One option here would be to provide a pedestrian scramble between each vehicle phase, reducing capacity for vehicles, but increasing convenience for pedestrians which should be a priority on such a street.
And another angle…
Unrelated, but while we’re on crossings, interesting to watch people crossing mid-block and negotiating the snow piled up in the centre…
Snow median island…
The wait… experimenting with slow shutter speeds if that wasn’t obvious…
Waiting to cross…
Biking
I didn’t see a whole lot of people biking around, but there’s evidence for sure…
View through a bicycle wheel…
Parked bicycles
Taking the dog for a walk…
Silhouette…
Fat Biking
The hotel had fat bikes available for guests, and with the first major snow fall of the year the day prior, conditions were appropriate for it. The bikes could have done with a few more gears…
CCM fat bike
Dedicated pedestrian bridge adjacent the vehicle bridge keeps people safe and separate from motor vehicles. No photographs, but the pathway along the river drops underneath the bridges too…
Active modes bridge
Wow… Epic pathway views heading out of town…
We headed out of town and hike-a-biked uphill to an intriguingly named magic waterfall, it wasn’t all that magic…
Magic Waterfall
The hike-a-bike continued up a large staircase towards Quarry Lake. Wayfinding is plentiful around town and out on the trails…
Canmore Trail Map
Winter single track heading to Quarry Lake…
Quarry Lake and more epic mountain views…
From the lake, we headed along the power line trail towards Three Sisters which was a slog. After a bite to eat, we took the paved river pathway all the way back into town.
Pathway views…
The paved pathway was still a chore at times with the super soft fat tires… In fact I didn’t use anything but the three easiest gears all day. The little downhills on the way back were welcome relief…
Pathway panorama
It’s called sulphur pond for a reason, not nice downwind…
By this point we were nearly back home and kinda wiped out, but one more photo… I liked this pedestrian and bicycle priority street sign, reflecting to some degree, the Dutch fietsstraat messaging here… Also… 20’s even better than 30…
A Canmore fietsstraat of sorts…
It was a fun ride, but probably one of the hardest 20 kilometres we’ve done on a bike… While we were out for a fun ride, the pathway does make it safe and comfortable for people to ride between the main town area and Three Sisters neighbourhood. A great active transportation connection.
Winter Woonerf in Banff
On the way back to the airport, we detoured through Banff as I was keen to check out the Bear Street Woonerf. Seeing it in winter was maybe not the perfect time to see it at its best, but it did reveal some interesting things. With the vehicle path largely snow covered and the edges cleared, most pedestrians tended to keep to the sides, but they did cross freely from side to side.
Crossing from side to side
The lateral shift in the centre for sure helped to slow things down and even caused a bit of local congestion… not a bad thing… it’s intended to slow drivers down…
Woonerf congestion
As I heard a small thud, I saw one thing I might not have otherwise noticed. I saw a driver backing up their truck to create more space to leave a parking stall, and in doing so, had backed up directly into a bench… Demonstrating that putting a bench at the end of a parking stall may not be the best location…
Would you sit here?
Not wanting to end what is a great addition to the town on a downer… This fire pit was a welcome addition for some…
Useful fire pit given it’s about 15 below…
And more people crossing from side to side
On the subjects of woonerf’s, these commercial street woonerfs are fine, I’d argue they’d be better simply pedestrianized assuming there is the foot traffic to support such a change. Just a reminder that we need real woonerfs in North America, i.e., these techniques applied on residential streets…
More Scramble Crossings
Like Canmore, Banff has some scramble crossings with the same pros and cons. Note the green sharrow poking out in the snow…
there are pros and cons to scramble crosswalks
On this below 15 day, we didn’t enjoy having to wait so long to cross and would have preferred to keep moving. The downside of safety in a winter town…
If you time it right, the diagonal option can be more convenient
It was cold walking, must have been even worse on the bike… I like the decorative signal poles, haven’t seen that before…
Winter biking…
Pedestrian Pathways
We left the centre to check out the pathway network, pedestrian bridges, Bow River Falls and famous Fairmont hotel. I liked the wayfinding to all nearby destinations and the distance confirmation. There is no way anyone on a bike is keeping to the 5 km/h posted speed…
Bicycle speed limits… Hmmmm…
There are two pedestrian bridges, this is one of them… The creatively titled Banff Pedestrian Bridge.
More dog walking…
Two waterfalls in one post, apologies for the departure from street and active transportation design… The Bow Falls this time…
Bow Falls
Another pedestrian bridge that mirrors the first one in design… The two pedestrian bridges are located either side of the one vehicle bridge, making it a little bit easier to choose walking or biking rather than driving. Improved active modes connectivity is always welcome.
Nancy Pauw active modes bridge
And just another paved pathway on the way back to the car…
Bow River Pathway
All in all, an interesting and fun few days in the Rocky Mountains. Don’t let snow be an excuse not to do good things with your street designs…