By Grant Warkentin
Bike lanes added to Hilchey Road four years ago have been so unpopular the city is looking to get rid of them, for five times the cost of their original installation.
In 2021-22, the previous mayor and council decided to take advantage of a watermain replacement project on Hilchey from Dogwood Street east to Highway 19A and make cycling improvements at the same time, since the road was already under construction. The city added bike lanes and designated on-street parking lanes at the request of the River City Cycling Club and a recommendation from then-transportation specialist Melissa Heidema. The city budgeted $150,000 for the work, which mostly included line-painting, and came in under budget.
After four years of community complaints, traffic collisions, and near-misses involving young pedestrians around Penfield School, council asked staff earlier this year to come up with options to fix the road. A new report from Heidema, now the city’s senior transport engineer, proposes to undo the earlier work and create a pathway for cyclists that takes them off Hilchey and down safer side streets.
“Staff recommend removing the existing bike lanes from Hilchey Road thereby restoring two parking and two travel lanes for vehicles and creating a neighbourhood bikeway on Simms and Parkway Roads, with a bi-directional cycling path on Hilchey Road beside the adjacent sidewalk from Penfield Road to South Dogwood Street,” says Heidema’s report to council. “Compared to other options, the proposed neighbourhood bikeway is deemed to better address systemic safety issues on Hilchey Road, improve cycling comfort, and addresses some of the concerns raised by Penfield School officials.”
The cost to reconfigure Hilchey Road and create designated cycling paths on nearby streets is estimated to cost up to $750,000. Most of that cost will go towards creating a designated two-way bike lane from Dogwood to Penfield that’s separated from the road and sidewalk, along the south side of Hilchey. At Penfield, the recommendations suggest directing cyclists north on Penfield, then east on Parkway, north again on Alder, then east again on Simms all the way to Highway 19A.
Heidema’s report suggests the bike lanes off Hilchey could be added starting next year, while making the Hilchey improvements this summer.
Her report suggests an alternative option, reversing the bike lanes and the parking lanes, so cars park along the curb and the bike lane is on the road side. This plan is budgeted to cost $100,000 less than the first option.
Collision data driving the decision
The report relies on a technical memo prepared by consultants at McElhanney Ltd. The memo looked at ICBC traffic data along Hilchey between 2020-2024.
“Since implementation, the existing layout has been the subject of ongoing community concern. Feedback from residents, cyclists, parents, and school representatives has raised questions related to user comfort, driver behaviour, pedestrian safety at marked crossings, and the overall consistency of the corridor for all road users,” says the memo. “These concerns have been heightened by several reported collisions in recent years, including incidents involving pedestrians and school-aged children in the vicinity of Penfield Elementary School.”
The memo does not provide a breakdown of traffic incidents by year. Neither the memo nor the staff report say if incidents increased or decreased after the changes were made to Hilchey in 2022.
The data shows there were 90 reported collisions at nine intersections along Hilchey over four years (2020–2024), including 48 injury collisions. The worst spots were the Hwy 19A intersection (32 collisions, 18 injuries) and Dogwood Street (22 collisions, 11 injuries). Galerno Road stood out among intersections without signals with 16 collisions and 11 injuries, several involving cyclists.
City council will review staff’s recommendations at Tuesday’s Committee of the Whole meeting.
Featured image: Artist conception of what Hilchey Road could look like between Dogwood and Penfield if reconfiguration goes ahead this summer.
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