Avowed cycling enthusiast, and Winnipeg Free Press editor Margo Goodhand, had a double-doozy in her Editor's Bulletin this afternoon. Make that a triple.
1) Her intrepid reporters were waiting to ambush Sam Katz at a policy announcement today, to get his reaction to his slide in their recent poll.
We didn't ambush him, he walked into our studio yesterday and COMPLIMENTED the alternative media for asking smart, tough questions. And you know what, NOT ONE question was about the poll, or ANY polls. We talked to the Mayor about ISSUES.
And in the process, here's what you won't read in tomorrow's MSM scribblings:
A) The Sherbrook bike lane from Ellice to Cumberland is on hold while interim COA Michael Ruta meets with residents and the West End Biz.
B) Berry Street work proceeded yesterday on the authority of Ruta, even though the Mayor admitted he saw that the residents have NEVER seen a final version of the undulating mess, only the fantasy version of 2 straight pavement roadways rammed over their grass and manhole covers.
C) Katz admitted he never knew about the planned direction change for McDermot Avenue by his ballpark until we emailed him about it, but that it wasn't him who froze the project, Ruta did it.
2) "Bart Kives is also looking at River Heights, the city’s most politically engaged ward, which is up in arms over bike-and-pedestrian upgrades."
Weeks ago we broke the story about the Fleet curb extensions, and this week we led in breaking the Parking Authority targeting the Grosvenor bike lane and issuing Westworth United Church members parking tickets after being assured the city would arrange for an exemption; today we had the exclusive details about the terror tactics of cyclists against Wellington Crescent residents.
City Hall reporter Kives, who skipped the Open Houses as irrelevant and did not develop contacts on the ground in the 'politically engaged' ward as a result, is now chasing the alternative media on a daily basis.
3) "Lindsey Wiebe explores traffic ‘calming’ measures like mini-circles and curb extensions. They’ve been around for decades in North America, and are known to boost safety."
Firstly, perhaps Margo meant "mini-roundabouts"; as Spirited Kenny remarked, what she said sounds like a Homer Simpson-ism for 'mini-doughnuts'.
Secondly, the evidence on what is known about the safety record of traffic circles may prove an inconvenient truth to Margo's assertions.
So, just in case there is NO reference in Wiebe's story to the international study first revealed on our show last week by Andrew Allentuck, allow us to provide a link:
http://www.teachamerica.com/rab08/RAB08_Papers/RAB08S8CDaniels.pdf
Page 12: The best estimate for the overall effect of roundabouts on injury crashes involving bicyclists on or nearby the roundabout is an increase of 27%. The best estimate for the effect on crashes involving fatal and serious injuries is an increase of 42-44%, depending on the applied dispersion-value k.
The number of injury crashes at roundabouts with cycle lanes turns out to increase significantly (+93%, C.I. [+38%;+169%]).
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Wednesday on TGCTS at 4 PM
-- More commentary and information from Allentuck about how AT "improvements" in River Heights have endangered cyclists, pedestrians and motorists;
-- The Mynarski ward NDP election finance scandal heats up - as more eyewitnesses to Ross Eadie's admission the NDP is illegally financing his campaign come forward;
-- We recap the $30,000 Elgin Bike Lane barricade rip-off; twice rejected by city council committees, the eyesore was still installed last week by the Public Works department without ANY political authorization, disrupting the Weston/Brooklands neighbourhood and hurting area seniors, residents and businesses.
