Photo of garbage bike lane by James Schwartz / The Urban Country

On the morning of November 7th, a pregnant woman was killed by the back wheels of a truck in Toronto while riding her bike to pick up her son at school. As a result of Jenna Morrison’s tragic and avoidable death, various cycling advocates have been brainstorming ideas for how we can help prevent a similar collision from happening again. Federal Member of Parliament Olivia Chow has proposed a Bill to the House of Commons for mandatory side-guards on trucks to help prevent cyclists from falling into the underside of a truck and getting run over by the rear wheels. Side guards are an initiative I support, and have been mandatory in the U.K. and the European Union for more than 20 years. Last week I gave an interview to CBC Radio’s Rita Celli explaining my support for side guards, while also explaining that safety doesn’t stop at side guards. There is much more we need to do to improve conditions to make cycling more comfortable and safe. Yesterday morning I met up with Dave Meslin (the Founder of the Toronto Cyclists Union) to measure the dimensions of the intersection where Jenna was killed so we can propose a new design design to make bicyclists more visible and help to reduce conflict between drivers and cyclists. Hopefully a better design on this street might prevent another incident like this from happening. To see how a bike lane might work on this street we gathered garbage and sticks and created a homemade bike lane. The painted bicycle symbols (or “sharrows”) were painted by an anonymous group/person shortly after Jenna’s death.

We observed how cars and trucks drove with our “trash” bike lane present. Drivers seemed to stay clear of our faux bike lane when they drove through the intersection, including a large tractor-trailer whose rear wheels stayed clear of our bike lane.

Read about our trash bike lane on Mez’s blog: “Re:Cycling – This is how bike lanes save lives”

Jenna was on the right side of a truck just before the Stop sign when the truck proceeded to turn right. The side of the truck apparently knocked Jenna off her bike and the rear wheels subsequently ran over her.

Having a bike lane might prevent this type of collision from occurring by giving a cyclist more space and making a truck driver more aware that a cyclist might be present.

This street is not unique in Toronto – there is no shortage of intersections that could be re-designed to positively improve the comfort and safety of cyclists.

Before we created the trash bike lane:

Photo by James Schwartz / The Urban Country

AFTER photos:

Photo by James Schwartz / The Urban Country

Photo by James Schwartz / The Urban Country

Photo by James Schwartz / The Urban Country

Photo by James Schwartz / The Urban Country

Photo by James Schwartz / The Urban Country

You may notice that there was significantly less garbage on the bike lane in the last two photos. This is because we had already cleared our trash bike lane when we spotted this truck approaching the intersection. As the truck was approaching we quickly re-applied some of the garbage just in time.

Despite the truck’s length and the narrow composition of the vehicle lane at this intersection the truck was still able to prevent his rear wheels from entering our 1.5 metre bike lane.

In a similar, but more permanent initiative, a group of advocates in Mexico painted their own 5km bike lane.

We cannot let Jenna’s tragic, untimely and senseless death be in vain. Positive change needs to happen to prevent someone else from experiencing the same fate.

Next step, use our measurements to design a new intersection that is inclusive of cyclists. Stay tuned.

James D. Schwartz is a Transportation Pragmatist and the Editor of The Urban Country. You can contact James at james.schwartz@theurbancountry.com or follow him on Twitter.

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