Editor's note: This is part four of a five-part series between Coast Reporter and Sunshine Coast Regional District (SCRD) featuring cycling programs and improvements by several organizations on the Coast.
Choosing how to get from A to B on the Coast depends on many factors - travel time, work needs, safe routes and available destination parking all figure into it. Our collective choices paint a picture of how we get around on the Coast, and currently, single occupancy vehicles dominate. Rising fuel costs, environmental impacts of fossil fuels and negative health effects of personal vehicles make advancing alternative transportation as important as ever.
Our population of 30,000 is distributed in a narrow band with clusters near business centres like Madeira Park, Sechelt, Roberts Creek and Gibsons. The short distances in centres make them well-suited for bike travel. Studies show people choose to walk or bike where the distance from home to amenities is five to 10 minutes. Where work and living spaces are combined in attractive ways, we open these options to more people.
Planning such communities is the first step to achieving them.
Facilitated in part by local government, progressive plans can address transportation and other issues. Building bicycle infrastructure is complex in that it involves more than one agency. On the Coast it combines efforts of the Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure (MOTI) which is responsible for Highway 101 and rural area roads, and local government.
While roads are not under the SCRD's jurisdiction, it does have a bicycle walking paths function which aims to develop paved road shoulders in rural areas B, D, E and F. This development is done along key rural transportation corridors, in co-operation with MOTI. Each of the local municipalities also develops and maintains bicycle walking path infrastructure on the non highway portions of road within their areas. Strengthening the collaborative and information sharing processes between jurisdictions helps achieve well linked routes.
Historically our communities were connected by boat rather than car. The rocky sloping coastline adds to the cost of building roads and bikeways. A small population limits the tax base available to pay for these projects, which usually depend on provincial or federal grants. For example, the recent two km shoulder widening along Highway 101 through Selma Park cost roughly $2.5 million. This is the same sum spent on all previous SCRD bikeway work in the rural areas combined on the Sunshine Coast (roughly 25 km since 1998). While costly, the bikeway has made a previously very dangerous portion of the highway much safer to ride for cyclists. A legacy fund might help sustain quicker adoption of new infrastructure.
Not without its challenges, expanding bicycle commuting infrastructure is one part of making more sustainable transportation options available and popular on the Coast.
- Submitted
