Bike to Work Week: Surrey investing in cycling infrastructure
City only began recently keeping bike stats, but believes investments will be popular
The car might be the king of transportation in Surrey, but the city is working to change that.
Although the city was originally built with drivers in mind, Surrey is now spending $5 million on cycling infrastructure this year.
"Those range from about nine kilometres of on-street bike lanes, five kilometres of off-street green ways and something exciting for us is we're starting to get into separated one-way cycling tracks," said Jaime Boan, the city's manager of transportation.
Surrey cyclists are also excited about a bike path that runs along the east side of Highway One all the way to the Port Mann Bridge, which will be completed in a month's time. The bridge is tolled for vehicle traffic, but will be free to ride for cyclists.
Surrey has only recently begun keeping cycling statistics, so it's hard to know exactly how many people ride their bikes to work, but anecdotally the investments are popular with cyclists taking part in Bike to Work Week.
"Surrey is really wonderful, in my view," said one cyclist Fiona Walsh.
"You build it and they will come because right now we're encouraging cyclists to get out there. I come from North Vancouver and when I get to Surrey I say, 'I love it, I love it.'"
Cecil Milligan, the owner of Bike Zone in Guildford, says mountain bikes were his biggest seller six years ago, but that's now starting to change.
"A lot of the product that we sell has definitely switched to a more commuter-style bike. People want to enjoy, just recreation and not so much the mountain bikes, with the prices of gas."