Bike symbol in middle of street a nudge to share the lane, says Cycling PEI

Cycling PEI says it will have to do more to educate Islanders about the new bike symbols painted on two one-way streets in downtown Charlottetown.

Fitzroy runs west, while Richmond street runs east.

The idea is to create a safer route for cyclists to get back and forth from the Victoria Park cycling lanes, to the Confederation Trail in Joe Ghiz park.

"The ShareRoad bike lane indicates that a cyclist is able to ride in traffic, on the highway as a rightful user of the lane and that motorists would go around them," said Mike Connolly, Executive Director of Cycling PEI."

"Fitzroy is a perfect example because it's a 2-lane, one-way street. There's no obstructions to any vehicles, so that when vehicles come up, they would just pass on the left lane and go around the cyclist."

Symbols confusing to some

Connolly agreed that some may find the new symbols confusing, so a new campaign is planned to let drivers and cyclists know the new rules on the two streets.    

"We have a lot of educating to do. Not just for the motorist, but for cyclists as well, because there is a certain way to ride and there's a certain place to ride so we don't always want to put the emphasis on the motorists," he said.

Connolly said dedicated bike lanes on the two streets might be safer, but it would be too disruptive.

"We don't want to remove any infrastructure for motorists. To have a dedicated bike lane on this street, we'd have to remove parking, and there would be some construction work required to do that, and it just makes sense to do a ShareRoad bike lane because it doesn't disrupt any vehicular traffic," he said.

Connolly said a new map will soon be put out that shows the entire network of cycling routes throughout the city.