As I neither drive a car nor ride a bicycle, my opinion of the new bike lanes is probably less personal than those of many others from whom you are hearing.
However, I am a taxpayer and as such feel I, and the rest of the taxpaying residents of Red Deer, should have been invited to voice our opinions before council arbitrarily spent what, $750,000? $800,000? $1.3 million? I have heard all these figures quoted, but nobody seems to have an official quote.
Waiting for my bus on 39th Street, I see hundreds of cars, trucks and a few motorcycles and buses, but rarely even one bicycle. For this, our bus- through fare has been reduced to one motor traffic lane in each direction.
What was wrong with our relatively few bicycles using the sidewalk? There are no pedestrians using them in my neighbourhood.
Ask bus drivers, ask taxi drivers, ask operators of emergency services what they think of this new development! Then, please get out there, quick, and repaint those lane lines before the snow covers them up for six or seven months and nobody knows where they are allowed to drive.
The recent letter to the Advocate from Al Coker says it better than I. I understand someone has a petition going; add my name to it, please!
Dicksie Helm
Red Deer