Have you ever had trouble finding bicycle parking near Lion & Bright, Local Source, Envie, and Smith’s Bakery? With narrow sidewalks on Agricola and other streets it’s hard to put enough bicycle parking in place. That’s why we worked with the city to create Halifax’s first on-street bicycle parking space, at 5775 Charles St (in front of Envie.)
We placed 8 posts (enough for 16 bicycles) in a space that was previously a no-parking area. In the future, on-street bicycle parking could be expanded to existing car parking spaces, replacing one car with ten or more bicycles.
Our one-week pilot takes place November 7-November 15th, 2015. We’ll be back in April with a full-summer installation.
Why should we built on-street bicycle parking?
A curb extension and Spring Garden and Queen makes space for bicycle parking, benches, and more.
On-street bicycle parking is a great way to test potential sidewalk expansions. The recent expansion of the sidewalk at Spring Garden and Queen is a great example of this. The city was able to add bicycle parking, benches, and more on a previously narrow sidewalk. Sidewalk expansions are expensive and permanent. The projects can run over $100,000 including moving storm drains and catchbasins. On-street bicycle parking is far cheaper, at approximately $3,000, allowing the city to test how the street functions with the changes before making permanent alterations.
How did we pay for on-street bicycle parking?
This on-street bicycle parking project was funded through a $7,107 grant from the District 8 Capital Fund. The budget is broken down as follows:
- 8 bicycle racks: $2,000
- 2 planters: $500
- Permit: $125
- Due to budget efficiencies and changes in scope (we removed the garbage cans and received a better price than planned for the bicycle racks) we have $4,482 left. This will be used to install more racks next spring or returned to the capital fund. Stay tuned.
This project was made possible through the hard work of our volunteers. Support our work by becoming a member today.
Want one of these outside of your business? Get in touch.
