Safety Impacts of Bicycle Infrastructure in Canada

The Chief Engineers’ Council of the Transportation Association of Canada (TAC) is recommending the development of a new project on safety impacts of bicycle infrastructure in Canada.

Several bicycle facility planning and design guidelines and resources already exist, including the Traffic Signal Guidelines for Bicycles (2014) and Bikeway Traffic Control Guidelines for Canada (2012) published by TAC. However, there is a lack of understanding of specific safety impacts of different bicycle facilities in the Canadian context.

Advanced by the Road Safety Standing Committee, key objectives of this project are:

• identifying methods and measures to evaluate the safety of bicycle facilities, including the impact on all road users
• identifying data requirements to determine the safety performance of future bicycle facilities
• identifying major bicycle infrastructure projects undertaken in Canadian cities over the past decade
• documenting impacts on the number of cyclists that use roads or ride in neighbourhoods following infrastructure improvements
• quantifying impacts on the safety of cyclists, and other road users, following implementation of bicycle infrastructure improvements

The report will supplement aforementioned TAC publications by providing basic requirements for evaluating bicycle facilities; case studies documenting the safety performance of various types of bicycle facilities, and safety heuristics for associated bicycle facilities.

Organizations wishing to participate as project partners are invited to contact Sandra Majkic.

Information about other TAC projects in development seeking funding is available on the TAC website.