Thumbtacks strewn across Montreal bike path as tensions rise between motorists, cyclists - Montreal | Globalnews.ca
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Acts of vandalism targeting bike paths have been reported recently as one borough's plan to eliminate parking for a path for cyclists has polarized the community.

Montreal is easily one of the most bike-friendly cities in North America, and yet even here we have carbrains who feel perpetually entitled to 250 parking spaces (the amount removed for the new bike lane) over the needs of everyone else. Clearly someone felt so strongly entitled to their parking that they threw thumbtacks in the new bike lane.

  • @Nouveau_BurnswickEnglish
    25•1 year ago

    Okay, the loss is 250, but of how many?

    I can’t find a fixed value for the number of spaces in the Burrough, however this CBC article suggests that 29.8% of the Burrough is parking (bike lanes are 2%).

    The burrough is 16.5km^2. Therefore 4.917 km^2 is parking. Parkingindustry.ca offers 8" x 16" as the average parking space in Canada, which is 0.000011891589 km^2. I’m going to round up to 0.00002 km^2 to make math easier and absorb non-stall area of parking lots.

    That gives us at least 245,850 parking spots in the Burrough. So the percentage of parking lost is 0.1%.

    Villeray–Saint-Michel–Parc-Extension resident parking permits cost $100 for most cars.

    • @Fried_out_KombiOPMEnglish
      28•1 year ago

      Is that 29.8% the percent of total land or the percent of total street space? The article’s wording is kind of vague.

      As an aside, I also find it very frustrating how one woman quoted in the article said this:

      “When you’re doing a project like the bike lane, have a compromise in mind,” Bailakis said in an interview outside. “Why do the old people, kids, families get booted out [of the conversation] just to please one people: the bike people?”

      It’s such a gross way to portray the topic. They just automatically assume the car as default and treat bikes like some thing that only the “bike people” use. I might ask her why she believes my sister, who had her driver’s license suspended because of a medical condition, doesn’t deserve the same rights as those physically fit to drive. My sister can ride a bike just fine, but just can’t drive, and yet car-dependent urban design strips her of what ought to be equal rights to mobility.

      • @[email protected]English
        11•1 year ago

        “Why do the old people, kids, families get booted out [of the conversation] just to please one people: the bike people?”

        How are old people and children benefitting from cars over bikes???

        • @Fried_out_KombiOPMEnglish
          14•1 year ago

          Clearly children and the elderly are literally physically incapable of using any mode of transit besides a car, thus our car-dependent hellscape is actually an act of charity out of the pure goodness of our hearts!!

          /s

      • @Nouveau_BurnswickEnglish
        3•1 year ago

        Is that 29.8% the percent of total land or the percent of total street space? The article’s wording is kind of vague.

        Dunno, I assumed total area, and balanced that by giving nearly half the area to “parking area” that didn’t count towards the number of stalls.

        I haven’t been up there, so I don’t know that the burrough is like. I’d also be unlikely to see anything not within 1km of a metro station even if I did go, so my view would be biased anyways.

        Alternatively, the population of the burrough is 143,85, so they are removing one stall for every 575 residents (all residents, not just driving residents).