Council opens door on Bourke Street’s future

By Michael Gormly

Council on Monday night voted unanimously for a separated two-way cycleway along Bourke Street from Woolloomooloo to Zetland, with a promise to investigate several points brought up in last week’s tumultuous committee meeting. A move by Labor’s Meredith Burgmann to defer the vote for further investigation was defeated 8’2.

While many are applauding this move into the 21st Century, many residents of the street remain unhappy with aspects of the design.

One snag they foresee is that cars parked next to the cycle path will be obliged to open passenger-side doors directly into the path of southbound cyclists. A 400mm wide kerb, flush to the surface of the path, has been designed in to ease this conflict. But the open door of a Renault hatch, for example, is 1.38m long and will penetrate well into the near cycle lane. Southbound is downhill so many riders will be moving quickly. (See diagram)

While this is still far safer for cyclists than the existing on-road route (approaching driver’s-side doors of parked cars from behind), children will be unloaded from cars directly onto the new cycle path, behind an open door and unable to see oncoming cyclists ‘ who are quick, silent, and usually uninsured. There is a public school on the street in Surry Hills, so a lot of kids arrive and depart on school days.

Children do not stay still, and a parent with their head in the back seat unstrapping child #2 will be blindsided and preoccupied. Residents say there will be accidents when a speeding cyclist hits either a child, or an oncoming rider while avoiding these conflicts ‘ and it will be Council copping the compensation claims.

A compromise plan suggests converting the proposed two-way path to one-way northbound (uphill), with a wider bike lane than a current single lane and a wide flat median strip separating bikes and cars, where car drivers can do their thing in safety as per the existing one-way bike path at Bourke and Cleveland Sts. (see photo).

Southbound (downhill) cyclists would share the road with cars, assisted by a bike route painted onto the road, well away from opening car doors, marked by periodic large bike logos. This system is termed BIKEs and is used in Brisbane and parts of London. Riders say it works well and feels safe as drivers are constantly aware of bikes and their right to the road. The relatively quick downhill run on Bourke St minimises conflict between cars and bikes as their speeds can be fairly close.

The City News put this idea to all councillors and project manager Michael Leyland before Monday’s vote. All except Ms Burgmann were confident the present plan will work. Staff have produced their own diagram showing a 1m door from a medium-sized four-door car extending into the cycle lane. However on Tuesday morning one resident said four out of sixteen cars parked near his house were two-door hatches which have much longer doors.