Post date: Aug 11, 2011 1:14:7 AM

Death highlights bike path peril

Cement truck crushes cyclist

By JAMES MENNIE, The Gazette August 10, 2011 4:23 PM

Police remove the bike of a 56-year-old cyclist who was hit and killed at the corner of Frontenac and Notre Dame Sts. The truck driver who hit him may simply not have seen him.

Photograph by: Dave Sidaway, The Gazette

MONTREAL - It was, to all appearances, a tragic accident.

But was it an accident waiting to happen?

The 56-year-old cyclist crushed to death on Tuesday morning by a cement-mixing truck as it turned north onto Frontenac St. from Notre Dame St. may well have been travelling west on the same green light the truck driver followed to make his turn.

This possibility has led Montreal police to repeat their warning to cyclists and pedestrians to establish eye contact with the driver turning onto an intersection they are about to cross.

And when it comes to the corner of Frontenac and Notre Dame, that's advice cyclists would do well to follow.

While traffic lights at the intersection do have a separate set of signals for pedestrians crossing Frontenac St., no separate set of signals has been installed for cyclists. This, even though the bike path that debouches onto the intersection, part of the Route Vert, is well travelled enough to see nearly 40 cyclists use that section of path over the course of a single hour on Tuesday afternoon.

That lack of a separate set of signals leaves cyclists obliged to obey the green and red signals used by automobile traffic. And the situation doesn't improve at the intersections where the bicycle path crosses city streets west of the site of the accident.

And even though Notre Dame St. remains a roadway frequently travelled by tractor-trailers and other heavy vehicles, there is no indicator at the intersection telling motorists that they are about to turn into an intersection that is part of a bicycle path or even that there's a bicycle path running parallel.

But for Suzanne Lareau, head of Vélo Québec, the issue is increased awareness.

"I always tell cyclists that buses and trucks have large blind spots (when turning)," she said.

"I don't know what happened (at Frontenac and Notre Dame), but one thing is clear: whether it's a cyclist or motorist approaching an intersection, they have to slow down, that's the only way you'll be able to see everything that's going on around you and be able to react to the unforeseen.

"Because an intersection is nothing but a zone of unforeseens."

Lareau doubted whether a separate set of traffic signals for cyclists would make a difference along Notre Dame St., noting that an existing system of signals for cyclists along Rachel St. are so unsynchronized they don't even allow enough time to cycle across an intersection.

Preliminary indications suggest the driver of the truck, making a wide turn onto Frontenac St., simply didn't see the cyclist.

The 37-year-old truck driver was brought to hospital for treatment of shock. A 20-year-old female driver who witnessed the crash was also treated for shock.

jmennie@ montrealgazette.com

Read more: http://www.montrealgazette.com/news/Death+highlights+bike+path+peril/5231589/story.html#ixzz1Ug6hAA3M