McGill has a long history of stubborness about bikes.... just try riding a bike to the McLennan library from anywhere on campus: the only way to lock up is to either carry your bike down the stairs, or to ride illegally against traffic on McTavish.

It's just getting worse and it's shameful.

There is far more bike traffic on campus than car traffic. I say re-route cars, not bikes.

Setting the basic arguments of flow of traffic aside, what are the grounds of McGill to be considered if they are open to the public and partake of public and private funds?

We shouldn't let issues like this pass lightly, urban space is going to be something we may find ourselves without one day, if it is forever allowed to be privatized.

It can hardly be considered common space if the grounds (note I'm not considering buildings part of this argument) are independently policed.

Many years ago a McGill employee died when he was hit by a bike courier taking exactly the same route people here are advocating. The cyclist was going so fast that he knocked the employee over, who hit his head on the curb right by the Roddick Gates.

This isn't an issue of security... it's a safety/legal issue.

There was a lot of talk about this about 5-6 years ago within McGill's Environmental Subcommittee (http://www.mcgill.ca/rethink/), but the key problem here is that McGill's grounds are considered private property. If a cyclist were to be hurt (or were to hurt someone else), then it would be the university's responsibility. Which is why the university allows students to go through, but not non-students. Biking is great, but let's be honest... some cyclists can be a**holes.

Reading the university's staff person's responses I'm reminded of the story I read recently about New Orleans, school buses and hurricane Katrina.

It seems that an official had been put in charge of making sure all the local school bus drivers in New Orleans were safely evacuated so that after the storm they could be recalled if needed to transport people out of town.

The city's 700 buses were parked together in an open area.

The plan went perfectly.

Until the levees broke, the buses, parked 11 feet below sea level, were flooded and the drivers (with keys!) were out of town. No one could be transported out and the buses were lost.

But the planning official, in his narrow context, had done everything right.

All to say - Hey McGill - look at the big picture as many here are urging and do what's right, remove a small amount of parking, set up curb barriers so pedestrians will be safely separated and be part of the overall city context.

PS - Can someone post a picture url of the on-street bike parking mentioned so this out of towner can see what they look like. Thx

That said, the university would be well-advised to create two-way bikeways running both ways (E-O and N-S) through the Lower Campus.

In case anyone is curious i asked the guard if there was any possibility of getting a fine for breaking the rules (always my first reaction when I'm told something I do is against the rules, since I got murdered with a 200$ fine for not having my STM student card when I was a student) and she said there wasn't. So if there's no guard it's probably safe to pass through.

So this all just happened to arise while students (and student activists) are mostly out of school. Well it's probably more likely that it happened to arise while it's biking season, which happens to occur around summer semester.

So the university is hiring another fascist security guard to enforce its policy. The university also probably has some liability were any accident to occur on campus and therefore needs to at least demonstrate that it reasonably tried to avoid any problem.

Yes, Concordia's Sir George Williams campus and UQÀM's primary Quartier Latin campus have cycling paths running through them. But these are both urban campuses and the streets are public thoroughfares; the paths were installed at the city's will more than anything else. (I could be mistaken, but more reasonably comparable Loyola campus doesn't have any dedicated paths.)

This complaining fits well with all-too-many Montrealers' perception of avid cyclists in this city (and a point a few other commenters touched on): cyclists feel like they're above the law. I agree with the overall premise that McGill should do more for its community, and opening itself to cyclists is a good start, but if this is a public relations battle we're waging, we'll surely lose it this way.

Of course, I will point out that he is a private security guard - not a police officer. In other words, complying with what he asks is purely optional.

The hill is like 40 feet long and mellow. It's actually easier to go up over the top when you head west because it's a wider route and there are fewer pedestrians.

I stopped and chatted with the security guards twice and they were very friendly and seemed to have no problem with bikes. They just wanted us to use the proper and more safe routes.

But the "steep hill" at McGill is in fact a rise of a few feet. It's nothing.

As currently configured, the lane is actually dangerous to bike on, because of the blind curve mentioned in some of the previous comments. The curve would be much better if there was no parking on the lane, at least in the vicinity of the curve. (This would be about 3-4 parking sports, which are mostly currently out of commission due to construction anyway.)

Do away with parking on this route, outline two bike paths on the road surface, install a few speed bumps (if 'safety' is considered a problem,) and presto: McGill would serve a growing community of environmentally friendly users (year-round!), instead of a handful of troglodytes and their carapaces.
Loss of parking income? 30.000 students,
thousands of employees, thousands of cyclists, thousands of office workers taking a lunch break, various groups of kindergarten kids would all benefit from this simple measure. Who does the accounting at this University? Loss of control over 'private property'? The Roddick and Milton gates are habitually closed one day a year to prevent the exercise of 'acquired rights' by anyone; this includes the right to parking!

Technically, universities are private property, but not in the sense of a private business or home - our taxes pay for them, and traditionally universities are open to non-students and non-staff for consultations at the library, public lectures and events, etc.

I don't agree with going the wrong way either, but it would be easy to solve this problem by painting a bicycle lane in the opposite direction, as has been done recently on avenue de l'Esplanade between Villeneuve and Mont-Royal (in front of the home of the late cycling activist Claire Morrissette) and elsewhere in the neighbourhood. It is important to design bicycle lanes that follow the natural flow of traffic, and privilege bicycles above cars, as we are part of the solution to the current environmental crisis; they are part of the problem.