St. Catharines fire/smoke (pictures & video)

Doing some work around the garden, I noticed a large amount of black smoke in the sky last night:

Since it didn’t appear all that far away I got my cameras and bike and took off, just following the smoke.

^On Lakeport Road. Smoke coming from the left, heading to the West end.

^Scott Street backed up, straight ahead pitch black.

^At times visibility was near zero around Grantham Plaza.

^Closer to the fire. Oh, the van wasn’t driving in the bike lane or anything. Emergency vehicle was coming so he pulled over.

^Grantham plaza was closed off. People were still walking/cycling through mind you.

^I picked a bad location to be. Other then smoke you couldn’t see much. I was choking on smoke where I was, so I didn’t really want to head closer.

^This guy was talking to different people, going on about “The Muslims” and how it’s all there fault.

Naturally, my attention soon turned to bicycle watching. I’ve always found this area to be one of St. Catharines’ busiest bicycle areas, but throw in a fire and it increased. Unfortunately I didn’t get as many pictures of people on bikes as I’d have liked.

^ I didn’t actually notice until I got home, but the city needs to clean the Vine Street bike lane. Brutal.

Here’s an article on the fire (LINK)

The fire was at a new condo being built (Walker’s Creek). $2million worth in damages, I guess they’ll have to start over.

A person on Twitter said that a worker in a next door business saw a kid or kids coming from the area just minutes earlier. Not sure if that’s the case, but it has been classified as suspicious.
Also someone from the fire department said this was the thickest smoke he’s seen since the early 90’s here.

Niagara worst roads…

It’s that time of year again, CAA’s worst roads list for Niagara (LINK).

One might think that after a post I did days ago on Lakeshore Road (LINK TO POST), that this is the road I would nominate.

Nope. Despite the horrendous state Lakeshore is in, it still pales in comparison to Ontario Street (between Linwell and Lakeport).

Between Linwell and the Ontario Street entrance to the townhouse complex (77 Linwell), the road is rather narrow AND there is a bit of a hill.
From the above townhouse to Chapleau Gate the road actually isn’t all bad…

However the short stretch between Chapleau Gate and Lakeport Road, it is without doubt the worst road in the city.

^To the left is Chapleau Gate, and so begins a narrower road with gravel shoulder and pot holes.

^ If you look at the position of the vehicle, take into account riding far enough out to avoid potholes, you are nearly riding in the centre of the lane.

^To make matters worse, many large trucks use this streets (plus it’s a bus route).

^It also seems like no matter the time of day, it is ALWAYS busy.

^If bike lanes were added (after all, the space is already there) vehicles wouldn’t have to come to a near stop to wait to pass safely, and since this stretch is so congested, there are not too many chances to pass safely.

Ontario Street (between Welland Ave & the GM Plant) was not much better, at least with regards to pot holes (it was curbed with no shoulder).

^What the stretch between Welland Ave & the GM plat looks like now. Smooth and more enjoyable to ride on.

^No re-surfaced, but this stretch has always been fine for riding. Smooth and wide.

^After Carlton, Ontario becomes four lanes until Linwell. It is wide enough and not consistently busy like Lake Street.

The stretch that I nominate for worst road, is actually so bad that when I do take Ontario street to go home, I’ll go an extra 5-10 minutes out of my way by turning down Linwell and taking it to Lakeport.

Working on Ontario Street would not only make it safer and more enjoyable to cycle on, but would just make the area look a lot nice.

Here is Lakeport Road many years back, a road I’m always on.

Here it is today after work was done.

Overall it just looks better.

The West ends on/off bike lane network

A trip to the west end was in store today, as I noticed at SoftMoc (shoe store) a pair of Converse All Star high tops on sale ($10 off).
It’s actually been a while since I’ve been to the cities west end, which has grown to a massive size in recent years. Sadly I remember when it was just the Humane Society, Walmart and a few strip malls. Now it’s that plus a good dozen more strip malls, many more big box stores and even now the cities hospital.
The usual route out to the west end it taking Ontario Street (or Lake street and a bunch of side streets). Today I went via Port Dalhousie and Martindale.
Just outside of Port Dalhousie there was a garage and burger place. Was there for years before being torn down in favour of this new building (dental offices, which in a 1.5km radius of me there have to be 4 or 5, including a new one being built down the street).
What caught my attention was the bike rack at the side.

Below is a Canadian legion building, which was recently sold (or approved to sale). I guess it will be torn down and a new 5 or 6 story senior condo will be built…Hopefully that doesn’t effect the pathway behind it.

Not far from the above location is a future condo tower, which is/was quite controversial. Frankly I don’t care what is built there, I’m just thrilled the 1-4am wake up calls from drunk students passing my place has finished (mostly bars were located in that area).


^Main Street in Port Dalhousie. Not a bad area to ride but it is a rather narrow road, in which the condition is starting to deteriorate.



It seems since I posted a video complaining about how bad motorists have gotten in this city, they have improved. Past few times I’ve been out people have been quite generous in the space given.

^The start of the on/off bike lane.

^I believe less the 1km later it ends.

^Then the road condition worsens with a gravel shoulder and potholes near the right of the road.


^Turning from Main Street onto Martindale Road. One of the few areas within the city where the speed jumps to 60km/h.

^Unfortunately there is then a slight hill, where the bike lane ends…

^Right at the bridge there is no bike lane.

^Bike lane starts up again at the top of the hill.


^Can’t believe the new(er) mansions  built overlooking Martindale pond (to the left).

^Again, the bike lane ends.

^Whenever I take this route, it is usually home which means I avoid the off ramp to the highway. However to the right it can be tricky (depending on the hour) for cyclists to merge into the bike lane on the bridge. Fortunately being a Sunday afternoon it wasn’t too bad.

^The previous bridge was two (narrow) lanes, but the replacement is four lanes plus bike lanes. But that doesn’t solve the issue for cyclists merging right, when vehicles are coming off the highway.


^Looking back

^Over the bridge the bike lane continues to the left of the turning lane. A complaint I hear from people in other cities is they put the bike lane to the right of the turning lane.


^Of course, the bike lane ends again, this time merging you into narrow traffic. Plenty of space here for bike lanes however.

^A little ways up, the bike lane starts, but soon ends again…to only begin a little ways up again!


^As I said in my previous post (regarding people parked in the Geneva Street bike lane), I’ve never had an issue with people behind me slowing down to let me pass parked vehicles…

^Today was no exception as those three vehicles let me move out without issue.

I *believe* the pedestrian area is the bike lane over the bridge…

…since the sidewalk on this older overpass is on one side, I guess that is considered a ‘pedestrian area’. It is actually kind of spooky riding that close to the barrier, as on a bike you really tower over it to view this below…


^Bike lane does continue on the other side of the lights, however I turned right here.

^If there is one major complaint I have with the entire west end shopping are, it’s bike parking.
Above is at Walmart where there are two racks. Best Buy has a small bike rack and then there is SuperStore. Aside from those places, I don’t really recall seeing any other spots to park a bike.
Unfortunately where Walmart located the bike racks, there are right next to bags of soil, and people parked up there to load up their vehicles with bags of it (on for $1 per bag). At least the people there respected my bike!

^ Took this picture mainly because I miss having a road bike on hand

^Now onto Ontario street. I wasn’t able to take any pictures of the one stretch of 4th Ave do to heavy traffic and having to merge through 2 lanes in order to get into a left turn lane.
I did two posts on Ontario Street before. This stretch was paved and a million times better for cycling on. I can’t say the same for the stretch of Ontario near where I live (one area sidewalk cycling is actually safer).

^Even this stretch by the old GM plant where it wasn’t recently paved is still smooth and wide to cycle on.
On the other side of Carlton it becomes four lanes. Many choose to do the following when cycling that stretch…


^Ontario street overpass. I’m still not sure why bike lanes were not included when they re-did this bridge a few years ago.
Despite always dreading the idea of heading to West St. Catharines, I’ve never had any issues. Even in the mad (Sunday) traffic where it was quite busy, bike lanes made it more enjoyable in the parts where they were located, some areas were wide enough to allow safe passing, and even on the narrower stretches of road people in the west end seem to always leave a good amount of space.
Still think it’s too bad the city didn’t take bike lanes into consideration in the spot where they widen the road.

More pictures: LINK 1   LINK 2