“In 2018, the City of Greater Bendigo hosted two national walking and cycling conferences and became Australia’s first internationally-accredited Bicycle Friendly Community. This recognises the involvement and commitment of the community and the City in developing a leading place
to walk and cycle.”
There is (or rather was) a bike lane on both sides of Russell Street in Quarry Hill, allowing residents and students of the local primary school semi-protected access to the Back Creek Trial, which in turn accesses the CBD and connects to other bike paths leading to Bendigo Secondary College and Latrobe University.
The bike lanes on Russell Street were marked “Bike Lane Only”, save for a handful of marked car parks outside a mechanic and church. As is expected, some car owners think they can park anywhere they please and parked in this bike lane. One even had a car cover on it and was left for two months. See photos.
When reported to Bendigo Council, it did the usual thing, viz. nothing. On repeated followup, the solved the problem …
By removing the bike lane!
Praise be, and let’s all pay homage the motor vehicle gods. To hell with active recreation and the council’s published strategy. So much for being “the first internationally accredited bike-friendly city”
With the plethora of confusing signage for parking, road rules, and everything related I can imagine ‘bikes only’ along a road means different things to different people.
The council seems to have taken the ‘clarifying position’ (lets not go there!) that the lane is for bikes and parking. If the intention was a dedicated bike transit lane one would reasonably expect ‘No Parking’ signs to accompany the ‘bikes only’ to clear confusion.
Have you contacted council about the seeming inane situation rather than the ‘symptom’ you point out? Unfortunately they seem more likely to change the text in their policy than the riding/parking but nothing tried?
In Qld it is legal to park in a bike lane as long as there is no “No parking” type signage
“ You must give way to bikes when moving into a bike lane. You can stop or park in a marked bike lane if you are allowed to drive in it and there are no signs or road markings prohibiting it .”
I understand that it is not the same in SA but I think most other States also allow parking in bike lanes.
SA rules state “ Do not drive, stop or park in a bicycle lane, you can cross a bicycle lane to turn left, enter private property or park in a parking lane .”
