Going by the Sun this photo was taken during the Afternoon Peak hour at the corner of Sussex & King St. Eight bikes can clearly be seen in the photo waiting to cross, four west bound and 4 east bound. As I am not a stalker I was not going to sit there and take photo after photo but from what I saw as I passed through this area at the time it was constant. This has been backed up by further reading the footage I have seen.
It is no real surprise that the SCC (Sydney City Council) wants to extend the King Street Cycleway the full length of the street. It makes very good sense, it would link the Kent & Collage Street Cycleways as well as the Pyrmont Bridge to Collage Street cycleway. Currently only the Pyrmont Bridge and Kent Street Cycleway are linked by the King Street Cycleway. This is the importance of the above photo as it shows that even the existing short cycleway is getting decent numbers. King Street Cycleway extension is also important in the fact that it would allow a East-West Link throught the centre of Sydney City CBD. This would break down the distance anyone would have to ride on general streets to reach there workplace.
So what is the problem? Well the problem is that the new Premier of New South Wales by all accounts hates the Lord Mayor of Sydney City. Currently the Lord Mayor has duel roles as both Lord Mayor and a member of the lower house of the New South Wales Parliament. In both roles Clover Moore was elected by the people but such is the Premiers hatred of her is that he has had the law changed so that no person can hold more that one public office at once. This of course effects more than just Clover as there is some other members from the far west NSW that are also have to resign from one of there roles. The other problem is that the Premier is also changing the law so that SCC has to get approval from the state on what they do to there own roads (this is completely bizarre to me). By some reports the Premier is a typical blue blood not caring about cyclists once publicly stating that the cycleways needed to be torn up, sorry relocated. Some how this does not equal tearing them up?
Anyway Back to the (convenient) Technical Reason. Some how extending the Path would create traffic grid lock (it's unfeasible). If I knew how to insert a laughter button I would. Sydney City Traffic is so bad it is gridlock already. Buses travelling the 2.5kms from Circular Quey to central station during peak are given 25-30 minutes. This is slower then walking and I have easily out paced traffic before in Sydney when walking. But that is North South Traffic we are talking about East West Traffic. What is being proposed is a path that would have a total length of just over 500m on a street that is not even a free flowing street. It effectively finishes in what traffic wise is a T intersection where most traffic goes left or right not straight ahead. So far the council has been very clever and not had to reclaim any traffic lanes but this may be first and I think so what. If they did reclaim a single lane the street may keep a single configuration for it's entire length. Currently it jumps from 3 to 4 to 3 then back to 4 lanes. Then there is the grand scheme of things. Would this cycleway bring the rest of the CBD to a halt. Well the Fact is the CBD is already at a halt!
To me this blocking of this path has more to do with politics then it has to do sound transport policy.
http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/cyclists-left-with-an-eastwest-divide-20120507-1y94e.html
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