Good work. That trail will be easier for wheelchairs to navigate than the goofy back sloped sidewalks the city builds.

Hey city works administration ever wonder why you see wheelchairs, people running and walking on the road instead of the sidewalk? Hint, less of a slope.

I agree with seamutt on both points.

For greater than 40 years, the city of Prince George has been building sidewalks with a terrible slope towards the curb.

These sidewalks make for a poor walking surface in the best of conditions, but become incredibly icy and dangerous during a Prince George winter.

There has got to be a better sidewalk design.

City says they need the slope so the water will run off and therefore they won’t become icy. I wonder if they have ever walked on the sidewalks themselves. Different sidewalk walk designs have been put forward to the City but they won’t even look at them.

Thanks folks. I have been wondering why there are so many people on electric scooters out in the traffic. They would rather get hit by a vehicle than drive on sloped sidewalks.

“City says they need the slope so the water will run off and therefore they won’t become icy.”

I suggest we inundate them with pictures of the icy sidewalks which cannot possibly be icy because they have a slope.

It is difficult for water to run off when snow on the low part of the sidewalk prevents the water from running off and, instead, gets soaked up by the snow to form a hard ice dam which will take even longer to melt.

We have to remember that sidewalks do not only slope across but also along the length of the sidewalk. There are very few sections of sidewalk which are dead level. So water seeking the low level does not care whether it is across or along the length.

However, it is very difficult for most people, and it becomes even more difficult as one gets older, to walk along a surface which has a side slope to it. The steeper it is, the worse it gets. There are many spots which exceed the recommended side slope, especially at driveways with curb cuts.

A picture of a fairly normal sidewalk not located adjacent to a roadway.http://pvpost.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/01/Icy_sidewalk_Prairie_Village.jpg

Here is a picture which is more like the PG situation of sidewalk adjacent to a road with snow piled up at the junction of the two.http://www.streets.mn/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/mpls-icy-sidewalk.jpg

Other than the fact that this sidewalk is wider than PG sidewalks, it does show the other hazards we have, and that is utility poles built in for a slalom course. In some places they actually have put in some extra paving to provide a wider path around, but it looks like kindergarten kids came in doing the patchwork.

http://www.vtpi.org/blog/SW01.jpg

Maybe it is time to put City Council members in a wheelchair and send them down some typical problem sidewalks in the city as these folks did.

http://www.clarionledger.com/article/20130810/NEWS01/308100031/Wheelchair-challenge-offers-perspective

Constructing sidewalks with a 2 percent cross slope toward the street meets standards, Kiser said. “Above 2 percent means the sidewalk is tilted so much that gravity makes the wheelchair user roll toward the street. They have to use more pressure on one of their wheels, and if they aren’t paying attention, they will roll into the street,” Kiser said.

The designers and those responsible for continuing to make excuses for sloping sidewalks must not have ever walked on our sidewalks in the winter time. I have walked to work for at least the past 10 years. The sidewalks are treacherous because they are sloped. If they were flat, you might have half a chance of not busting your skull.

Well, I’m guessing they can’t be flat. At least a 1% grade away from buildings especially, maybe 2% at a driveway drop ?