The Sixth Avenue Bike Lane in downtown Kamloops is officially open.

Transportation Manager Purvez Irani says the first separated bike lane in the City – that runs from Columbia Street to Lansdowne Street – has been a long time coming.

It allows cyclists to travel in both directions from the Lansdowne Bus Exchange to Peterson Creek Park, including Xget’tem’ Trail.

“Nobody was really sure how a two way cycle track would work here,” Irani said during the opening ceremony Friday.

“It was parking. There was a lot of other issues we had to take into account – transit, because it goes right to the transit exchange and we didn’t want to impact transit operations either. A lot of things that we had to consider and to make it more difficult, this was during COVID times.”

Councillor Nancy Bepple, herself an avid cyclist, says she bikes up and down the new path several times a week.

“It’s just a fantastic project which shows how when community makes their needs known, when council listens to what community is asking for and when we have great staff who can put it into operations, we can have something that really makes the City a better place to live,” Bepple said.

“The highlight for me is I have seen multiple times little kids on bicycles cycling up and down this path and that would not have been happening without the cycle path. You would not have seen them on Sixth Avenue, so this is a huge win for everybody in the community.”

Irani says this new bike lane – which has been operational since early September – is the last component of the Summit-Downtown Active Transportation Connection Project.

“The two components are key active transportation connections to support a continuous north-south bicycle route from Aberdeen to Westsyde and are part of the overall North-South Kamloops Bicycle Corridor Project,” the City said.

“[It] aims to build out a core bike network in Kamloops, connecting infrastructure and pathways from Aberdeen through the Downtown to the North Shore and Westsyde.”

Construction on the bike lane began in Sept. 2022.

As part of this project, the City says residents will notice the following changes to traffic movement through the corridor for traffic flow and safety purposes:

• Cyclists passing through Seymour Street and Victoria Street will now see new, bike-specific traffic signals.
• Changes have been made to the lane configurations at intersections along 6th Avenue as the roadway has been converted from four vehicle lanes to two vehicle lanes to accommodate the width of the bike lane and separation median.
• Cyclists using the protected, two-way bicycle lane are required to yield to pedestrians crossing the bicycle lane from the sidewalk to the bus stops. A rectangular rapid flashing beacon and yellow urban braille have been installed to ensure the safe movement for people of all abilities.
• The traffic light at 6th Avenue and Victoria Street will operate differently to ensure better separation between cyclists and certain vehicle movements. Watch the animated traffic graphic.
• New “No Right on Red” signs at have been installed at:
  – 6th Avenue and Columbia Street (westbound right turn)
  – 6th Avenue and Victoria Street (westbound right turn)
• The configuration for southbound lanes exiting Lansdowne Mall at 6th Avenue have been changed, converting the shared through-right lane into a right-turn only.