Just when you think winter is done, another winter storm hits the city leaving us covered in a further 20cm of snow. And, with the temperatures plunging back into the minus 20s⁰C, there’s a huge temptation to hide inside and simply ride on the indoor trainer.

I don’t advocate riding during a storm. I found that out the hard way earlier in the year when  I couldn’t keep my googles clear enough to see where I was riding, the cycle path quickly drifted over and my hands froze in the plunging temperatures.  But once the snow has stopped and contractors have had a chance to clear the bike paths, then it’s just the low temperatures you have to contend with.

Where I live Downtown, on the morning after a storm the first path-clearing vehicle sweeps past my apartment at 6am, preparing the way for hardy bike commuters. And, sure enough, even with temperatures in the mid minus twenties, a few cyclists brave the conditions to ride into work.  I certainly wasn’t going to head out before the sun rose, but I was interested in finding out just what had been cleared for cyclists straight after a snowfall.

On  leaving the apartment, I found the Bow River Trail at Prince’s Island Park was brushed clear enough to ride, although there were patches of compressed snow in places and I was glad to be riding on studded tires.  Heading west on the south bank,  I passed under  the 9 and 10 Street bridges, travelling a little slower than normally as the patches of snow dragged on my tires.  The underpasses were mercifully clear of snow.

Using an old cycle computer with limited battery life and uncertain charging, I suddenly found I had no cycling information as it had gone dormant in the cold after only a couple of kilometres.  Luckily, I could start up Strava on my phone to cover the majority of the ride. 

Not long after my computer gave up, the cleared path also came to an abrupt end at   Pumphouse Road leaving me with a kilometre of rutted snow to the Chrowchild pedestrian bridge.  I was able to follow packed tracks made by fat tire bikes but, when I fell to the side,  I was brought to a halt by 10cm of loose snow.   Across the river, I could see contractor crews working to clear the Bow Valley Trail there so, I guess, the route from  Parkdale into downtown along the north bank, gets priority.

I had no problems in Parkdale but did have to ride on the footpath past the Angel Café because of the water pipeline construction going on there. The Angel Café was, sadly, boarded up now that the business has had to vacate and either relocate or close down completely. Further west, in Shouldice Park, 13 Avenue had been ploughed down to a firm, packed surface that was easy to ride.

At the Bowness Road bridge over the Bow, I had two options, either to continue west along the Bowness Road or to take the longer, hillier route on the north bank via Bowmont Park.   As the bike paths continued to look clear, I chose to head up to Bowmont Park, naively believing that my return journey from Bowness on the Bowness Road bike path would be straightforward.

Even with the stiff climbs in Bowmont Park, I had no trouble with the cycling surfaces that were mostly bushed down to bare asphalt.  I did, however, find my rear derailleur was freezing up and becoming reluctant to spring back out when I selected higher gears such that  I had to nudge it with my boot heel occasionally.

Apart from one or two dog walkers, there were very few trail users even through the normally crowded Baker Path just east of the Stoney Trail bridge. There were even fewer cyclists on the trails but I did encounter  one man who was clearly taking great delight in getting frost on his wild man beard.  On me, I could see frost building up on the back of my fibre-fleece mittens but my hands were warm enough, especially with the handlebar pogies providing additional wind protection.

Trails in Bowness Park were still snow-covered but packed firm by bikers and walkers so ran reasonably well.  My bike ran better in the shallow tracks of the Park’s runabout buggy as the  the boot-packed snow gave a choppy ride.  Coming out of the Park, and onto 48 Ave, I got a taste of the road conditions ahead.  Here, motor traffic had cleared tracks down to bare asphalt but the road margins were covered in 10cm of churned up dirty snow. When I turned right onto 85 Street where I expected to find a cleared bike lane, I discovered conditions were the same. Luckily, my lunch destination, Angel’s Drive In diner, was only a hundred metres away.

I refueled on a burger and fries, and slowly drank my coffee to warm up.  My toes were tingling slightly and I could feel where my face had been exposed to the minus twenty degree cold but the rest of me was warm enough.  When it came time to leave, I had been warming up for 30 minutes so found it very hard to leave the cozy environment and face the 40 degree drop in temperature outside.      

Climbing over a berm of snow to reach the road, I now realized the full extent of the problem ahead. If I cycled in the road I would be holding up traffic, or I could try the sidewalk but that wasn’t completely clear and at every driveway and side road was a mess of churned up snow.  I rode the sidewalk option initially but after the road curved to the east and turned into Bowness Road there was no effective sidewalk. The a parallel sideroad was competently un-ploughed so, with some trepidation, I chose to ride in the main road.  

Fortunately, traffic was very light and even the vehicles that were on the road were travelling cautiously.  As I set off in the righthand track, I noticed a panel van ahead of me wasn’t going much faster than I was.  Cars did overtake me by moving carefully onto the hardpacked snow nearer the centre of the road but no-one showed impatience towards me.

Eventually, I made my way over the Bow River and could turn off the Bowness Road into Shouldice Park.  From there, my ride back to Downtown was uneventful as the contractors had fully brushed the bike path through to Princes Island Park.  Tiny flakes of bitingly cold snow drifted into my eyes before I reached my destination but I couldn’t be bothered to pull down my ski googles. For most of my ride I hadn’t even used sunglasses either as they just misted up too quickly.  On a brighter, sunnier day, I would have struggled.  

From my two-hour ride on the bike paths immediately after a winter storm I was impressed with the crews who cleared the dedicated cycle paths.  In contrast, from what I saw, bike lanes that were adjacent to roads were not cleared and conditions made them unrideable.    According to the City of Calgary’s snow clearing policy,( Snow clearing on bikeways  ) downtown cycle tracks are Priority 1 (cleared within 24 hours) while on-street bicycle lanes are Priority 2 (cleared within 48 hours). This approach may explain the differences I experienced that day after the storm.