My reading of BC’s new COVID guidelines is that unless you live on the Shore you can’t ride on the Shore. The Mayor of the DNV is staying stay out of their Parks unless you're from North Van. Based upon what I’ve seen over the last year, I would guess about 20% of people will comply with that. Is anyone, who doesn't live on the Shore, planning on stopping riding?
BC COVID Restrictions
Can you provide a link to the Mayor of NV's statement?
According to this, crossing a bridge to ride the Shore is barely against the rules. https://www2.gov.bc.ca/gov/content/covid-19/info/restrictions#pho-order
Last edited by: craw on April 14, 2021, 9:57 a.m., edited 2 times in total.
Here you go. He talks about it in the third paragraph.
toll the bridges and it'll keep people away and support the infastructure. No brainer.
Fine. Gravel bikes on this side of the bridge only.
That's right. Stay out.
I've been grumbling about this approach all ski season. Essentially the Covid response is to set up a big Prisoner's Dilemma experiment.
Don't ski whistler because it's not a "local" mountain. But people from Vancouver can consider the North Shore mountains 'local' (huh?). Meanwhile, only the people that break the "rules" get the benefit of skiing a reduced capacity Whistler. So that leads people to the logical conclusion that breaking the "rules" is the logical approach.
We have community spread, so we need to stop community movement. Reality is, people aren't going to listen and are gonna go get their riding in. Also, outside exercise is (at least with Vanilla covid, maybe less so with variants) low risk from all the reading I've done. Which makes a bunch of this finger wagging frustrating.
Last edited by: Couch_Surfer on April 14, 2021, 11:55 a.m., edited 2 times in total.
Posted by: Couch_Surfer
I've been grumbling about this approach all ski season. Essentially the Covid response is to set up a big Prisoner's Dilemma experiment.
Don't ski whistler because it's not a "local" mountain. But people from Vancouver can consider the North Shore mountains 'local' (huh?). Meanwhile, only the people that break the "rules" get the benefit of skiing a reduced capacity Whistler. So that leads people to the logical conclusion that breaking the "rules" is the logical approach.
We have community spread, so we need to stop community movement. Reality is, people aren't going to listen and are gonna go get their riding in. Also, outside exercise is (at least with Vanilla covid, not variants) low risk from all the reading I've done. Which makes a bunch of this finger wagging frustrating.
This is pretty much my take. Spent much of the winter “finger-wagging” at people heading to Whistler, and much of last week doing the same to people from the Lower Mainland who were riding in Squamish. Now, I’m pretty sure that if I jumped in my car, drove to Squamish, rode by myself and headed straight home after, there isn’t much risk to anyone except those easily offended by my poor riding skills, but if I did that, I wouldn’t get to wag my finger.
Watching, on my daughter’s Snapchat, how many of her friends were spending every weekend in Whistler was an eye opener and makes it tough to tell her that she can’t do the same.
So, drive 16km to ride the Shore or drive 13km to run my dog at the Endowment Lands? Probably more crowded at the latter. I think this might be where I start doing what most people seem to have been doing: making up my own rules.
What's more dangerous in terms of catching/spreading Covid: my 3X/week trip to the grocery store, or my crossing the bridge on my road bike for some Stanley Park laps?
The biggest concern I'd think for outdoor exercise is the congestion at the parking areas, and the ignoring the "rules" for post-riding beer/gathering. But then again, patios are open and ok. It's just silly.
Last edited by: Couch_Surfer on April 14, 2021, 11:08 a.m., edited 3 times in total.
If you're not riding in groups, not hanging around congestion points throughout your ride and not stopping for drinks/food on the way home then I think the risk to everyone involved is minimal. But no one plans to crash or have a collision on the road and end up in a Fraser Valley hospital, which would be particularly bad.
I think that no-one plans to crash, for sure, but echoing words from Steve Vanderhoek "If you choose to pick up the bike you are accepting there is no way to mitigate all the risks" and now that ICUs are about to go into proper, scary triage it's worth thinking about the impact it would have.
The messaging has been particularly awful imho as this pandemic has gone on; with vague requests and zero real enforcement - but the start of last summer for crowds of riders, post and pre ride gatherings and shuttling was a shit show on the the north shore. And this was before it really took off.Many, many residents got really pissed off having to navigate around groups of riders on sidewalks etc etc etc and spoke of this as a primary concern to the DNV. Look how quarry rock got shut and look how quickly parking restrictions (and specific no shuttling signs) got thrown down in a reaction to resident complaints.
Lynn Valley was the first epicentre of covid for BC with 7 lost almost straight away and people aren't going to forget how this unfolded last year and the casual disregard from many visible trail users that was on display - the trouble is, a car loaded with bikes is a really easy target to aim at when talking to the DNV compared to a car full of hikers/dogwalkers/whatever which makes the whole thing come down on the riding community really hard. So considering how residents remember this last year you gives a little context to this request, right or wrong.
I watched this unfolding from my window daily - it really pissed me off and I advocate for riding on the North Shore as much as anyone else here. I was genuinely worried that we were going to see all trails shut, maybe for good. So many people in the area just could not believe the nose thumbing they had to deal with on top of everything else that was happening.
And I'm preaching to the choir here. Does it help to stop all non-local travel for recreation? I have no real data to look at apart from maybe PEI and the other atlantic provinces, but it seems like a reasonable idea when many travel to a single place to enjoy a public resource with limited methods for access.
What's the answer? No idea with the current 'hope that people do the right thing' methodology. My family are spread across three continents and have been through various degrees of lockdown from full police state to curfews and I can see which has worked and which hasn't in that exact context. But try to please understand where people are coming from when making decisions that are for a temporary time but may have long lasting impacts - be sneaky, be quiet, don't be obvious and all those other things.
where does the insanity end? does the district of north van tell people that live within the city of north van limits that they can't go to the trail head either?
Covid's been a bitch for everyone, but looking back on last year at this time, the dumbest thing going was closing trailheads and parking when the only safe activity is outdoor rec.
and yes, some trailhead and parking areas get busy, but the risk is low and as long as you're not being a covidiot, overall it's a safe activity and good for everyone's mental health. once you are on your bike and in the trails there really isn't an issue with over crowding.
I live close to cypress, so most of the time I choose to ride there to stay close to home plus I like riding from home and not driving. But cypress isn't a really friendly hill for kids, so I also have to travel short distances to get them their healthy dose of rides.
While I don't plan to travel far to ride, I live 30 min from squamish. I wasn't planning to ride there over the easter weekend anyways, but I took SORCA's easter stay away msg as a little hypocritical when all the squamish insta-stars have been posting footage of their north shore rides all winter.
Posted by: rip78
where does the insanity end? does the district of north van tell people that live within the city of north van limits that they can't go to the trail head either?
Covid's been a bitch for everyone, but looking back on last year at this time, the dumbest thing going was closing trailheads and parking when the only safe activity is outdoor rec.
and yes, some trailhead and parking areas get busy, but the risk is low and as long as you're not being a covidiot, overall it's a safe activity and good for everyone's mental health. once you are on your bike and in the trails there really isn't an issue with over crowding.
I live close to cypress, so most of the time I choose to ride there to stay close to home plus I like riding from home and not driving. But cypress isn't a really friendly hill for kids, so I also have to travel short distances to get them their healthy dose of rides.
While I don't plan to travel far to ride, I live 30 min from squamish. I wasn't planning to ride there over the easter weekend anyways, but I took SORCA's easter stay away msg as a little hypocritical when all the squamish insta-stars have been posting footage of their north shore rides all winter.
Exactly.
We're over a year into the pandemic, it's widely known and accepted that outdoor transmission is negligible and we're still talking about whether mountain bike trails should be closed to stop the spread of covid? Give me a break...
Different variant. Different level of transmission.
https://globalnews.ca/news/7740392/covid-variants-transmissible-outdoor-gathering-rules/
Hinshaw said Alberta officials have seen cases where individuals are in close proximity to one another for long periods of time, such as going on a long walk together and are not distanced or masked.
"And over the course for that long period of time that they are close together talking, there has been some transmission reported,” she said. “If people are gathering outside for social gatherings, they should be very mindful of being distanced or masked. If you wanted to be completely safe you can do both.”
I think the challenge is people using "i'm outdoors" as a catch-all to expand social circles to infinity and ignore distancing suggestions. If you're just going for a solo ride or with your kids, whatever BH.
Last edited by: Couch_Surfer on April 14, 2021, 1:55 p.m., edited 3 times in total.
Forum jump:
