A $200,000 safety system on the Fraser River's cyclist 'death bridge' is repeatedly failing

The Agassiz-Rosedale Bridge’s new $200,000 cyclist safety system isn’t working.

But just how frequently the system is failing is still shocking.

The system was installed last year and is supposed to automatically notify drivers when a cyclist is on the bridge, which lacks bike lanes, shoulders, or even sidewalks. But in early March, The Current reported that local cyclists described the system as ‘useless’ and prone to failure.

This week, this reporter saw just how frequently—and why—the system is failing. And feedback from dozens of Current readers suggest the system wasn’t just having a particularly bad day.

Some cyclists call the Agassiz-Rosedale Bridge the ‘death bridge.’ The reason it can be dangerous isn’t hard to figure out: It’s extremely long and narrow with no sidewalks or shoulders. When traffic is heavy in the opposite direction, there is little, if any, room for a vehicle to pass a cyclist.

Locals have regularly complained about the lack of sidewalks to BC’s Transportation Ministry. Petitions have been organized, and the District of Kent has written to the ministry to call for a wider bridge deck. But with such a fix likely costing tens of millions of dollars, the ministry quietly opted to try a technological fix. (The ministry didn’t publicly announce the installation of the system; it only explained what it was doing after the local paper noticed construction and inquired about the work.)

Last year, the province installed a system that is supposed to use sensors to detect when a cyclist is on the bridge. Flashing lights at each end of the bridge are then supposed to alert traffic traveling in the same direction. But most of the time the lights are flashing, no bike is in sight.

In the course of five minutes Wednesday, this reporter witnessed the system provide false alerts on two separate occasions. In both cases, lights began to flash despite there being no cyclist on the bridge.

And it was far from an isolated occurrence.

Cyclist Dave Pinton told The Current in February that he has witnessed cyclists crossing with no lights behind them alerting drivers. And he’s also seen the lights flashing with no cyclists on the bridge. Both scenarios are dangerous, he noted: the first may mean cyclists have a false sense of security about the awareness of drivers behind them; the latter false-positive notification failure conditions regular bridge users not to trust the system.

The Current surveyed its newsletter readers Thursday. More than 60 readers say they have witnessed the lights flashing but no cyclists present. More than half of those who said they rarely cross the bridge have still seen the lights flashing with no cyclists present.

One regular commuter over the bridge wrote that “95% of the time that the lights are flashing there is not a cyclist.”

The Current’s observations on Wednesday suggest why the system is triggered so easily.

On Wednesday, this reporter saw the lights flashing as he crossed the bridge driving south. No cyclist was present on the bridge or on the road beyond it. After stopping to take a quick photograph for a potential follow-up story, the reporter returned to his car. The northbound lights were not flashing.

Then: the sound of sirens approached. As an ambulance crossed the bridge, traffic in both directions slowed and pulled to the side of the road. And quickly, the northbound notification lights began flashing.

This suggests that the system seeks to detect cyclists by relying on either the speed of objects traveling on the roadway, the location of objects on the shoulder before the bridge, or a combination of both.

The frequency of the false notifications suggests that the system is most often triggered by vehicles, rather than cyclists.

There has been one other change to the road patterns in the area: the speed limit over the bridge has recently been lowered from 80 km/h to 70 km/h.

The Current asked the Ministry of Transportation about how the light system is triggered; if it’s aware of the failures and, if so, what it plans to do about them; if the speed limit decrease was linked to the notification system issues; and why the province did not install a manual system whereby a cyclist would press a button to trigger the lights—a system in place in the Fraser Canyon.

A provincial spokesperson said responses could not be provided by The Current’s deadline but would come next week. Watch The Current’s daily newsletter for that response. (Subscribe for free below.)