Where the sidewalk ends: Filling in the cracks on Edmonton's missing sidewalks
On a stretch of Roper Road near 50th Street in south Edmonton, pedestrians will find a spot where the sidewalk comes to an abrupt end.
The concrete gives way to a well-worn foot trail through the mud and snow.
It's one hundreds of missing sidewalks across the city.
"This one just boggles my mind," said Sarah Hoyles, executive director of Paths for People, a group advocating for better infrastructure for pedestrians and cyclists and people in wheelchairs.
"It just stops in the middle of the block," Hoyles said in an interview Tuesday with CBC Radio's Edmonton AM.
"You can see in the snow and the mud there is a trail. People are voting with their feet.
"It's like that book, Where the Sidewalk Ends."
91 kilometres missing
But unlike the famed children's poetry collection, where the end of a sidewalk leads to a magical place of soft grass and "peppermint wind," missing sidewalks are a source of frustration for pedestrians, Hoyles said.
An inventory maintained by city administration has identified more than 91 kilometres of missing sidewalks across Edmonton.
A report detailing the cost of building the absent infrastructure will be presented to the city's urban planning committee on Tuesday.
Construction of missing sidewalks is currently prioritized based on "safety, accessibility, connectivity to support land uses and expected level of use," the administration said in its report.
The city has currently allocated $2 million over the next four years toward construction.
Coun. Aaron Paquette said that's not nearly enough. He said he has been bothered by the haphazard sidewalks for years, and often sees young families and people with mobility issues struggling to get around.
"It's nowhere near the amount we actually need," Paquette said. "If we are spending billions of dollars on the LRT — which we are — surely we can earmark a little bit more to actually create the sidewalks that people need to get from point A to point B.
"It would be a lot less money than anything else, and it would help people out immediately."
'Low cost high impact changes'
Hoyles said her organization has been collecting information from local residents to identify gaps in infrastructure, including missing sidewalks and crosswalks, and compiled the data on a map.
The "missing links" initiative has been bombarded with submissions since it launched in late January, she said.
"We've had more than 150 missing links identified. We're casting the net a little wider than sidewalks but they are captured on there and it's been surprising how many there are."
Hoyles will present the map to council on Tuesday and urge the city to invest more in pedestrian-friendly infrastructure.
"These are low cost-high impact changes," she said.
"Sidewalks are connectors, they connect us to our homes, they connect us to our neighbours, to our greater communities, businesses and the city as a whole. And without those connectors, we're cut off."
