CAG Position Statement - Multi-Use Pathways


Position Statement on Multi-Use Pathways

Revised: April 5, 2024

About the Consumer Access Group (CAG)

The Consumer Access Group (CAG) is a coalition of blindness related not for profit organizations. Each partner contributes their expertise to developing position statements on blindness related concerns. These statements enable organizations and individuals to advocate with a common voice on blindness-related issues, increasing the capacity of each to more effectively promote social inclusion for Canadians who are blind, deafblind and partially sighted.

Issue

Multi-use pathways (MUP), also known as multi-use trails, shared-use paths or mixed-use paths, are pathways that support multiple modes of recreation and transportation. MUP typically have a hard surface and are separated from traffic, and may include features such as benches, rest stops, and bike racks. Because more and more people are engaging in an active lifestyle, and the amount of land to enable these activities is limited, the current trend is to physically mix users and vehicles of vastly different speeds and weights, on a single surface. It is the diversity of MUP users and vehicles which potentially creates a safety and access concern for pedestrians who are blind, deafblind or partially sighted (hereafter referred to as blind).

Background

MUP allow a wide range of transportation methods in urban areas, providing numerous benefits to users, including the social, psychological, and physical benefits of active transportation, but only when they are safe and accessible for all users. MUP support active transportation users of many kinds, including pedestrians, runners, wheelchair users, cyclists, and people using devices such as scooters, inline skates, and skateboards. It is the diversity of MUP users and vehicles; the speed that they can achieve; their maneuverability and their size and weight, that can create a potential danger, particularly to pedestrians who are blind.

In the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, ratified by Canada in March 2010, Article 9 states, in part, that "States Parties shall take appropriate measures to ensure persons with disabilities access, on an equal basis with others, to the physical environment, to transportation, to information and communications, including information and communications technologies and systems, and to other facilities and services open or provided to the public, both in urban and rural areas."

Blind pedestrians do not have equitable access to MUP unless they feature appropriate accessibility infrastructure and guidelines that ensure safe access. Blind pedestrians need a way to know that they are walking on the pedestrian designated side of the MUP, can anticipate intersections and can find features along the pathway.

The organizations listed below, endorse the following design recommendations be adopted when planning the installation of multi-use pathways. Also see Clearing Our Path.

Recommendations

1. Municipalities must create an effective public education strategy, with the goal of ensuring the safety of all multi-use pathway users. 

2. Multi-use pathways should have a separate pedestrian-only lane.

3. A strip of cane-detectable material in a contrasting colour and texture to the pathway surface should separate to the pedestrian-only lane from other lanes and buffer zones. Separation strips should ideally be attention TWSIs but this may not be feasible over extended distances.

4. Guidance TWSIs should be installed across the pedestrian-only lane to indicate the location of features such as signage and benches.

5. All pathway markings should be large, clearly legible and distinctly contrasting in colour to the pathway’s surface. Paint used for marking should be slip resistant.

6. Information provided on the pathway, through surface markings, should also be provided in the form of large print, high contrast signage that includes Braille and tactile markings.

7. Attention TWSIs, spanning the width of the pedestrian-only path, should be used to warn of intersecting paths and roadways (crossrides). Wherever possible, crossrides should be signalized with an APS system.


Review Date: April 2026

Endorsed by the following CAG organizations:

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