From: rex@cs.su.oz.au (Rex Monty di Bona)
Subject: Re: Whats riding in sydney like?
Reply-To: rex@cluster.cs.su.oz (Rex Monty di Bona)
Organization: Basser Dept of Computer Science, University of Sydney, Australia
Distribution: aus
Date: Thu, 1 Oct 1992 06:04:31 GMT

In article <1ads5aINN3lq@huon.itd.adelaide.edu.au> cagney@cs.adelaide.edu.au (Andrew Cagney - aka Noid) writes:
> 
> I and my SO are looking at moving to Sydney and we prefer to ride rather
>  then bus/drive.  To be more specific, one of us is going to need to comute
> to Sydney Uni while the other will be traveling to North Ryde.
> 
> Whats it like getting between these two by bike/bus/train?  Are there better
> suburbs in terms of access to bike routes or public transport.  What's
> it like travelling home late?  What about riding over any of the bridges?

Well, I have commuted from Sydney Uni to St Ives (somewhat near North
Ryde if you are jaundiced enough :-).  The short answer is that it is a
bitch getting across the harbour from the Uni.  There are two routes, the
first is across the Gladesville bridge, the second is across the harbour
bridge.

Across the Gladesville bridge then up Epping Rd to Lane Cove Road would
be the fastest way (continuing along Lane Cove rd gets you to St Ives).
But you have the excitment of doing the Gladesville Bridge the bike
lane of which is on the eastern side only, so if you want to stay on the
road you have to hug it with the traffic (the lanes are narrow as they
wanted to get more lanes on the bridge).  The bridge is steep, and tall
(once the worlds largest pre-stressed concrete bridge; may still be for
all I know) and on the other side you have to cross two lanes of traffic
to exit towards North Ryde.  Once off the bridge you have the lovely
climb into Lane Cove, the traditional "endless" hill (or it seems
endless when you're going up it with the cars whizzing past).

The run from Lane Cove to North Ryde along Epping Rd is, in comparison,
a dream run, with a three lane road (80K zone) and only relatively
gentle hills.

The other way is through the harbour bridge.  along the expressway and
onto Epping Rd (both routes converge at the junction of Lane Cove Rd and
Epping Rd).  The Bridge itself is a dream, with a dedicated bicycle lane
(although getting to and from this lane is hard).  And the expressway now
has a shared shoulder/bicycle lane (and is marked as such).  I haven't
used this lane, as my first experience with it was seeing it from a car
and wondering how one departed from the lane.  The end of the bicycle
lane occurs when traffic from the Pacific Hwy (old route 1) is merged
with the expressway and becomes Epping Rd.  The bicycle lane which was
hugging the expressway has a sign "bicycles must give way" and stops.
On the right is two lanes of 80Kph traffic from the bridge, and on the
left is one lane of 80Kph traffic from the Pacific Hwy.  It has to be the
worlds most brain dead ending to a bicycle lane (although I saw some
good ones in the states :-)

So, my prefered way of doing a commute to North Ryde would be
Gladesville bridge.  I, however, avoid this thesedays through a nifty
little move into balmain, which is a lot closer to the uni :-) 

Hope this helps. - Rex.
--
Rex di Bona (rex@cs.su.oz.au)		 Penguin Lust is NOT immoral