TRIBUTE OR HAZARD
Should ghost bikes be regulated?
In life, Meg Dussault was wellloved and, in death, expressively remembered — with spokes and wheels, ribbon and a rosary, with a small tree, a planter, a photograph, an ice sculpture.
Seasonally, there have been roses and wreaths, crosses and pumpkins, signs and flags, all steps from where the cyclist, at 55, died in a collision with a cement truck on a July evening in 2013.
Emile Therien looks at the streetside memorial at Bank Street and Riverside Drive and, while sympathetic, wants it gone.
“Almost 20 months (after the accident), the memorial still stands. Why? What purpose does it serve?” he wrote to his city councillor, the police chief and the mayor.
Therien, a retired safety advocate who lives nearby, is proposing the city regulate the use of roadside memorials honouring those who have died in accidents.
He sees merit in the Winnipeg model, which restricts the size of memorials (one square metre) and the duration on the street (one year), while offering the installation of a small but permanent plaque on the site of fatalities. This memorial, in particular, he says, presents “a visual distraction” for drivers, as well as a potential impediment for pedestrians and cyclists.
“If somebody got hurt because of a distracted driving accident, who would wear that?”
Paddy Dussault is Meg’s husband. He has been down this road in 2014 with Capital Ward Coun. David Chernushenko, who has responded to public inquiries about the memorial, once called “a party” by a passing pedestrian.
Dussault, a retired financial executive and board member at Shepherds of Good Hope, explained the memorial was never a grand plan but grew out of the “magical” but anonymous donation of a so-called “ghost bike” within 24 hours of Meg’s death. “We were amazed to see it. We thought it was fitting.”
Meg, who worked at Cognos, is from a large family. Soon, Paddy and Meg’s siblings were adding flowers to the bike, which is spray-painted white. Then, as autumn came, pumpkins were tried. Remembrance Day was marked, as was Christmas, with sometimes festive colours. A winter theme was attempted and, because of her Irish ancestry, St. Patrick’s Day was marked with a flag. After a year, the bike was repainted, to keep it freshlooking.
“We’re trying to make it look nice,” says Dussault. “We’ve chosen items to try to reflect Meg’s life. We’re not trying to make it a macabre memorial.”
He says the feedback, with a couple of exceptions, has been overwhelmingly positive. Dussault says he’s been hugged by strangers at the site and thanked numerous times. It is not a visual “distraction” but a visual “reminder,” he argues, a point made by many passing motorists.
“You know, it always reminds me to slow down,” is a common remark, he says. Meg was cycling home from a tennis lesson when she was struck by a turning truck in daylight.
Dussault says the family hopes to maintain the memorial as long as it can, a task that includes shovelling the short sidewalk and tidying the corner. “The importance for me and the family was as a public memorial to Meg and the broader message about cyclist and vehicular safety,” said Dussault.
Chernushenko, meanwhile, explained that the city’s approach to ghost bikes or roadside memorials is essentially “hands-off” unless there is an obvious safety hazard with the placement. In a reply to Therien, he called it a “surprisingly touchy subject.”
“Your views and feelings are shared by many residents who either object to the principle of somebody being permitted to occupy sidewalk space without any sort of permission or to the lack of rules to govern such memorials,” the councillor wrote.
“Some express specific worries that the distraction or impediment to walking or to good sight lines may cause unintended dangers.
“On the other hand, many residents contact us to express different views, most notably their belief that there is an important role for this type of spontaneous memorial.”
Chernushenko said he would raise the issue of legal regulations with fellow councillors as part of a city review of current bylaws, likely this spring.
There are ghost bikes scattered across the city, in various conditions, and a handful of “ghost walkers” or cut-out silhouette figures that mark locations where pedestrians have been struck and killed in traffic.
Therien, meanwhile, thinks it’s also unfair that some victims get high-profile treatment in public spaces while others, due to circumstances, would get nothing. The use of religious symbols, like crosses, might irk some of the travelling public, he added.
“I think we need some rules and regulations.”