Ride with Candidates: Joe Gowing, Regional Councillor – Kitchener

For the 2026 municipal elections, CycleWR volunteers have been taking municipal electoral candidates on bike rides to show off the best and worst of the cycling infrastructure in their ward/city/region.

Below is a summary written by CycleWR volunteer Austin Dobrik, on their ride with municipal candidate for Kitchener Regional Councillor, Jow Gowing.

Disclaimer: CycleWR is a non-partisan organization that does not endorse a party or candidate. Summaries are written by volunteers or candidates and may not reflect the mandate or views of CycleWR. For more information, contact us at hello@cyclewr.ca.

Last Tuesday, I spent a couple of hours biking around Kitchener with Joe, a sitting regional councilor and candidate, talking about cycling infrastructure and how we make it better.

I thought it was a useful way to have the conversation. Rather than sitting around talking about bike lanes in the abstract, we could actually ride through the places we’re talking about and experience them together.

We started around Henry Sturm Creek and rode down some of Route 1. It’s a good example of what separated cycling infrastructure can feel like when it’s done well. We talked about some of the interchanges, different conflict points, where cyclists should or shouldn’t dismount, and some of the ambiguity around places where we have pedestrian paths and places where we don’t.

From there, we went up Belmont, and the difference was pretty striking. Belmont has green paint and some separation, but it doesn’t feel anything like the experience on Route 1. Cars are passing relatively close, you can’t really comfortably ride two abreast, and getting across to Victoria means moving ahead and crossing a lane of traffic.

The physical quality of the bike lane wasn’t particularly good either. There were cones and other things in the cycling space, and the road surface was noticeably worse in the bike lane than in the adjacent driving lanes. None of these things individually makes a route impossible to use, but together they make it a much less comfortable experience.

We then popped over to the Iron Horse Trail, which was another useful contrast. It’s a great cycling experience, and it’s a good reminder of how valuable these trails are and why we should protect them.

But trails can’t take you everywhere.

Even if we try to funnel as many trips as possible onto high-quality trails, people still need reasonable ways to get to those trails from different directions. A network isn’t just the nice sections in isolation. The connections matter just as much.

We saw that again on Glasgow. There is technically cycling infrastructure there, but the actual experience isn’t great. Cars pass relatively close, and in the winter the usable space gets even narrower when snow accumulates. For an adult who is comfortable riding in traffic, that’s one thing. For a kid riding a bike to school on that street, it’s a very different proposition.

That’s one of the things I kept stressing while riding with Joe: it’s not enough to ask whether someone can ride somewhere. We should also ask who actually feels comfortable doing it.

We also rode down Westmount. Joe had previously seen some of the discussion around adding cycling infrastructure there and some of the support and opposition to it, so it was useful to actually ride the section without a bike lane and experience it firsthand.

From there we went to Victoria and Westmount, where the current infrastructure feels like a bit of a patchwork. There appears to be future work planned in the area, but the eventual configuration and timing aren’t particularly clear. At the moment, crossing Victoria onto Westmount takes you into a section that looks like it ought to be a bike facility, but isn’t actually one as there are utility poles in the way , with signage that isn’t especially intuitive.

That brought us to a broader issue we discussed: how do we make sure these little gaps actually get closed?

Joe talked about the need for stronger collaboration between the City and the Region. It seems fairly easy for projects to make sense individually but fail to connect when they’re implemented by different governments, on different timelines, or through different projects. You end up with a bike lane that stops just where you need the next one to begin, or infrastructure that changes significantly at a jurisdictional boundary.

His idea of having people specifically responsible for making sure that this coordination happens struck me as useful and he is already implementing it. There is a lot of cycling infrastructure that has already been built. Making the existing network substantially more useful doesn’t always require a giant new project; sometimes it’s about fixing the awkward transition, closing the missing 200 metres, improving a crossing, or making the signage actually make sense.

That idea also came through in some of the other things Joe sent me after our ride.

He supports looking at a standalone cycling budget that could be used to address critical gaps without always waiting for a complete road reconstruction. He suggested having staff develop a ranked list based on things like safety, network connections, expected use and cost. Importantly, that assessment should consider people who would cycle if the route felt safe, not just people who already cycle.

We also talked about some specific corridors. On Fairway, for example, he said he would support looking at a physically separated route, including the difficult details like utility relocation and safe crossings at intersections and business entrances. On Victoria, he supports looking at the connections between Lancaster, Victoria and Weber, including the gap around Wellington, with physical separation from traffic where practical. And on Weber, he supports assessing where separated infrastructure can fit, while also looking at parallel routes where a continuous facility isn’t practical.

We also talked about implementation. One of the frustrating things with infrastructure planning is that a plan can exist for years without the physical infrastructure appearing. Joe said he wants clearer reporting about what is funded, what is scheduled, what has slipped and why. If a major project can’t happen immediately, he also thinks it’s worth asking whether an interim improvement can be made sooner rather than simply leaving the problem untouched.

We talked about e-bikes as well. His position is that bicycle-style e-bikes meeting the provincial requirements should be able to use the routes available to regular bicycles, including both pedal-assist and throttle-equipped bikes within the proposed weight and speed limits. At the same time, he emphasized that the maximum assisted speed of an e-bike shouldn’t be treated as an appropriate speed around pedestrians, particularly on shared trails. Consistent rules and signage across the area municipalities would also be useful.

And then there’s bike share. Joe said he’s open to exploring a municipal bike-share system, but wants to compare that with alternatives such as stronger service and affordability requirements for a contracted operator. With the transition to Lime, he wants to look at pricing, availability and coverage across the three cities. He also raised the possibility of conventional bikes and e-bikes, affordable memberships, discounts for lower-income residents and employer sponsorships.

I appreciated that he wasn’t presenting any of these things as a magic solution. The basic question he raised was whether the costs, maintenance requirements, expected use and public contribution actually justify the investment.

That attitude of listening and investigating was probably the part of the conversation I appreciated most.

Joe took a couple of hours out of a Tuesday evening, in the middle of a campaign, to actually ride around with me and see these places. He was willing to stop at awkward intersections, look at confusing transitions and talk through why one route feels dramatically better than another.

He also gave an example from Ottawa Street where residents had raised concerns about accessibility infrastructure and metal grates following reconstruction. Rather than treating that as somebody else’s problem, he went out to look at it and worked to get the issue fixed.

Those kinds of issues are easy to overlook. A grate in the wrong place, a missing connection, a confusing sign, a bike lane that disappears for 200 metres, or a crossing that feels uncomfortable might not make it into a big infrastructure announcement. But for someone who actually uses the network, those details can determine whether the whole trip works.

There are obviously big questions about transportation infrastructure and what we want Kitchener and the Region to look like. But there are also a lot of relatively small decisions that add up to the experience people have every day.

I appreciated that Joe was willing to get on a bike and look at those details firsthand, listen to someone who uses the infrastructure regularly, and think both about the tactical fixes and the larger question of how the City and Region can work together to build a network that actually connects. Joe was willing to listen and take action to support a better transportation network in our city, and I think he would continue to do a good job as councilor.