The 153 ave MUP is pretty good, except a few parts

Hello r/edmonton - I've seen a few comment recently about how "the new 95 ave MUP is nice" - I was going to go ride it but it looks like it's still under contruction so I figured I'd review a different piece of cycling infrastructure, the 153 ave MUP, which has recently been improved by the Active Transportation Network expansion

Virtual Tour - Starting from the farthest west (142st) going east to the end (Meridian St.)

Design and perceived safety - 7/10

There are definitely parts of this that are fairly well thought out and designed, and there are some parts that I think someone just decided it was a MUP and marked at as such on the map so that it wouldn't look like there was a gap.

The good
Everything from 97st to Manning. Not only is this a nice wide MUP, with good quality pavement, and long sight-lines to see any pedestrians/traffic/other cyclists, but due to the design of the road/neighborhoods it runs along, it also has very minimal road traffic interactions. In this 5.8 KM section, there are only 4 lighted intersections (not incl 97 and manning itself) and 3 stop-sign intersections. Additionally one of those 4 lighted intersections is a 'smart light' that is rarely red in my experience.† The only possibly perceived safety issue in this section is with the stop-sign controlled intersections - more on those later.
†My Strava personal heat map of this section is white hot - I very regularly take this exact route to Fraser/river valley/NE park.

The Middling
From 142st to 127 - I almost listed this section in the bad, but really it's just the very dumb design of 134St intersection that's bad on it, while the rest is a well paved MUP, though does have a lot of stop sign and parking lot intersections.

From Manning to Fraser Way - In this 2.3 KM section, there is not only 3 lights (not incl manning/fraser itself) - there are also 3 other stop-sign controlled intersections. The design of the 30st crossing here seems slightly more dangerous than a normal stop sign crossing. Some of this is also a wide-sidewalk, though this one is at least in better condition than:

The Bad
From 127 St to Castle Downs Rd. - You'll notice in the video I had to cross over to the north side of 153 here. That itself is bad, having to flop/flop to different sides is not only slow and annoying, it's confusing to users - a common cyclist that didn't look this road up beforehand on the bike map is going to continue on the southern side here on the regular sidewalk. Once you do cross over here, you're put on one of those terrible wide-sidewalk MUPs. You can tell in the video/audio these things are not at all comfortable to ride on - they're not as wide as a real MUP, they always seem to have long cracks, and the sidewalk-cracks themselves are annoying at least on a road bike. The actual path here just between these 2 major roads also has 3 stop-signed crossings that will almost certainly soon be 4 once the school is completed?

From Castle Downs Rd to Veterans Way - It may not be obvious from the wide-angle video, but this is a regular-ass not-wide sidewalk, that I assure you is marked as a MUP on The CoE Map - if you think I don't like riding on wide-sidewalk MUPs, I can assure you I do not like riding on a sidewalk that much more - there is no room for maneuvering, and it is not safe for any pedestrians that might happen to be using it.

The intersection of Victoria trail and 153 - you may have noticed in the video a few parts where they seem to be re-doing the pedestrian islands such as 82nd/66th (TBH I'm not actually sure why some of those were re-done as they seemed to be in OK condition) but this intersection is bad enough that I specifically took this picture. Those road-sidewalk ramps inexplicably face more north than east-west which is where the crosswalk itself goes, you have to make a really dumb wide turn which gets you quite close to traffic that you can see in the video, so as to not hit the curb-edge of the thing.

possible "easy" fixes:
Add crosswalk/"elephant's feet" markings to the stop-sign intersections. You may have noticed multiple times when I'm crossing stop-sign only intersections the cars come towards the intersection at high speeds and stop just before the turn point, rather than the Traffic Safety Act required 3 meters behind the intersection. Markings would give a clear and obvious stop point.

Go around 153 ave slightly? - I assume this one isn't "easy" as it might appear on paper, but currently there is no MUP at all from 127 to 121 even though there's a powerline greenbelt. To make this even more "complicated" as far as I could tell when I cycled by it today, they just re-paved that part of 153 on the south with what looked like a regular-width sidewalk (though I was on the other side, maybe it is MUP width?)

Network/Connectivity - 7/10

This category may be subjective, because of course how well-connected a route is depends on exactly where you're going, and where from. As this road technically has a MUP from its literal end to end, east to west across the entire city, there's a good chance that if it's between where you are and where you're going, it's one good way to get there.

Cycling network connections
From the very start in the west you're connected to 142 St MUP - this itself is a good way to get to 137 Ave (and the theater there), or to St Albert. (127st/castle downs MUP also go pretty nicely to 137 if they're closer to where you're going)

97st now has an improved part of the MUP going northward in to the Namao shopping center. This one also connects to the powerline MUP been 163 ave and 164 ave if you want a more chill ride from here to 50st.

66st has also just been improved - and there's also a currently-under-construction brand new Manning MUP, though until that's completed the 50st MUP can mostly get to the same locations (even if part of it is a terrible wide-sidewalk MUP).

While not technically directly connected, going down the small-residential road of Fraser Way is a good way to connect to the river valley paths that can then lead you to either the NE edmonton park (and across the new bridge) or to Hermitage if you go the other way.

Residential
Despite what I said above about 97-manning having little intersections, this MUP still comes out positive here because there are plenty of cycle/pedestrian connections mid-block, and a few crosswalks to T intersections from the northern side of 153 for further residential connections. Suffice it to say if you live in any of the neighborhoods directly beside 153 ave you will have an easy time getting to it without having to go a roundabout way.

Commercial
Being 15km long, the 'convenience' of the commercial connections will vary greatly depending on where you're starting here, however they're fairly well spaced. There are shopping areas at 127st, Castle Downs Road, 97st, and of course manning that have grocery and restaurant/fast food options. The Manning one specifically has good quality bike racks near every store

N.B.

I went west-to-east on this video, but due to the nature of the MUP east-to-west is effectively identical, though it is slightly more downhill if you go eastward

WTF is with 96st? A tiny cul-de-sac that connects directly to 153... must be weird to have an alleyway that goes to a completely different road too.

As mentioned above, you may have noticed in the video the part between Griesbach Rd and 82nd is brand new pavement (and slightly unfinished at 88a St) - this seems to have been a great improvement, and without it the Connectivity score would most certainly have lost a couple points.

TL;DR

Design/Safety - 7/10
Network/Connectivity - 7/10

Overall this is a pretty good east-west corridor, as long as you need to do that this far north in the city. It has a few sections that are good for long distances with minimal cars/traffic, but has a few sections/items that seem like they could use some work.