By Us President Donald

Copyright brisbanetimes

Walkers and e-scooter and bike riders will be formally separated on Brisbane’s Kurilpa Bridge after the speed limit on the bridge was raised last year.

Lines will be painted on the car-free Kurilpa Bridge, which connects South Bank to Tank Street in the CBD, to mark out separate lanes for riders and walkers.

Bike riders were fined for exceeding the previous 10km/h speed limit on the bridge until the state government said it would raise the limit, following questions from this masthead.

A CCTV study found that while the 10km/h limit was almost universally ignored, the vast majority of interactions between riders and walkers did not seem to be disconcerting or uncomfortable.

The government raised the speed limit on the bridge to 20km/h last April – the same as the Goodwill Bridge, which connects South Bank and the Queensland University of Technology.

It planned to paint the bridge with “soft segregation”, but that never went ahead.

In response to a letter from the Brisbane CBD Bicycle User Group, however, a spokesman from the Public Works Department said it was finally preparing to improve markings on the Kurilpa Bridge.

“[This] will include the update of speed signage, plus the addition of soft segregation markings between pedestrians and cyclists to further enhance safety for the users of the bridge,” he said.

How the Kurilpa Bridge will be segregated is not clear.

The Kangaroo Point Bridge encourages pedestrians to walk in both directions on one side of the bridge, under the shade cover, while cyclists use the opposite side.

Markings on the Goodwill Bridge encourage pedestrians to walk on the outside edges of the bridge, while cyclists and e-scooter riders use the centre.