Coming soon - Bike Sense 8th Edition
The BC Cycling Coalition is preparing to update Bike Sense, “The British Columbia Bicycle Operator’s Manual”, with plans to publish the 8th edition in the fall of 2026.
Providing information about bike handling, traffic skills, and the rules of the road in BC, including condensed and paraphrased language from the BC Motor Vehicle Act, Bike Sense has been in continuous publication and free to all British Columbians since it was first published in 2000; to date 130,000 copies of Bike Sense have been printed and distributed across the province.
The 7th edition of Bike Sense was published in June 2021. In addition to 20,000 printed copies distributed to sponsor locations, advocacy groups, cycling instructors, and ICBC claims centres, Bike Sense is provided to retail bike shops across the province free of charge.
The BCCC also maintains Bike Sense on its website, and is seeking additional funding for the 8th edition to improve its online presence and development of videos, animations, and memes to support its reach and influence.
“Bike Sense is important because it provides safety advice not included in the law, and helpful information to all road users about why we cycle, who's cycling, and how bicycles are used, none of which can be easily found elsewhere,” said Colin Stein, Executive Director of the BCCC.
“Since Bike Sense was last updated, there have been some significant changes to the Motor Vehicle Act, as well as behaviours, trends, and public awareness of active transportation, mobility devices, and the rules of the road.”
Stein emphasized plans to bring Bike Sense to bike shops, advocates, and other transportation groups in low income and rural areas across BC, as well as work to integrate Indigenous interests and participation in the publication.
“Bike Sense is about helping everyone get around safely and equitably in BC, and to better understand barriers and other issues related to changing our approach to transportation safety and education. That involves different ways of defining what is active transportation.
The objective of Bike Sense 8th edition is to provide information on cycling and active transportation education to 200,000 British Columbians, beginning in October 2026 with the launch of the publication at the 4th Active Transportation Summit in Victoria.
For more information about plans for Bike Sense 8th edition, contact the BCCC.
Summary of Changes - Bike Sense 8th Edition
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Bike Sense 8th edition will be substantially reorganized, resulting in a reduction of chapter count from 16 to 7, and the addition of subheadings to allow easier identification of topics when viewing Bike Sense on-line. Changes to editorial structure should make it easier for readers to find material of interest.
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Earlier editions of Bike Sense used John Forester’s book Effective Cycling as the basis for the safety sections; many elements of his book are not supported by evidence from peer-reviewed research. Safety-related content about road positioning will be included in the section entitled Biking Skills & Practices, when supported by evidence.
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A reference list of research citations will be included at the end of Bike Sense — while not exhaustive, references will highlight BC evidence, classic studies, and/or review articles.
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Information about new laws and regulations will be added (e.g., safe passing, e-bikes). Where apropriate, laws will be included within the relevant sections of the text. Legal text will be paraphrased where deemed equivalent and reasonable. Names for specific laws and regulations will be included in full, as well as links to the full legal texts. Laws not covered in earlier sections of Bike Sense will be included in the section Biking & the Law.
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The section on Biking Safety will be substantially expanded to include missing elements and details consistently shown in research to reduce injuries and deaths to people riding bikes. To the extent possible, the ordering of the subsections will follow the order of impact on safety.
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Repetition will be removed throughout to make the document shorter, despite the addition of new material. A few details about bike repair and technical bike components will be removed.
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Language will be altered to make the tone less prescriptive, and more choice-based for the reader (except where there is a law).