When I lived in Edmonton I really didn't like cycling there. It's too auto-centric, and even when you get out of the city there isn't much of a shoulder to ride on, but there are flat straight roads that someone could plow over you on. There are some very brave souls who do it, year-round, but I was not one of them. The multi-use trails are a nice option to the roads, but ultimately it was challenging to find anything that connected to anything. The trails in the river valley that are closer to downtown do get maintained but you still need to watch out for ice. You can get mtb ice tires with studs. But depending on where you are the roads can be a real mess. It can be hard to ride a bike when you are dealing with really deep snow/ice ruts on the road.