As a candidate for Toronto City Council, Ward 25 Scarborough-Rouge Park, I want to give my thoughts on today's decision.
I am glad this has happened, for mainly 3 reasons. No matter how you feel about bike lanes, especially downtown, I don't think it is Doug Ford's place to over-ride city decisions on internal infrastructure.
Reason number 1:
These lanes are hard infrastructure. They are not painted lines. They are concrete curbs with separation from traffic. Right now Port Union is undergoing construction and similar lanes are being installed. Sheppard between Bayview and Willowdale has had them installed. Queens Quay redesign is fantastic. There is a lot of cost that goes into the commissioning of these lanes. Many studies are done, it is debated for years and there is large costs before the infrastructure is installed. To remove them after installation basically throws all that money away. We are paying for the reports, we pay for the consultation, we pay for the installation...only to have another level of government come in and say "we will rip it out" after it is installed? It is a massive waste of taxpayer dollars.
Reason number 2:
Doug Ford is not Premier of Toronto. He needs to stop micro-managing the city. Toronto has it's own elected representative's who do work on behalf of the people of Toronto. He is also interfering in different municipalities across Ontario against the wishes of the local communities. I'm glad an Ontario Court has checked his power.
Reason number 3:
I prefer bike lanes to have a hard barrier between the traffic and the bike lane. Painted lines are...well temporary and provide no safety for the cyclist. Bike lanes with concrete curb separation have shown to reduce deaths and injuries to cyclists who share the space with other users.
I have a video response to watch below.
@brianmatthews.realtor As a candidate for councillor in Ward 25, Scarborough-Rouge Park, City of Toronto here is my take on the court decision to stop Doug Ford from ripping out bike lanes. #ward25byelection ♬ original sound - Brian Matthews 🇨🇦
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To add some facts to your notes above about the province interfering with the city. The city is a creature of the province and only exists at the province's pleasure. If the city had not started removing existing "live" lanes for traffic, there wouldn't be an issue. Response times for emergency vehicles are way up and the city is clogged with traffic since these lanes were installed. Better transit is coming, but slowly, and until such time as it exists, the city needs to embrace the fact that motorized vehicles are here to stay.
Since I'm on a rant, motorized vehicles are the majority of bike lane users. Why is this clear violation of the law not enforced?
Hi Scott, Yes, cities are a creature of the province. That creature is responsible for road design. If Doug Ford wins on appeal then all municipalities would likely send all road designs to the province before spending money to change them. Also, response times for EMS have increased due to other factors, like paramedics staying in the hospital for 12 hours before the patient is admitted. My problem is ripping out new (ish) infrastructure. It's a waste of money. So we've paid to install them, the province may fight Toronto on how much the cost of removal will be, traffic will be stuck for years while it's being ripped out and at the end of it all, cars will be parking on the curb lane again, which isn't solving the traffic problem. So if this is the way the province wants to operate, they should just upload the roads to their jurisdiction. And stop wasting taxpayers money.