Has the city lost it's mind...

[nobbie48]

There are two types of cyclists, whether they are motor or pedal.

Type "A" uses their cycle for transportation. Type "B" uses it for recreation.

Our roads were built for transportation, not recreation. Hogging lanes for recreational purposes while impeding vehicles trying to deliver goods or workers is counter productive.

There is validity for transportation bicycle lanes but IMO better car drivers would produce better results.

The road to better drivers is long.

If it's OK to take over a road for recreational riding what's wrong with taking over a road for a dance or shinny hockey?

How about a polka party at Yonge and Bloor or the High Park Stanley Shinny Cup.

 

[nobbie48]

The problem with the current system is that it's piece meal.

The infrastructure is piece meal, the data is piece meal... there's no big picture. By building more they're trying to complete the missing puzzle pieces.
Up to last year my kid was going to a school 2km from our place. There are bike lanes from our place to the school. It was still to sketchy for her to take it by herself at 10 y old, not because she's not responsible enough, but because of the drivers. My "fears" were confirmed when a parent who had just dropped off their kid got hit by a car 1 street over from the schools entrance. Car didnt look both ways and went too far forward hitting the lady on her bike. I couldn't constantly subject kiddo to that risk that she probably wouldn't see coming.

This type of situation is happening all over the place, we design something to say "oh we put it in place" but it's whether not connected to another part of a "system" or it's not safe enough for a person who's got a normal level of risk aversion to want to use it, so it doesnt get as much use. As motorcyclists i'd like to say that we have a lower risk aversion than most of the population, which kinda puts into perspective the kind of attitude you need to ride your bicycle in the GTA; a lot of people wouldn't be seen out there riding motorbikes as they find it too dangerous. I mean 36 motorcyclists have died in 2024 in ontario (yikes) vs 6 cyclists in toronto. I think they're just trying to save lives. Heck just this morning a man cycling in markham was killed.

Ford is basically meddling in Municipal level design. He says he gives mayors more powers only to neuter them elsewhere, and handpicks issues he doesnt like. Could he put more pressure/attention on metrolinx instead?
His legislation is basically to give his party the power to say a big no to something he doesnt want implemented and to (in the 2nd phase) revisit all that's been implemented in the past 5 years or so. He's done the same with the MZO.
I mean if that's where we want our taxes to go, sure. He even has a "Red tape reduction" ministry, but i guess they're not working too hard.
In the end if you're gonna say "no" to infrastructure being implemented to protect vulnerable road users, i think he should HAVE to offer another alternative that would work towards that goal. Otherwise the municipal level will just get entangled in never ending red tape.

Re the dangers:

If you've taken any industrial safety course you've probably seen the safety pyramid. 10,000 unsafe acts at the bottom results in 1000 close calls a level up. That results in 100 minor injuries another level up. Repeat and the next level is 10 serious injuries and at the top is a death.

We see tens of thousands of the bottom level stuff on the streets and it goes unpunished. Lane discipline, turn rules, ignorant pedestrians, stop sign running etc, etc.

 

[Mad Mike]

meh, even if you remove all 500km of bike lane "infrastructure" (most of it being paint along pre-existing roads) you still will have the $hit traffic
there are 5000+km of roadway in toronto, give 10% back and all you'll get is that "lifestyle creep" where you get just enough to end up using it and being back to "where did my extra space go"

I don't think it's a call to remove all of it, the province is stepping in because the city has pandered to the bicycle lobby, and justified it decisions using cherry-picked or simply nonsensical data. The change is to insure the development of transport infrastructure is done without pandering, and to serve the greater needs of the community.

It has taken a while, but road users, emergency service providers, and courier/freight carriers who all need roads are starting to push back... hard. Regular citizens too.

I love this line from the traffic wonks in Mississauga. It's core justification for cutting Bloor from 4 lanes to 2. "Our studies show that eliminating a lane on each side of the street will not slow down traffic much at all"

 

[nobbie48]

I don't think it's a call to remove all of it, the province is stepping in because the city has pandered to the bicycle lobby, and justified it decisions using cherry-picked or simply nonsensical data. The change is to insure the development of transport infrastructure is done without pandering, and to serve the greater needs of the community.

It has taken a while, but road users, emergency service providers, and courier/freight carriers who all need roads are starting to push back... hard. Regular citizens too.

I love this line from the traffic wonks in Mississauga. It's core justification for cutting Bloor from 4 lanes to 2. "Our studies show that eliminating a lane on each side of the street will not slow down traffic much at all"

There's a stretch of Bloor from Dixie to Cawthra that has single family homes both sides. Enjoy getting out of your driveways.

 

[Priller]

Re. bike lanes, much as it's my instinct to defend urban density and reduction of single-occupant car use, the municipalities across Ontario have largely lost the plot when it comes to road use. There has been this herd mentality about promoting bicycle lanes and discouraging car use that has become totally divorced from common sense.

I work for an engineering and CA company that works for many municipalities, and we're involved in the traffic planning for infrastructure repair. Dealing with all cities across Southern Ontario is bizarre, as every middle manager PM is absolutely terrified to piss off cyclists for fear of incurring the wrath of a city councilor.

In one example for a relatively major city (>250k pop.) not in the GTA, emergency (and yes, a real emergency with risk of catastrophic failure) infrastructure repair has been delayed for over a year because some of the required temporary installations would have forced closure and a detour for bike lane on a busy commercial street. We sent someone to spend a day counting the bicycles on this supposed critical lane, and came back with an average of 0.9 bicycles per hour. Less than one per HOUR. And we were proposing an easy detour that would have added roughly 0.4km (200m away, 200m back) to a 3 km run of bike lane. Between the city themselves and the Region who actually owned the main road, there were over a dozen meetings, we had to generate multiple reports, full closure of a vehicle lane was proposed as an alternate, they considered burying a bypass pipeline for almost 3km at a cost well over $2M, all to avoid the perception of not prioritising cyclists. In the end, sanity prevailed, but it was a real illustration of the priority placed on the APPEARANCE of caring about cyclists. Nobody actually cared about the cyclists, though, and there was zero thought given to the larger picture.

Toronto has recently updated their standard spec for traffic control, and it's explicit that car lanes are to be closed or made alternating before affecting bicycle or pedestrian traffic in all but the most exceptional cases. They have added language for 2024 that basically states when planning traffic control, pedestrian and bicycle routes are to be considered as higher priority than vehicle traffic. While this is sometimes admirable, what it leads to is the same kind of simple thinking as outlined above where people doing the planning are so fearful of incurring the wrath of their bosses that they will follow the letter of the law with zero thought paid to the bigger picture. And so we end up with a gridlocked city.

I'm all for encouraging people to get out of their cars and promoting more efficient and less impactful modes of transportation. But you can't simultaneously starve the only viable year-round alternative in public mass transit while also making driving near impossible. Until GO and the TTC are sorted out and treated similar to roads (e.g. a loss leader and something we should all subsidise for the greater good), simply making driving a nightmare is no solution.

I commute from Hamilton to Toronto three days a week. I would love to take the train in. But as it stands, it is both significantly slower AND more expensive to do so, so it's hard to justify. Even adding in an electric scooter or something similar to bridge the local transit gaps that add a significant amount of time doesn't make it better.

 

[LePhillou]

There are two types of cyclists, whether they are motor or pedal.

Type "A" uses their cycle for transportation. Type "B" uses it for recreation.

Our roads were built for transportation, not recreation. Hogging lanes for recreational purposes while impeding vehicles trying to deliver goods or workers is counter productive.

There is validity for transportation bicycle lanes but IMO better car drivers would produce better results.

The road to better drivers is long.

If it's OK to take over a road for recreational riding what's wrong with taking over a road for a dance or shinny hockey?

How about a polka party at Yonge and Bloor or the High Park Stanley Shinny Cup.

Most normal people are under LTS1 and LTS2, teens biking to school, bikeshare users, casual commuters.

when you venture into LTS3 you lose a lotta people, and LTS4 are only the entusiasts and more hmmm...hardened people who ride bikes. A big issue is that in the bike network you'll switch from LTS2 to LTS4, losing even more people.

The recreational/workout cyclists usually can manage LTS3-4. Heck LTS1 might be too "slow" for them. What we need to build for truly are LTS1-2 IMO.

@Mad Mike i think what happens here is the end goal is to allow more people to have an option to not have to absolutely rely on their car for all their movement. So if it takes everyone an additional 2 minutes to get through a section but allows Timmy to bike safely to school instead of being driven by his mom, so be it.

As for emergency services...if built properly as seen around the world, the bike lane provides a quick option for emergency services to go through, or even an option for cars to move over. From what i understand "Toronto Fire deputy chief Jim Jessop said emergency response times, based on two key performance indicators, have improved since the bike lanes were installed."

@nobbie48 yeah there's a big safety issue in the lack of enforcement overall, there are no consequences for almost anyone on the roads lol. Everytime i'm driving and riding i have so much head shaking happening. Sadly we're reaching the top of the pyramid a bit too often.
re: bloor comment, they have a protected lane on lakeshore from Dwight to hillside (near royal york), people get out of their houses and apartment buildings alright. And there's even a streetcar track there too!

 

[GreyGhost]

There's a stretch of Bloor from Dixie to Cawthra that has single family homes both sides. Enjoy getting out of your driveways.

Sounds like a great stretch for densification. Major road, one big driveway every half block is easier and safer to manage than 10 driveways.

 

[Mad Mike]

...
Ford is basically meddling in Municipal level design. He says he gives mayors more powers only to neuter them elsewhere, and handpicks issues he doesnt like. Could he put more pressure/attention on metrolinx instead?

Yes, he needs to get on Metrolinx. But that doesn't mean other issues must wait.

His legislation is basically to give his party the power to say a big no to something he doesnt want implemented and to (in the 2nd phase) revisit all that's been implemented in the past 5 years or so.

That's because the city is sliding backward on the congestion problem, and it's moving from the core to the outer reaches. I'm way out in the burbs, the crazy number of speed reductions, desynchronization of traffic lights, and new traffic lights have doubled my drive time from Markham Rd to the 404 in the space of a few years. When I started driving this 11km route, the speed limit for the 4 lane roadway was 70kmh. I had 2 stop signs and 7 synchronized lights. Fast forward to today, the speed limit is 60, with 4 stop signs and 19 unsynchronized lights. Those 'improvements' have increased my drive time by 50%.

He's done the same with the MZO.
I mean if that's where we want our taxes to go, sure. He even has a "Red tape reduction" ministry, but i guess they're not working too hard.

I think some of it's working. You can get a building permit for a basement reno in 3 days now in most major centers, you can get moving on a new build if you have an engineer stamp your drawings. That stuff took weeks or months not long ago.

MZO's are important tools as well. Here's the website supported by the usual opponents of MZOs - look it over - can you find any that are generally harmful to Ontarians? Almost all MZOs are requested or supported by local municipal gov'ts and are typically used when activists use process to bog down zoning changes, mostly to add punishing delays or financial load planners.

In the end if you're gonna say "no" to infrastructure being implemented to protect vulnerable road users, i think he should HAVE to offer another alternative that would work towards that goal. Otherwise the municipal level will just get entangled in never ending red tape.

I don't think the point is to punish vulnerable road users. The Province wants the justification and planning facts - not any facts, not made up or irrelevant facts, but facts that show the true cost/benefit to all stakeholders. Future plans, and maybe past works retroactively will need options and alternate approaches.

 

[Mad Mike]

@Mad Mike i think what happens here is the end goal is to allow more people to have an option to not have to absolutely rely on their car for all their movement. So if it takes everyone an additional 2 minutes to get through a section but allows Timmy to bike safely to school instead of being driven by his mom, so be it.

I don't have a problem with safe traffic on side streets, or children using sidewalks. I don't think that's what DF is concerned with either.

It's more about taking the already congested 4 lane major thoroughfares and changing them to 2 lanes. I think this is what Doug might be reacting to:


That's setup goes both sides of the street. Count the bikes, count the cars. Proponents will argue that 2 bike lane will accomodate 3200 bikes/hour, and 2 car lane will accommodate 1600 cars/hour. That's great, but the bike lanes only need to accommodate 600 bikes/hour,and the car lanes 4000 cars/hour. What's wrong with a bi-directional bike lane on one side of the street?

 

[GreyGhost]

. What's wrong with a bi-directional bike lane on one side of the street?

That's easy. It's an absolute cluster at every intersection unless bikes and vehicles have their own lights (which is also a cluster). Braindead drivers can't make turns without mowing down people walking, having someone closing at 30 km/h after you have committed to the turn is a bloodbath. Honestly, I'd rather have bike paths between lane. Like roundabouts, more bumps, less straight up kill shots from perpendicular impacts.

 

[LePhillou]

Yes, he needs to get on Metrolinx. But that doesn't mean other issues must wait.

I mean, it should be prioritized as it would probably have greater impact to have the LRT in place by moving more people and "unhindering" the drivers around the project. It's their jurisdiction, the puck has been dropped majorly.

That's because the city is sliding backward on the congestion problem, and it's moving from the core to the outer reaches. I'm way out in the burbs, the crazy number of speed reductions, desynchronization of traffic lights, and new traffic lights have doubled my drive time from Markham Rd to the 404 in the space of a few years. When I started driving this 11km route, the speed limit for the 4 lane roadway was 70kmh. I had 2 stop signs and 7 synchronized lights. Fast forward to today, the speed limit is 60, with 4 stop signs and 19 unsynchronized lights. Those 'improvements' have increased my drive time by 50%.

The desync of traffic lights i have to say is ridiculous LOL i mean... that gets no one moving... speed reductions of 10km/h, people will still drive 70-80km/h if the limit is 60, so over a 10-15km distance it won't be an enormous difference but i guess the 4 stop signs and 19 unsychro lights (the light increase is a bit nuts!) would do it! Have there been a lot of development and construction for dwellings in the area? New subdivisions will require more lights for sure... and often will only get triggered when a car triggers the timer instead of relying on a synchronized system, sadly. I've gotten 2 more traffic lights (on top of the 6 pre-existing ones) on a 1.5km stretch, but there's about 15k+ people moving in within the next 10 years here so it must unfortunately happen.

I think some of it's working. You can get a building permit for a basement reno in 3 days now in most major centers, you can get moving on a new build if you have an engineer stamp your drawings. That stuff took weeks or months not long ago.

MZO's are important tools as well. Here's the website supported by the usual opponents of MZOs - look it over - can you find any that are generally harmful to Ontarians? Almost all MZOs are requested or supported by local municipal gov'ts and are typically used when activists use process to bog down zoning changes, mostly to add punishing delays or financial load planners.

Removing barriers for changes definitely is what it should be about. But i've seen the MZO process used by the developers to get veto when they're not getting what they want (without necessarily consulting the municipality). And when we know how tied our government is with developers it does make me raise an eyebrow. And this process adds yet another gate.

I don't think the point is to punish vulnerable road users. The Province wants the justification and planning facts - not any facts, not made up or irrelevant facts, but facts that show the true cost/benefit to all stakeholders. Future plans, and maybe past works retroactively will need options and alternate approaches.

Saving lives, avoiding major injuries and cost on our healthcare, getting people moving and active (dare i say healthier) by offering an alternative would be a benefit to all stakeholders. Our streets were originally engineered with volume and speed of cars as priorities. Safety of any other road users came lower on the list.
With some of those changes we're seeing them trying to rewrite the script and maybe bring safety up a few notches on the priority list. As we get denser in population, this legacy will become more and more of an issue, it's change and for the most part people don't like it.

 

[GreyGhost]

I . Safety of any other road users came lower on the list.
With some of those changes we're seeing them trying to rewrite the script and maybe bring safety up a few notches on the priority list. As we get denser in population, this legacy will become more and more of an issue, it's change and for the most part people don't like it.

If safety was the priority, I still think bike lanes on secondary roads is far better for everybody. They are trying to run the length of bloor as a virtue signaling masterpiece. Giving bike lanes absolute priority for snow clearing is just the next step in the dumpster fire of stupidity. They might as well heat them. At least at that point, most people could use them in the winter (although only a few will).

 

[LePhillou]

If safety was the priority, I still think bike lanes on secondary roads is far better for everybody. They are trying to run the length of bloor as a virtue signaling masterpiece. Giving bike lanes absolute priority for snow clearing is just the next step in the dumpster fire of stupidity. They might as well heat them. At least at that point, most people could use them in the winter (although only a few will).

If you want come with me on a ride into downtown using the waterfront trail. One third of it is on side streets and adds 5km to the commute, that's about 20 more minutes give or take.
It's generally safer although several segments of it are on residential streets without any separation (not even paint). It also winds around several detours (hence the extra kms), it's almost like the equivalent of taking the service road when you have a highway available, you don't know if it'll continue the whole way, you might have to switch to get from north to south service, etc etc. And when your energy is finite, unlike gas that you can just put back in your car at a gas station, you want to most efficient way to get there for sure. The other half on martin goodman trail is amazing, minus the lack of lighting (and the other users that don't use any type of lighting while using it)
There aren't a lot of major-city wide routes available. Removing bloor brings you 10km down to MGT. So i think it's more about continuity than just virtue signaling.
As for snow...I mean they do it in montreal with the Express Bike Network. They have actual snow there and way colder temps than us, i'd say one of the MAIN reasons i don't bike in winter is because i won't have cleared paths and end up with a $hit ton of debris on the roads. I have the gear to stay warm (once i dig it out of my basement) but the roads aren't clean/clear enough to venture out, especially in the dark mornings.

 

[nobbie48]

If you want come with me on a ride into downtown using the waterfront trail. One third of it is on side streets and adds 5km to the commute, that's about 20 more minutes give or take.
It's generally safer although several segments of it are on residential streets without any separation (not even paint). It also winds around several detours (hence the extra kms), it's almost like the equivalent of taking the service road when you have a highway available, you don't know if it'll continue the whole way, you might have to switch to get from north to south service, etc etc. And when your energy is finite, unlike gas that you can just put back in your car at a gas station, you want to most efficient way to get there for sure. The other half on martin goodman trail is amazing, minus the lack of lighting (and the other users that don't use any type of lighting while using it)
There aren't a lot of major-city wide routes available. Removing bloor brings you 10km down to MGT. So i think it's more about continuity than just virtue signaling.
As for snow...I mean they do it in montreal with the Express Bike Network. They have actual snow there and way colder temps than us, i'd say one of the MAIN reasons i don't bike in winter is because i won't have cleared paths and end up with a $hit ton of debris on the roads. I have the gear to stay warm (once i dig it out of my basement) but the roads aren't clean/clear enough to venture out, especially in the dark mornings.

Toronto prioritizes snow clearing on bike lanes over sidewalks when there are more pedestrians than cyclists.

 

[Mad Mike]

...
I'm all for encouraging people to get out of their cars and promoting more efficient and less impactful modes of transportation. But you can't simultaneously starve the only viable year-round alternative in public mass transit while also making driving near impossible. Until GO and the TTC are sorted out and treated similar to roads (e.g. a loss leader and something we should all subsidise for the greater good), simply making driving a nightmare is no solution.

I don't know where people get this stuff. Gas tax is collected at the federal and provincial levels. In Ontario, of the federal portion 60% goes to general revenue, 40% municipal infrastructure and public transportation grants.

The Ontario fuel tax is shared between municipalities and the province. Municipalities get 2c/l for their transportation budgets, the rest goes to the province. Province maintains highways, connectors, and priority links (DVP, Gardiner are funded by the province.)

Every year Toronto spends half a billion to maintain transportation routes, and another half a billion to build and upgrade them (total $1B). TO collects more than $1B in Provincial fuel taxes, and even more in federally funded fuel tax grants. It's impossible to argue that roads are subsidized.

The subsidy to public transit is $1.5b, which is about the same as they receive in grants and fuel tax transfers over and above what it costs to build and maintain roads. For public transport to be on the same 'user pay' basis as car drivers, fares would need to increase by 150%.

 

[Evoex]

Ford doubles down on 'remove and replace' when it comes to existing bike lanes

Premier Ford not only doubled when it comes to bike lanes, saying he was going to bring "sanity back to bike lane decisions."

toronto.citynews.ca

 

[Mad Mike]

Ford doubles down on 'remove and replace' when it comes to existing bike lanes

Premier Ford not only doubled when it comes to bike lanes, saying he was going to bring "sanity back to bike lane decisions."

toronto.citynews.ca

This will drive a few people nuts, but it’s necessary.

Parts of Toronto and York Region are locked up because of ideological planning has overtaken practical planning and there is really no easy or practical democratic opportunity for citizens to drive transportation policy at the local level.

Will the province do better? Who know… but it would be hard to do worse.

 

[LePhillou]

The subsidy to public transit is $1.5b, which is about the same as they receive in grants and fuel tax transfers over and above what it costs to build and maintain roads. For public transport to be on the same 'user pay' basis as car drivers, fares would need to increase by 150%.

So i guess it's about subsidizing the behaviour you want to encourage the most (to make it the most appealing)

 

[GreyGhost]

So i guess it's about subsidizing the behaviour you want to encourage the most (to make it the most appealing)

Sadly, often the subsidy and the desirability are unrelated. Giant political/management wank with bonuses and back slapping all around with little change in user experience. Hopefully at some point a government organization can focus on value for money and if it isn't achieved, management takes the hit.

 

[LePhillou]

I give you, value.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1848443122008965419

That money could go towards the 3 struggling transit projects under provincial authority to get people moving. But instead I guess we have money to send $200 cheques to people, cancel contracts a year early to get beers in corner stores, and destroy recently built lanes in a city.