[Midtown Hank]

It's not silly if the purpose of Bill 212 is to reduce congestion.

As it stands, Bill 212 will literally accomplish nothing to help congestion.

Not even counting the 401, DVP, Gardiner, 404, which are the worst spots - let's look at Toronto's busiest intersections.

Here is a list of the 10 Toronto intersections with the most traffic congestion in 2022:

1. Lake Shore Boulevard East & Lower Sherbourne Street

2. Finch Avenue West & Norfinch Drive/Oakdale Road

3. Finch Avenue West & 400 South Finch Westbound Ramp

4. Finch Avenue West & 400 North Finch Eastbound Ramp

5. Finch Avenue West & Signet Drive/Arrow Road

6. Lawrence Avenue East & Scarborough Golf Club Road

7. Lake Shore Boulevard East & Bay Street

8. Steeles Avenue East & Pharmacy Avenue/ Esna Park Drive

9. Islington Avenue & Finch Avenue West

10. Lake Shore Boulevard East & Parliament Street


You know what is not on any of them? Bike Lanes. (Exception of Bay & Sherbourne but those bike lanes did NOT remove a lane of traffic since the road is too narrow). Congestion here is called by cars merging into the one lane that goes onto the Gardiner. Nothing to do with cycling.

So again where is the ROI on spending tens of millions and putting streets back into construction for months? There's no benefit.

Apologies GrimSweeper for calling your point silly. You make a valid point about overall congestion. I was focused purely on the 3 streets the province has selected for bike lane removal.

As for whether or not there is an ROI or any net benefit, it would depend on the eye of the beholder. Similarly one could argue that there is no ROI or net benefit to overall cycling safety throughout the GTA by adding a bike lane on Bloor.

 

[evandyk]

Apologies GrimSweeper for calling your point silly. You make a valid point about overall congestion. I was focused purely on the 3 streets the province has selected for bike lane removal.

As for whether or not there is an ROI or any net benefit, it would depend on the eye of the beholder. Similarly one could argue that there is no ROI or net benefit to overall cycling safety throughout the GTA by adding a bike lane on Bloor.

If you created a metric of "People cycling to more destinations than they did before" that you could measure, the Bloor, Danforth, Yonge and University lanes would make a very large difference in that metric. Assuming you think that getting people to cycle is a benefit (which the city obviously does, for obvious reasons), there is clearly a benefit from the lanes. Those four bike lanes, plus Richmond and Adelaide (which they're also polling about removing) are probably involved in a very significant share of bike trips in Toronto every day.

I am pretty sure the share of bike trips on those lanes vastly exceeds the share of car trips on those lanes. The real congestion on Toronto streets has nothing to do with those lanes, and will not be addressed by removing those lanes. That's a fact which was presented to the government in their own staff's analysis.

 

[TheGrimSweeper]

Apologies GrimSweeper for calling your point silly. You make a valid point about overall congestion. I was focused purely on the 3 streets the province has selected for bike lane removal.

As for whether or not there is an ROI or any net benefit, it would depend on the eye of the beholder. Similarly one could argue that there is no ROI or net benefit to overall cycling safety throughout the GTA by adding a bike lane on Bloor.

We have data that shows cycling accidents have gone down, business has gone up (Bloor BIA) since the bike lanes and the overall usage of bike lanes has gone up exponentially. So there is a net benefit if we are making data driven decisions (which we know the province is not).

 

[Midtown Hank]

This is clearly a BIA that supports the bike lanes. That’s one. What of the other BIAs along the bike lanes? I’m a big fan and user of our bikes lanes, but you can’t just pick those who share our views.

What I’d like to see Mayor Chow do is ask the Premier for a year’s grace to reduce automobile congestion without removing the bike lanes. This will be achieved through the following….

1. Reduce or eliminate construction-related lane closures.
2. Sequence traffic signals to expedite rush hour flow
3. Enact hardcore traffic enforcement to reduce block boxing and illegal parking/standing (consider to deputize citizenry with ticket bounty). Commercial trucks, shredding trucks, etc. seized for auction.
4. Cancel all in-lane patios or other dine TO blockage. Nothing goes in the roadspace.
5. Better control of signalized right turns so that pedestrians and cars flow better.
6. Reduce or eliminate left turns unless there’s a dedicated left turn lane, especially on streetcar routes.
7. As much as possible roadworks or utility work to be undertaken at night or weekends. Every roadwork project to be measured against its impact on congestion and how it can be avoided.
8. Expand hours for no parking during rush hour from 3pm to 7pm, along with hardcore enforcement #3.

We’d need the Premier to agree to support much of this both financially and legislatively.

Agree, but I think we know she doesn't have a year's grace. I would ask for the province to foot the bill for alternative bike lanes on streets that would act as alternatives to the streets where the province is intent on removing the bike lanes. I know there are no good options, but figure out the best alternative routes and make the ask.

 

[TheGrimSweeper]

Part of me hopes this will end after the low hanging fruit is addressed. Bloor West and Yonge from what I remember are really only painted lines and could be removed quickly, to give Doug his quick win before spring election.

I really struggle to imagine Doug wants to put the entirety of University and Bloor under construction for the next year to address their full removal. Where the city would have t o be involved for utilities, street posts etc. In many cases on Bloor it would not even give a lane of traffic back (unless they removed the on street parking).

Insane traffic caused by totally unnecessary construction on those roads during the election I can't see them wanting (but who knows).

 

[afransen]

My pessimism is moderated by my suspicious that this is just posturing that the province will back down from once they get their real priority advanced (413) and the election has passed. Maybe the point was just to introduce the legislation and get a lot of media attention, then let it die when the election is called.

 

[Natika33]

I'm not sure if that's just a joke, or minimum spends are actually a thing?

(I've never been in a Costco - don't you need a membership or something?)

Some wholesalers do have minimum spends, but Costco isn't one of them. Yes, you do need a membership there.

 

[Natika33]

Question - are cars not legally required to pass bikes with a 1-metre leeway? In some spots, doesn't that mean that bike lanes actually allow cars to pass closer to a cyclist than they'd technically be allowed to pass if there were no bike lane at all?