I ask that you please leave…

I ask that you please leave the Bloor and University bike lanes in place. And trust the elected councillors of the City of Toronto to decide if changes should be made.

I live with my family in the High Park area. My wife and I, who are both over 50, ride bicycles to work every day. My daughter rides to high school in Parkdale and last summer, biked to various locations around the city to her job which was at different sites. My son used the Bloor lane to bike to school north of Bloor West Village until he graduated. I take the waterfront trail to Front and Spadina all year round. There are no decent TTC options to get there. My wife takes the Bloor lane to her job at Yonge and Bloor as long as it is not icy. It takes her 30 minutes to bike door to door - but to reliably arrive on time using the TTC, she must set aside one hour and fifteen minutes EACH WAY and often it takes longer.

We are also the owner of two cars and drive several hours each week to commitments across the City, eg Sunnybrook Park and Avenue and Lawrence. Our extended families live outside Toronto and we must drive to see them too. As regular drivers, we understand and share the frustration of gridlock and would like to spend less time in traffic. But we see no correlation between bike lanes and being stuck in traffic. For the last few years, Bloor Street has been reduced to singles lanes for construction at the rail crossings, Mirvish construction site, and for road repairs between Bathurst and Avenue. These are all valuable projects but they cause(d) very lengthy delays and congestion. I also regularly encounter shorter delays caused by drivers stopped or parked in a lane of traffic. Finally, the most delays occur on streets without bike lanes. Bike lanes are not a significant cause of delay within the City.

We have regularly biked on streets without bike lanes. It is frequently terrifying, particularly when cars are moving at high speed. You must have the statistics and have seen the many ghost bikes marking where cyclists have been killed by drivers. Please add cyclist and pedestrian safety to your criteria if you decide the province will take on these decisions.