I am a Registered…

I am a Registered Professional Planner, specializing in Transportation Planning with nearly 10 years of experience working for both public and private sectors in Ontario. I, along with all of my colleagues, are absolutely opposed to the proposed changes under Bill 212, for several reasons.

1) The political theatre created around the inclusion of bike lane changes into this bill is not only fundamentally dangerous for mobility and WILL undoubtedly result in an increase in congestion, reduction in road safety, and increase in deaths and serious injuries.. but it also furthers the politicization of mobility as a fundamental service. In an era of increased polarization, basic infrastructure should be immune to politics and determined based on facts not feelings.

2) I urge MPPs see that the range of experts and professionals opposed to Bill 212 far exceeds transportation planners, traffic engineers, and road safety professionals.
Safe streets and bike lanes have multi-disciplinary (and positive) implications across public health, emergency services, educators, data and tech, business owners, and are critical tools to activate the public realm for community building. The elimination of bike lanes and increased red tape will cause significant harm to communities across Ontario who are looking to activate their public spaces, reduce transportation costs on households, and rejuvenate their main streets.

3) It is a disgrace that the main effort of this bill to eliminate EA requirements for highways has been slid under the rug and hidden from public discourse over the last several weeks. It is shameful that the province, after repeated assurances that they will “not touch the greenbelt” continues to push ahead to build a highway that none of the communities want, that will expand auto-dependant sprawl and worsen congestion across the region, and will pave over the very environment we need to protect to reduce the severity of flooding and effects of Climate Change in the densest region of the country.

There are plenty of areas across the province that would benefit from the development the premiere is intent on “unlocking” for his friends who purchased the land along the 413 alignment. Communities on the other side of the greenbelt who have developable space for housing and services. Concentrating everything around Toronto and investing in highways instead of rapid regional rail services is a policy rooted in the 1950s with no regard to the lessons learned from our mistakes over the last century that led us to the crippling congestion and unsustainable land use we experience today.

4) Equal and accessible mobility has no gender, no race, and no political affiliation. At least it shouldn’t. It’s simply about moving more people, more efficiently, safely, and sustainably through our communities. But somewhere in the past decade Mobility - and in essence anything related to environmental sustainability, accessibility, or equity - has unfortunately fallen victim to the left-vs-right culture wars, enveloping our whole society. There is no winning side, everyone loses when congestion worsens, active mobility is too dangerous, and when limited tax dollars spent on infrastructure are wasted to rip up the same because a few in power prefer to find a group to demonize for votes, rather than further invest in a proven solution.

5) this has been said endlessly by others - but the data used by this administration to justify this Bill is fundamentally flawed, rooted in a desire to pad the pockets of the oil and gas lobby, and stoke anger among suburban voters who are not even directly effected by these bike lanes.

6) If the province wants to fix congestion, then activate the uptown and midtown CP and CN rail corridors through Toronto (parallel to 407 and south of the 401) as indicated in the provinces own Regional Transportation Plan. Activate these for Rapid GO rail services with stations across the city to service trips that cross the region and not concentrate downtown. Expand the tracks and run the trains as we had them decades ago, and watch how many cars you can take off the 401 tomorrow.

Finally, expand transit investment to an Ontario Line North (to Shepard or finch), Ontario Line western extension (up Dufferin to Downsview, or up Jane to Wonderland), accelerate construction of the Shepard east and west subway projects, extend the finch LRT south to Pearson and east to Scarborough, and fund the Waterfront east and west LRTs. Outside Toronto, upgrade the Lakeshore BRT to an extension of the Waterfront LRT, increase funding for YRT operations, and extend daily GO service to London.
The possibilities are endless, but the current vision is limited to short sighted desires for votes against the public interest.

Finally, I urge decision makers consider how this Bill is rightly opposed to the Provinces own planning legislation, and policies in communities across the province. This is anti democratic, will worsen congestion, hurt the environment by destroying the function of Greenbelt, and cost many lives.