This is a terrible idea,…

This is a terrible idea, driven purely by culture war politics of a certain group of drivers thinking they are superior, and the Premier's vendetta against Toronto.

It claims to be about reducing congestion. We have decades of data all over the world showing the opposite will happen. More people can move faster in bike lanes or on transit than in cars, because the amount of space required per person is much smaller. When Premier Ford sees somebody on a bike, he should imagine how much worse congestion would be if all those people had to be in cars instead, or even on their bikes but required to take up an entire car lane instead of a smaller bike lane. If nothing else, people using all modes of transport should all be able to agree that less congestion is the goal, and to have less congestion, you need less cars, not more. Premier Ford wants to spend a lot of money making the problem so much worse.

Let's recap some of the other reasons why municipalities need to maintain their ability to listen to the experts on how they build cities, rather than being held hostage for the Premier's vendetta.

Safety: it's very hard to kill somebody with a bike, and it's a lot harder to kill somebody with a car when there's some separation. Under Premier Ford's plan, bikes will have to ride with cars, going slower than cars, so drivers will be frustrated that they have to share the road and will occasionally take out that frustration on the vulnerable cyclist in front of them. Even if it isn't a matter of frustration, it only takes a short lapse in attention to kill somebody when cyclists are expected to be on the road.

Health: biking (or even walking between transit stops) means more exercise, more fresh air, and less pollution. And in places with public health care, better public health means less costs to the system.

Accessibility: not everyone can bike, or take transit, but not everyone can drive either, including children. If you want the rest of us to be able to leave our houses, we need safe ways to use multiple options.

Public maintenance costs: cars damage roads really fast, requiring lots of repairs. Along with being expensive, more construction means even more congestion. This is only getting worse as cars are getting much heavier in recent years. Roads can withstand the much lower weight of bikes (or one bus instead of 50 cars) for a lot longer, saving large amounts of public money.

Personal costs: cars are expensive personally, too. The last data I saw said $15,000 CAD per year, or about 15% of an average household income. My bike costs me maybe $200 a year on some maintenance, after about $1500 upfront a few years ago. A public transit pass here would be about $1000 per year, or I could pay per trip if you don't need a lot. For a man who is constantly saying he cares about affordability, it is very disappointing to see him demand that everybody devote that much money to a car.

Social interaction: cars are fundamentally isolating, buffering human interactions. Bike paths and on transit you see faces and occasionally talk to each other. Please stop taking away opportunities to freely interact with other people. We desperately need that.

Environmental damage: personal transportation is a substantial part of Ontario's contribution to climate change. EVs are slowly cutting that. Reliable bike or transit cuts it much more. If we don't cut back to less cars (which again, also means less congestion), we are dooming ourselves to much worse pain than having to see somebody on a bike.

Practicality of this review process: can a few provincial officials really review every bike lane in every city in the province, which has already gone through years of analyzing data, proposing the best solution, and convincing politicians who are usually like Premier Ford only able to imagine life inside a metal box? I assume they know the answer is no, and the real point is to stop municipalities from even trying. That is remarkably disingenuous.