Hello, I find this to be an…

Hello,

I find this to be an absolutely absurd policy. As cities in Ontario become more dense, biking increasingly becomes a more viable, popular and more efficient way to get around. There is no way around it. Cycling will increase in popularity with or without bike lanes.

Conversely, because cars take up so much more space on the road, as cities become more dense, there inevitably comes a point where there simply isn't anymore space to accommodate them. That is the case in Toronto.

Toronto is expected to hit 3 million people by 2030. There is simply no such thing as the roads necessary to accommodate 3 million people. The only way to ease congestion is to offer viable alternatives (e.g. walking, biking, transit). Walking and biking are simple choices people can take themselves. Sidewalks are a requirement of a road network. Bikes can easily occupy the street. The only thing you are doing with this policy is making cycling more dangerous. You WILL increase fatalities.

Furthermore, I don't understand why any consideration is being had for the very well studied and observed concept of "induced demand." Traffic is like water. It flows to wherever it can. If you add more lanes of traffic in a city, like Toronto, where the roads are already over capacity, those lanes will simply fill up with more traffic. The reason being, they are OVER capacity. Again, the only way around this is to offer viable alternatives to driving, like cycling!

Lastly, the idea that a conservative government would make the decision to remove infrastructure that 1) will inevitably be needed again and reinstalled at some point down the line as Toronto grows, and 2) that taxpayers have already paid for, is completely ludicrous. Instead of paying once for great cycling infrastructure, taxpayers will now have to also pay to have it removed and pay to have it reinstalled when a new government comes into power. How incredibly fiscally responsible of you. Thank you for that.