I dare say, I do wish the…

I dare say, I do wish the provincial government would stay in their lane! (See what I did there)? You’re suggesting using provincial public money to rip up infrastructure approved by democratically elected city councils, when I believe you should be working to fix what is already on your plate (healthcare, schools, lines 5 and 6) rather than adding anything additional (bike lanes).

The province has asked for data, so I have data. I will first say, it does not favour your ill-thought position that somehow taking away the bike lanes and adding additional cars (because many cyclists will decide to drive, instead; they didn’t just pop up out of no where! Many drove consistently before the implementation of a safer alternative)!

The PC government loves to pay lip service to small, local business. Let me give you the statistics around who most often shops local, and how much they spend:
Drivers on Bloor in Bloor West Village report visiting businesses along the road less than 1x per week, and 69% spend more than $100 per month. On the flip side, those who use alternative modes of transport (walk, bike, transit), visit these businesses at least 3x per week, and 86% spend $100 or more per month. After the bikeway was installed, total reported average customers increased by 40%, and average customer spending rose from $186 to $245. If I had a restaurant or storefront in the area, I wouldn’t be very pleased about losing clientele should the bikeway be removed.

Let’s look at another part of the city, so we can’t just claim Bloor West Village as an anomaly; Queen West in Parkdale.
Half of business owners along this stretch assume more than a quarter of their customers arrive by car. One in five stated half their customers arrive by car. Are you ready for the real percentage of customers that arrive by car? 3.9%. Yes, you read that right; less than 4 in 100 customers arrives by car. If we extrapolate the number of those 100 customers using other forms of transport, 19 arrive by bike, 22 would’ve arrived by transit, and 53 by walking. Why are you wanting to prioritize the lowest number of customers over the greater number? A business could likely afford to lose 4% of customers; I doubt they’d survive losing 19%.

Bike lanes mean business: 93% of customers walk, cycle or take transit to visit Bloor Annex BIA local businesses and only 7% arrive by car, says local BIA reps. And business has been growing since the lanes were installed in 2016.

Let’s look at our neighbours across the border for some further data.

Before bike lane installation in a major thoroughfare in NYC, car travel from 77th to 96th street took an average of 4.5 minutes. After installation, this same trip took the average car 3 minutes - a 35% time savings!
The stretch of Central Avenue in Minneapolis that saw a bike lane installation saw a 52% increase in food sales; a 2x greater increase than a nearby control area. Bike lanes also aid in employment, as the bikeway on Broadway in Seattle saw a 31% increase in food service employment, compared to the only 2% and 16% increases in control areas.

Cyclists make up approximately one third of all vehicles entering the Downtown Core in the morning along Adelaide (32%) and leaving the Downtown Core in the afternoon along Richmond (30%). Therefore, there is a higher total volume of vehicles within the single lane, than any single motor vehicle lane on the same stretch.

I’ve also seen plenty of claims about not being able to bike through the “6 months” of winter. First, I was raised in Calgary; if you think Toronto truly has 6 months of actual winter conditions, you might just be a giant baby. Second, if you cannot bike through the winter out of fear of your toesies getting cold, the average Norwegian 9 year old biking to school all through the year is tougher than you. I think that’s honestly quite embarrassing.
But back to data; in 2024, Bike Share clocked 779k trips through January to March. And that’s JUST bike share; the city nor province have installed bike counters into lanes, so we don’t know the total number of bike trips which would include cyclists who have their own at home bike.

Finally, Conservatives love to spout fiscal responsibility. Well, I have some further numbers for you. Dutch investment in cycle lanes (about €600M per year) saves an estimated €19B (yes, with a B) in healthcare costs per year. Car commutes also come with a net cost to society (tax payers) as a whole. For every one dollar the a cyclist puts towards their mode of transport, society pays an average of 8 CENTS. For every dollar a driver pays for their transport, society pays almost TEN dollars.
Having a cheaper means of transport is also more money into your constituents pockets. Car ownership costs vary, but usually are no less than $10,000 per year. A household that has two cars even being able to cut down to one is a massive savings for them, allowing them more money to put back into other economic outputs, as just the car would benefit only a handful of sectors (oil and gas, vehicle manufacturers, etc), while without that car, they can spread their savings out over multiple types of businesses, especially local ones! Improving safety for cyclists, by extension improves safety for pedestrians, as when physical barriers are in place, motorists are unable to cause harm to those both in a cycle lane, and on the adjacent side walk. This avoids over $60 million in economic costs.

Bike lanes and encouraging use are fiscally more responsible than endless car lanes.

I would say warm regards, but I don’t like to lie.
Dani