The proposed legislation is…

The proposed legislation is ill-advised, not rooted in evidence and is overall poor policy. There is no evidence suggesting that adding bike lanes – however major the thoroughfare – creates measurably more traffic or gridlock. Traffic is caused by one thing only – too much single-occupancy vehicle use, i.e. too many people using their cars to get around. The only proven way of reducing traffic is to get people to use other means of transportation, e.g. active transportation such as cycling or public transit. Decades of studies show that adding more lanes of traffic inevitably leads to more congestion through induced demand – adding more lanes induces people to drive more because you are increasing supply, thus increasing demand. You may see an improvement in traffic conditions for a few years or less, but gridlock will return, often worse than it was before. This is a well-documented phenomenon, both in Canada and abroad. In other words, the policy objective underpinning the proposed legislation, namely that removing bike lanes and returning lanes to motor vehicle traffic will reduce gridlock, is futile and is not supported by scientific evidence.

Worse, the proposed legislation will endanger the lives of cyclists – residents and taxpayers of Ontario – because cyclists, much like motorists, also want to get to their destination using the most direct, quickest way possible. This is basic human behaviour. Cyclists currently using Bloor, University or Yonge will not stop using those roads simply because the bike lanes have been removed. What will change, however, is the number of conflicts and accidents between motorists and cyclists, resulting in potential deaths. Moving bike lanes to secondary roads that often do not offer the same direct, straight-line path to a destination will result in those lanes being underused or unused.

Municipalities may be creatures of the Province but this is an unjustified overreach into municipal jurisdiction. The proposed legislation seems more motivated by political greed than by sound policy. The Government should instead focus its resources and taxpayers' money on implementing long-delayed transit projects such as the Eglinton Crosstown LRT, the Hurontario LRT, the painfully stalemated Hamilton LRT and the Ontario Line. This type of micromanagement into municipal jurisdiction is unbecoming of a provincial government.