Please do not remove bike…

Please do not remove bike lanes. Bike lanes reduce congestion and make the roads safer for everyone. If you look at the best cities in the world, all of them have great bike infrastructure. Why can’t Toronto do the same?

“Blaming bike lanes for city-wide failure of addressing congestion feels misguided or misinformed,” said Marvin Macaraig, a health promotor with Access Alliance, an organization that provides health and community services. “The 401 (highway) has congestion on it all day long and there are no bike lanes.”
Macaraig says many other cities have seen success with bike lanes, pointing to statistics from New York City that show travel times on one Manhattan street went down 35 per cent after bike lanes were installed.“

“ The report says 28 cyclists have been killed in Toronto from 2015 to the present time, with 380 people seriously injured. A full 68 per cent of those collisions took place on streets without cycling infrastructure.

The report also refers to a study from Toronto Metropolitan University, which looked at cyclist-vehicle collisions before and after the city installed fully separated bike lanes between 2000 and 2016. That study found there were 2.57 times more people cycling on city streets and a 35 per cent drop in collision rates in surrounding areas after bike lanes were installed.”

“ Saxe believes Ford’s plan to rip up bike lanes will not only make streets more congested, it will also make cycling less safe for those who choose to bike.
“Literally, people will die,” she says. “Businesses will make less money; air quality will be worse and the city will be more congested.”
Saxe says there is a “if you build it, they will come” factor when it comes to bike lanes.
“There are lots of people waiting for a choice to get out of their cars and many don't have it yet,” she says. “And that's exactly the opposite of what the province is doing. We need to invest in more infrastructure so people don't have to drive.”