When visiting Montréal…

When visiting Montréal recently, I found myself biking constantly. I never felt the need to call an Uber as I was able to use a combination of biking, public transit, and walking to get to my destination. Being a 15m walk from a subway station here in Toronto, I typically take a car or walk to the subway. I enjoy biking. It is good for my health and it is much faster than walking and sometimes public transit. Would I bike in Toronto? Yes. Do I feel safe using my bike to get to a further destination such as downtown? No. As my neighborhood has very minimal bike lanes, I don’t feel safe competing with a heavy metal vehicle going much faster than me. Bike lanes, especially those that have a physical barrier between the car and the cyclist, provide encouragement for the cyclist to cycle, rather than resorting to using a car and adding to congestion. To level up the city of Toronto, I would suggest that the network of existing bike lanes should be improved and expanded, and certainly not removed. Biking promotes a happier and healthier city, gets more people out of their cars, reducing traffic, and would allow for citizens of many income levels to have a simple commute.