I'm an avid urban cycling…

I'm an avid urban cycling commuter and in my family, we mostly travel by bike, public transportation and the occasional carshare and having the infrastructure in place can mean life or death.

While it is well-intentioned for the Ford government to reduce gridlock, I find this proposal to be disingenuous because bike lanes are not the cause of gridlock. Too many cars and spaces for parked cars is the root cause of traffic. The busiest highways in Toronto - the 401, the Gardener, and the Don valley - none of them have bike lanes but they are extremely backed up because cars are space inefficient and too many of them in one place will cause gridlock.

To truly reduce gridlock, we need to provide viable alternatives to driving - like safe infrastructure for bikes on main roads, like public transit and options to WFH. The fact that none of this is mentioned in this proposed bill means that traffic issues will continue and what this bill does will be to further sprawl, reduce the number of cyclists, and potentially increase cycling deaths and injuries due to lack of safe infrastructure.

Bill 212 exists to boost driving and cars, even if they are electric, cause a great deal of environmental damage. Air pollution, noise pollution, and microplastic pollution are all increased when car use is boosted. Therefore, Bill 212 must be amended because we all want to keep Ontario moving and that means that we need true alternatives to driving - like the current system where bike infrastructure is decided by municipalities and free from red tape from the provincial government.