I live onnBirch Avenue in…

I live on Birch Avenue in Toronto off Yonge Street. There are 17 streets that count Yonge as their only egress from Crescent Road to Heath Street along the midtown bike lanes on Yonge.

In some parts of that stretch the road is only 20 metres wide, and yet the City of Toronto has stuffed single north/south car lanes, bike lanes and CaféTO along that main artery.

The TTC Line 1 complicates matters given surface traffic is clogged with shuttle buses every time the subway is shut down (which is often).

Add in hundreds of construction vehicles and workers building multiple new high rise condominiums along that stretch of Yonge, and it’s a disaster.

We’ve asked the City for updated comparable emergency response times for police, fire and paramedics on those dead end and one way streets off Yonge versus pre-bike lane installation times, to no avail.

Let’s put it this way: I sure wouldn’t want to have a heart attack on my dead end street off Yonge during rush hour.