This proposal, especially as…

This proposal, especially as amended, is quite frankly insane.

As a regular biker and resident of Toronto, the bike lanes on University, Bloor, and Yonge are phenomenal. They are used all the time; every time I use them, there are lots of other bikers there as well. Since I live near all of these streets, many of my routes through the city involve using one of these lanes, and it's always convenient to be able to navigate using a main street and know that it's a safe place to bike. I don't need to worry about having to share space with cars, which is more stressful and more dangerous for both drivers and bikers. It's especially good because the network of bike lanes in Toronto is frequently disconnected; even for relatively short trips, I often need to bike on roads without bike lanes simply because no bike lane exists to get me where I need to go. Having main roads available as bike routes makes planning and navigation simpler and easier.

Removing these lanes would make life more difficult for the countless people who actually live, work, and travel downtown. That's not even mentioning the effect more prolonged road construction would have on the businesses along these streets, who already had to deal with business disruptions as recently as this year during the lanes' construction. All of this would be, at best, to benefit mostly people who don't even live in the areas affected, a benefit which is not even particularly likely.

It has been shown time and time again that widening roads tends to *increase* traffic, not decrease it. Insisting that further widening multi-lane streets will somehow "solve gridlock" therefore seems, to me, patently false. The big city can be a frightening place for a person on a bike, but the increase in bike infrastructure makes it better and safer for everybody. The only real way to permanently reduce traffic is to get more people out of their cars by making walking, public transit, and biking (including ebikes & scooters) more attractive options. Above all, it seems clear to me that these decisions should be made by the residents and politicians of the city, the people who actually live and work here, not by voters in Barrie or Sarnia, and not by the provincial government.