Reducing gridlock requires…

Reducing gridlock requires reducing the number of motor vehicles on the road. Motor vehicles carrying one person comprise the majority of traffic on the roads. Bike lanes help people make the transition that more and more people will have to make -- transitioning from motor vehicles to other modes of transportation. Many more bicycles can travel down a street in a bike lane than motor vehicles can travel down two lanes of road set aside for vehicles.

Many other major cities in the world took advantage of COVID to change their transportation priorities. New York is now covered in bike lanes. The Transportation Minister and others should go there and take a look around. And the weather in New York isn't much better than here. Plus, it is getting warmer here every year. Too bad Toronto was so slow at making these changes, but some changes were made, and now is not the time to back up. Even Montreal, colder by far than Toronto, has better bike lanes.

The lanes that have earned the ire of the PC government are on the only direct routes through those parts of town. My wife and I chose not not buy a house in Summerhill. Had the Yonge Street bike lanes existed when we bought our house we very well might have moved there. We both work in downtown Toronto.

The University Avenue bike lanes are well used and don't slow up motor vehicles at all. On University traffic is caused by drivers sending text messages not moving when the lights change.

I haven't ridden much on Bloor West because I'm on the other side of town, but Bloor on the east side of Bathurst is very well used.

The proposal to limit bike lane construction is catering to people driving motor vehicles from outside a city to points within a city -- exactly the kinds of trips that need to be limited. The Minister of Transportation thinks his commute by motor vehicle from Brampton to Queen's Park should be easy. It should not be easy to make that drive. Sound transportation policy would be discouraging motor vehicle traffic from Brampton to Queen's Park. He should be taking the train or GO bus. And tearing up a few bike lanes isn't going to make the Transportation Minister's drive to Queen's Park any easier. He'll just have one less thing to blame as more cyclists die from inattentive drivers or hostile drivers empowered by this legislation to believe bicycles are merely a hinderance to their all important motor vehicle.

The proposal to limit and eliminate bike lanes is very depressing. It shows Ontario is not serious about the future.