As someone who frequently…

As someone who frequently drives, cycles, walks, as well as subways on Bloor Street quite often, I believe that the removal of these bike lanes will only cause more distress and be an overall kerfuffle to both drivers and cyclists.

Although I walk and subway on Bloor street often enough, I will focus on the perspective of a driver and cyclist, since I believe those would be the two most impacted personas from this proposal. The conclusion that I attempt to express is that both folks, drivers and cyclists, will be negatively affected by the removal of these bike lanes.

As with any downtown, driving in downtown Toronto is busy and hectic. Bloor street is no exception to this. As a driver, I am always vigilant of my surroundings. As drivers are aware, there are a multitude of things to be aware of while driving in order to stay safe as a driver, and also to ensure you do not put others in danger. When I am driving, one great thing I appreciate and love about the bike lanes is that it separates bikes from cars. This means that I can focus on one less possible interaction on the road, while driving between intersections. Let's think about what would happen if we removed the bike lanes. Cyclists would share the road, and vehicles would have to share the road with cyclists. This adds an additional stress on drivers to ensure that they do not endanger cyclists.

As a cyclist, cycling in a guarded bike lane (as we have on Bloor street with concrete barriers, rather than just paint), I feel safer from the possibility of being hit by a car. This makes biking along Bloor street a very peaceful and enjoyable experience. Not needing to constantly brake and reaccelerate (which on a manual cycle means exerting more physical effort, which I don't always have when rushing to work in the morning) leaves me getting to work on time in a safe and consistent manner. If bike lanes are removed, almost all of this peacefulness and safety that the bike lanes provide would be removed. If I still was to bike, I would be stressed sharing the road with cars, thinking about my safety when surrounding myself between vehicles. If I wasn't cycling, I would have to take another mode of transportation. The only two modes of transportation that would compare to the speed of a cycle would be a vehicle or the subway. The subway is fine, and can hold lots of capacity. However, cars take up a whole lot more space and are not space efficient. The removal of a bike lane would thus induce more demand for cars on the road. Cycles are much more space efficient than cars. So what would end up happening is that many cyclists would be displaced to driving cars, making Bloor street a lot busier to drive on as a car driver.

If the whole point of this project was to reduce traffic on Bloor street, we see that removing bike lanes on Bloor street would only cause more cyclists to drive, thus making traffic worse. Providing cyclists their own proper lane would promote more cyclists to bike there, leaving more space for people who want to drive.

I genuinely hope that these bike lanes are not removed. They make my life easier as a driver and a cyclist in Toronto.

Thank you. :)