Bill 212 is terrible and a…

Bill 212 is terrible and a giant step backwards for Ontario.
Bike lanes are a municipal matter, not a provincial matter. The province should not be involved in municipal matters as it has no expertise or experience in municipal affairs. Case-in-point, the province led a survey that indicated higher numbers of people biking to work that the Premier and Minister of Transportation are quoting (https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/province-led-survey-suggests-higher-cy…). Presuming the higher number wasn’t suppressed intentionally to fit an agenda, how is the province to dictate municipal affairs, if it doesn’t even know its own survey numbers on the topic?
Based on my understanding, the province will create criteria regarding where bike lanes can go, and where they will be removed, but regardless of this criteria, which hasn’t been created yet, certain bike lanes are already slated to be removed. The decision to remove bike lanes in Toronto has not been based on science or studies, but personal animosity by Premier Doug Ford.
The permanent bike lanes around the Annex in Toronto have been under construction for years and are now complete or near complete. This bill to remove the bike lanes would mean years more construction to remove and create more gridlock with the added construction. The construction started during the Covid pandemic, which means that to remove them, it will take us to almost the 2030s for completion? This bill will create gridlock.
Construction contributes significantly to gridlock, however as the premier has ‘connections’ to developers (see Auditor General’s report regarding Greenbelt), construction related gridlock is not being considered as one of the main issues of gridlock, not bike lanes.
If bike lanes are removed, where will the cyclists go? There are no secondary roads that make any sense to travel on, as there are no continuous routes. This was why through thorough planning, the City of Toronto selected the streets where bike lanes should go. Is there any secondary roads that a bike lane can be added instead of the streets this bill will remove them from that won’t result in a lane of traffic being removed? That answer appears to be no. Cyclists will still use the same roads, just without protection. This will mean cars will need to change lanes to pass cyclists which in heavy traffic creates more opportunity for collisions, between cars, cyclists and pedestrians.
As a pedestrian bike lanes make me feel safer as it provides a buffer between the sidewalk and the road.
Is bike lane removal just a distraction for the removal of the requirement for an Environmental Assessment for highway 413? I will sneak this into the end, just as the bill is sneaking this Environmental Assessment removal through.