DO NOT PASS BILL 60. It…

DO NOT PASS BILL 60.
It presents a huge barrier to the implementation of safe infrastructure. The removal or reconfiguration of traditional lanes of traffic are often how we create new bike lanes and safely/efficiently get people on bikes around our cities and towns.

Bike Ottawa puts it well explaining the need for road reconfiguration:

These retrofits are the single most important tool Ottawa has to make our streets safer for people outside of a vehicle. They are how the city has decided to build a connected grid of safe, separated bike lanes across the city, because it is MUCH cheaper and easier than redesigning an entire roadway, curbs, sidewalks and all. This bill stops that work cold.

Like advocates and the local government in Ottawa, cities and towns that use local knowledge and community input, logically have the best insight into how to balance traffic flow with active transportation, road safety, and community needs. Cycling is demonstrated means of combating congestion; ‘bike lanes are an essential element of multi-modal planning that removes cars from the road for short trips and transit connections, thus alleviating congestion, not causing it’.