A whole lot of individuals confirmed up exterior Queens Park Saturday afternoon to push again towards the Ford authorities’s controversial bike lane invoice that may take away sure Toronto bike lanes to assist handle congestion.
The Progressive Conservative authorities has been fast-tracking laws that may require Ontario municipalities to ask the province for permission to put in bike lanes after they would take away a lane of auto site visitors.
The invoice additionally goes a step additional and would take away three main bike lanes in Toronto on Bloor Road, Yonge Road and College Avenue.
Struggle for Bikes co-founder Eva Stanger Ross, which organized Saturday’s rally, mentioned she makes use of the Bloor Road bike lanes virtually on daily basis.
“They’re all the time packed, so it is concentrating on a very powerful bike lanes within the metropolis. It makes completely no sense.”
Zev Godfrey (left) and Eva Stanger-Ross are co-founders of Struggle for Bikes, a gaggle that’s preventing towards the Ontario authorities’s proposed Invoice 212.
Zev Godfrey (left) and Eva Stanger-Ross are co-founders of Struggle for Bikes, a gaggle that’s preventing towards the Ontario authorities’s proposed Invoice 212. (CBC)
With out these protected bike lanes, Stanger-Ross mentioned drivers usually do not take into consideration the cyclists round them.
“They do not consider them as a hazard that they should be careful for, and it is far more probably that you’re going to be hit.”
The rally comes days after new amendments had been launched to the invoice, one in every of which might defend the province from potential lawsuits if cyclists are damage or killed after lanes are eliminated.
Stanger-Ross mentioned it suggests the federal government is aware of eradicating the lanes will make roads much less secure for cyclists.
“To me, it reveals that the federal government is aware of that they are going to be placing civilians in hurt’s approach they usually know that individuals might be killed or injured,” she mentioned.
“And as an alternative of doing one thing about it, as an alternative of holding the bike lanes, as an alternative of addressing it, they’re simply protecting themselves up.”
Cyclists take heed to a speech throughout a rally Saturday at Queens Park in Toronto towards the Ontario authorities’s proposed Invoice 212.
Cyclists take heed to a speech throughout a rally Saturday at Queens Park in Toronto towards the Ontario authorities’s proposed Invoice 212. (CBC )
These security considerations have stored Leah Jaunzem from biking across the metropolis for almost a 12 months — and motivated her to point out as much as Saturday’s rally.
“It is so simple and it is so easy: we have to defend cyclists. We have now such an issue on this metropolis with pedestrians and cyclists getting injured,” she mentioned.
“Like, cease with the politicking. That is precise folks’s lives. There’s some issues which might be past politics, and that is one in every of them.”
Secondary roads not the reply, cyclists say
Some cyclists at Saturday’s rally additionally rejected the federal government’s stance that bike lanes ought to as an alternative be on secondary roads.
“Toronto shouldn’t be an ideal grid and more often than not there aren’t streets that run alongside the first streets for very lengthy,” mentioned Zev Godfrey, one other co-founder of Struggle for Bikes.
Godfrey mentioned he thinks cyclists will proceed to make use of the identical main routes however be unprotected from car site visitors.
“Cyclists likes main streets for the very same motive that automotive drivers like main streets,” he mentioned.
“They go for a very long time, they’re much less interrupted and likewise the locations that you’ll are sometimes on these main streets.”
A whole lot of cyclists attended Saturday’s rally at Queen’s Park in Toronto.
A whole lot of cyclists attended Saturday’s rally at Queen’s Park in Toronto. (CBC)
Requested in regards to the protest, a spokesperson for Ontario’s transportation minister repeated authorities speaking factors that bike lanes contribute to gridlock in Canada’s largest metropolis.
“We’re doing every little thing we will to combat congestion and preserve main arterial roads transferring,” mentioned Dakota Brasier.
“We help a commonsense strategy to bike lanes, and encourage town to take heed to the hundreds of drivers to assist clear our main roads and get folks out of site visitors.”
Final week, Toronto metropolis council handed a movement to formally oppose Premier Doug Ford’s plans, following a report exhibiting it will value at the very least $48 million to take away bike lanes.
Mayor Olivia Chow mentioned Friday she is aware of first-hand how harmful biking and not using a bike lane will be.
“I have been doored on Bloor Road and not using a bike lane. Now I journey on Bloor Road with a motorbike lane, I really feel very safe. That’s due to the bike lane there,” she mentioned at a information convention.
Chow mentioned she hopes town and province can “discover the center floor” when it comes addressing site visitors congestion.
