It is so very nice to be in a city that values and invests in a high quality public realm, and one that encourages people to be out in the streets and parks. Sit, sleep, play; stay a while.
A colleague once asked me why people who often commute by bike are so quickly “radicalized” to advocate for safer streets. The answer is because if you commute by bike regularly, someone will literally deliberately try to kill you.
This happened on Dundas West this afternoon on my way home from my
@thebikebrigade
run. The guy (licence BR95664) deliberately tried to sideswipe me then jumped out and started chasing after me. Fortunately I managed to sprint away and lose him in traffic.
#closepass
Montreal’s commitment to excellence in public realm design is really quite incredible. Everywhere you look, a new street or sidewalk or leftover nook that has been reclaimed — often from spaces previously designed primarily for cars — and reinvigorated.
Morning rush hour, a literal Brinks truck blocking the same bike lane in which a person was killed last week because the bike lane was blocked.
The City’s data shows something like 5,000 people will use this bike lane today.
Montreal’s commitment to sustainability and livability through widespread greening is lovely to behold — city is *lush*, much of it having come more recently from reclaiming space previously used for street parking or gained through road narrowing. All of this was space for cars.
I once asked a former senior Toronto transportation staff member why they insisted on the flimsy plastic bollards to “protect” the bike lanes.
His answer: “Well we don’t want cars damaged when they drive into them.”
This city’s love affair with flexible bollards has got to end. Turns out “Trucks can drive over them!” is not a desirable feature for cycling infrastructure.
A mayor leveraging her remarkably high approval rating to deliver on the promises she made during her election campaign by beginning to unwind more than a decade of dishonest fiscal management is good, actually.
Mayor Chow now speaking to reporters. Says she inherited “a huge financial mess.” City is failing to provide basic services, roads are crumbling, transit is inadequate.
There’s currently a barbeque in the middle of Avenue Road outside the ROM, where dozens of tractors have set up for the convoy demonstration in Toronto.
#onpoli
If you live in Toronto, your tax dollars are paying the officer who hit a cyclist in High Park $281,031 a year to write tickets to people riding bikes in High Park.
Montreal has made such a strong commitment to *real* Vision Zero-adherent physical infrastructure improvements that we know save lives — bump-outs to reduce crossing distances, road narrowings, speed bumps, tightened corner radii, etc. It’s all there, everywhere.
So much demand for small businesses located in neighbourhoods. Would love to see an expansion of zoning to permit them much more widely as part of covid recovery measures.
Infuriating. People dying on the streets because of dangerous drivers flouting the law, emboldened by a police force that says it stopped enforcing traffic laws because it doesn’t have the resources to do so. But it has the resources to do this. Harmful negligence.
@TorontosMayor
1. Remove Mammoliti and Holyday from PWIC immediately.
2. Upgrade painted bike lanes to curb-protected.
3. Establish a new bike network plan with brand new bike routes.
All more helpful than your thoughts.
This is not difficult, and fewer people will die.
I’ve now been sent this photo by people living in the US, UK, Japan, Switzerland, and Australia. This is the vision of Toronto that is being projected widely right now.
📸
@Lachancephoto
Montreal’s contemporary attitude toward urban design rings of a city that loves people living and playing in it and wants to encourage more of it. It is to be emulated.
Today in “gentrification is whatever I define it as to make my point.” This development is replacing a massive discount store with literally hundreds of below-market rate homes, along with hundreds more market purpose built rental homes and new spaces for independent businesses.
Griffintown. New neighbourhood, big influx of density. What is Montreal doing in response? Right-sizing the streets, widening sidewalks, building protected bike lanes, and generally repairing the prevailing auto-centric form to respond to an influx of people. Managing growth.
The Danforth is 1,000 times more enjoyable with bike lanes and patios. Makes you want to stay, shop, linger. Good for businesses and people.
#DestinationDanforth
We once allowed four story apartments to be built on residential streets.
And they’re beautiful. Exactly where they belong. Not confined to an avenue or transportation corridor, but in the community itself.
Imagine looking at this and thinking “what this place really needs is two thousand more parking spots.”
That’s literally the current plan for Ontario Place.
Narrowed roads
Pedestrian crossovers
Tightened curb radii
Metal bollards
Photo radar
Protected bike lanes
Actual enforcement
Harsher penalties
And so on and so on...
THIS IS NOT HARD
…and not only do the offenders not typically go to jail, they don’t even lose their licenses. In fact, most often literally *nothing* happens in response to them trying to kill you.
Anyway, it seems no one on site was seriously injured, which is genuinely a miracle, but every single bike lane should be protected and there should be way more protection for people walking and sitting on patios. Cars are dangerous.
The speed limit is 40km/h on both of these streets. This will keep happening until Toronto gets serious about making changes to its physical infrastructure. Most everything else is window dressing (which is why this epidemic persists).
This is directly across the street from the section of the city’s busiest bike lane, which it was decided couldn’t have physical protection for people on bikes because some car parking would be lost.
I came upon this scene yesterday, a tragically perfect illustration of why Vision Zero is failing in Toronto (and of the fact that unprotected bike lanes are horrible and dangerous). 1/x
As it now seems clear the police aren’t going to play ball here, it’s really on the TTC/Transportation Department to make changes to the King route that obviate the need for enforcement.
That should be on the next Council agenda.
Again, “luxury condos” are the most affordable option for most Canadians living in urban areas, and are also the primary source of housing that is secured at below-market rents.
This rhetoric is , as ever, both deeply misleading and plainly unhelpful.
Justin Trudeau says one thing but does the other.
I visited Edmonton Griesbach, where Justin Trudeau promised to build more affordable homes.
Instead, he's building luxury condos you can’t afford.
With his plan — developers get rich, you get gouged.
Reminder that if even a small portion of these people choose to commute by car rather than by bike or transit, the city will come to a messy, grinding halt. Toronto needs a substantial, immediate build-out of a protected bike lane network.
HAPPENING NOW: Commuters wait for shuttle buses during the morning rush as the TTC suspends subway service between Jane and Ossington stations due to a partial derailment.
For the latest:
Today I announced that if I’m elected Mayor of Toronto there will be no more bike lanes on major roads and we will tear up the dedicated lanes on University Avenue to not slow down access to hospitals.
The CEOs of the hospitals that line the street where Saunders made this announcement wrote City Council to ask for those bike lanes to be installed so that the people who work at their hospitals could get to and from work safely.
Saunders says he’s not against bike lanes, and that they can be good things. But he’s against how they’re being implemented. Says there’s not enough consultation and they make traffic worse. Claims downtown politicians are forcing them where they don’t belong.
Did you know major crime is up 20% in Toronto over last year’s record crime rate?
We have a problem with crime in this city. The woman apparently in the lead to be mayor doesn’t talk about the issue. Read & RT
#topoli
Toronto police say while they stand behind an officer's decision to ticket a TTC streetcar operator for blocking an intersection during rush hour, traffic congestion should have been considered.
Is there a better visualization of the efficiency and importance of rapid transit than the videos we see whenever even a part of a major line is shut down? Imagine if all these people drove cars everyday.
HAPPENING NOW: Commuters wait for shuttle buses during the morning rush as the TTC suspends subway service between Jane and Ossington stations due to a partial derailment.
For the latest:
In 2006 I warned at Queen’s Park that photo radar was a slippery slope. While well intentioned to reduce speeding they would ultimately become a cash cow for municipalities. Case in point 👇 and in addition, as with any revenue to any government at any given time, the proceeds go
This one in particular ran a stop sign, nearly hit me, then tried to swerve me off the road after I yelled at him. I’ll report him to the police, who will do nothing because they are literally too busy ticketing cyclists in High Park.
Toronto could fully repair every one of its social housing units and every one of its parks facilities for less than it is spending ($2b) on repairing one elevated expressway.
#topoli
So glad
@TrafficServices
are out ticketing cyclists in High Park again. Wouldn’t want to be caught *actually* serving or protecting vulnerable road users, now, would we?
Toronto’s version of the “thoughts and prayers” that accompany every US school shooting.
This, from the Mayor who appointed the councillors most vociferously opposed to protecting cyclists to the committee in charge of protecting cyclists.
My thoughts are with the family and friends of the woman who died while cycling at Bloor and St. George Sts. today. The deaths of pedestrians & cyclists on our streets is deeply troubling to me. I am determined to do all we can to make our streets safer.
1. This is very well trodden ground for mayoral hopefuls—more often than not it hasn’t ended well for them (including in the last election)
2. This work is tied to water main replacement & isn’t changing the # of lanes
3. Filming stuff with your phone while driving is illegal
University intersects literally every east-west protected bike lane in the city.
Demand would *explode* if protected bike lanes were added to the expressway-like University; it’d be the first real step towards an actual (but small) safe cycling network in Toronto.
Clr Holyday says some streets being studied for bike lanes show incredibly low cyclist use now, cites University Ave. Doubts predictions of rapid cyclist uptake if lanes built. (University is almost an inner city highway with some stop lights. Cars travel very fast)
The Toronto Police don't enforce dangerous driving because they say they don't have the resources to do so. Clearing encampments that exist partly because those living in them don't feel safe in the shelter system? Bring in the commandos.
I live on this street. Neighbours have been *begging* the police for *years* to enforce dangerous driving on this and literally every surrounding street. But instead they’re using their supposedly limited resources to harass cyclists again.
The
@TorontoPolice
hate cyclists.
@m_layton
can we please know why this is happening? They have told community members they are doing this here all weekend.
On a 12-minute bike ride to a meeting this morn, I encountered:
> A driver going the wrong way up a 1-way who honked at me for “not getting out of the way”
> The driver stuck behind me, who rolled down his window to yell “faggot” at me as he sped by
> 12 cars parked in bike lanes
When I think about how meekly Toronto politicians are responding to the road safety crisis, I often think about the comment that the US forever lost the gun control plot once politicians decided not to act after 20 schoolchildren were murdered at Sandy Hook.
#BREAKING
: A baby is in life-threatening condition after being involved in a hit-and-run at Ellesmere Road and Pharmacy Avenue. Three pedestrians were struck in total. Police are looking for a grey Dodge Journey driven by a white male.
Always a good sign when you have to go to a different city from the one in which you are presently running for mayor to make a point you’re getting hammered for.
It will be up to the residents to decide on who best represents the vision of the Mississauga they want.
I will not be silenced in my opposition to remove two lanes from Bloor Street and create more gridlock in
#Mississauga
Hi,
@JohnTory
: in Winnipeg, they get that taking real action is more appropriate than defaulting to thoughts and prayers.
They do this because it makes it less likely that more people will die.
This is not difficult.