299 bloor call control.
Senior Member
Funny reading this thread and seeing what the publicly showcased plans were for Jarvis, what we ended up getting for Jarvis, and seeing that Jarvis will go back to square one. All because of the last-minute change of plans for bike lanes.
Had permanent narrowing of Jarvis taken place, we wouldn't be seeing those reversable lane signals be strung back up and lines repainted yet again. Nobody wins.
Throughout the Jarvis process, staff said any narrowing of the street wouldn't have taken place until scheduled reconstruction of the street, which wasn't to happen until the end of this decade. The bike lanes could be seen as an interim measure to slow down the street a bit, remove that 5th lane which presents pedestrian challenges of its own, and provide a bikeway to serve the community.
The problem was how hard certain parts of the cycling community pushed for the bike lanes. It was a needless fight that polarized motorists and cyclists, neighbourhoods against neighbourhoods, and thanks to Stintz's diatribe, families in Moore Park versus families downtown. The fight burnt a *lot* of political capital and created an easy opening for virtually every mayoral candidate to come out against the lanes (except Ford, strangely) during the 2010 election.