New Bike Lanes on University, Bay, Spadina, and Other Roads

[West End Boy]

Bike lanes are bad because they will lead to more pollution.

On University Avenue, adding bike lanes will mean that the bikes will be blocking ambulances from getting to the hospitals.

The pollution coming out of the tailpipes of cars is not the responsibility of the drivers - it's the fault of the politicians who don't provide better public transit.

If transit capacity were suddenly doubled, then a large percentage of car drivers would quickly ditch their cars and opt for public transit instead, because really it's public transit that they crave the most. So again, it's all because the politicians don't want to do it.

Driving is the only practical option for the vast majority of drivers. This is because taking public transit would cost less but take longer and mean you have to stand and wait for vehicles and deal with large crowds in rush hour.

Really?

 

[kettal]

Did I say 'none'? What is it about 'vast majority of people' that is confusing to you?... and why resort to polarizing absolutes?

When did 25% become a "vast majorty"?? The number of commutes into Ward 20 (the affected area) on a weekday morning, car drivers is only 25% of the total... I guess that's what part of 'vast majority of people' I don't understand.

Over 30% of downtown commutes are done by walking. Would that be true if we had a sidewalk network as extensive as our bike lane network? No chance. But in that scenario, people like you would be saying "building sidewalks which take away driving lanes is causing more pollutioN! the vast majority of people drive, so transit is the only option and sidewalks are a waste!!"

 

[Parkdalian]

On University Avenue, adding bike lanes will mean that the bikes will be blocking ambulances from getting to the hospitals.

Not criticizing you WEB, but I love when people who are against this pilot project use this argument - bicycles have somehow become larger obstacles to traffic than cars! I like to imagine that this is because when cars cross bicycle lanes at intersections, they explode in flames.

I went to a city planning meeting last night and I imagine it's similar to most of the places in the city: most of the people there wanted bike lanes in their neighbourhood, and they wanted the streets to be safer for their children (ie, traffic to be slower and more responsive to pedestrians). It's when people see an area as a place to drive through that they want everything removed from their path, planning and figures be damned. If you've been commuting for forty minutes, why would you want to spend a minute longer than you feel is required on a strip of road? If I lived in Vaughan, I would probably hate the idea of more bike lanes in the city even if someone *proved* it to me that they had an overall benefit to the city. Being stuck in traffic just once next to a bike lane would be more emotionally convincing than any fact or figure - and even though the traffic likely would have been there with or without the bike lane. (There's plenty of studies - and playing SIM city will show you this - adding more roads just adds more traffic.)

Some people just don't want to be convinced that functional (ie non-recreational) bike lanes can have benefits to a city, or that they can effectively reduce traffic, even in colder cities. Their commutes are convincing them, not logic.

 

[Second_in_pie]

If only we could instead have angry Go riders complaining about how the West Toronto Bike Path is preventing Georgetown and Milton Go service from reaching it's 5 minute service potential

 

[TOareaFan]

Ok since I raised it in the first place...I feel I need to clarify what I said.

I never said bikes (or bike lanes) block ambulances (at least that is not what I meant and I am too lazy to get my exact quote). What I said (or meant) was that a lot ambulances already have to negotiate this fairly busy car travelled road.......if it is true that the current 4 lanes are underultilized (as the report says) squeezing the 4 driving lanes into 3 will increase the congestion on those driving lanes and make it tougher for ambulances (and other emergency vehicles) to get past the cars in those 3 lanes....the cars will, simply, have less places to go to get out of the way. So it will continue to be cars blocking the emergency vehicles but they will be doing so more regularly because they will be squeezed into fewer lanes.

Someone then came along and said that the emergency vehicles can/will use the bike lanes.....and I said if this was so (although I don't know how that would work) then you probably have a convert in favour of these bike lanes on University because I think this would be good for emergency vehicles...again, however, I just do not know how this is gonna work and no one bothered to explain it.

 

[TOareaFan]

When did 25% become a "vast majorty"?? The number of commutes into Ward 20 (the affected area) on a weekday morning, car drivers is only 25% of the total... I guess that's what part of 'vast majority of people' I don't understand.

I don't want to join the debate over what "vast majority" means but can we agree that those 25% (I assume that you didn't just make that up) are likely to be people commuting from the farthest distances (ie the "burbs") and are, therefore, the least likely to want (or be able) to cycle on their commutes....so how are these bike lanes likely to reduce car use?

 

[kettal]

I don't want to join the debate over what "vast majority" means but can we agree that those 25% (I assume that you didn't just make that up) are likely to be people commuting from the farthest distances (ie the "burbs") and are, therefore, the least likely to want (or be able) to cycle on their commutes....so how are these bike lanes likely to reduce car use?

Here's the document I got it from: http://www.dmg.utoronto.ca/pdf/tts/2006/toronto_wards06.pdf

I can't find in the document the median trip length for drivers into the ward, so I have no idea if you're right or not.. but on Page 15, you can see that for the whole GTA, the median trip length for car commutes in the region is 5.6 km.

Now, that is a median, not an average, so it could very well mean that half the drivers have a 4 km commute, and the other half have a 20 km commute, but we know that in any scenario that means at least half of the cars on the road have a commute under 6 km, which is indeed an easy cycle.

Of course there are hundreds of variables which can affect their choice of commute, and the document I'm using is not complete, but feel free to go through it yourself. I realize that your commute is a long one, but we're not taking away all the driving lanes, only a small fraction of them. Still plenty of room for folks like yourself to drive on.

 

[Tewder]

When did 25% become a "vast majorty"?? The number of commutes into Ward 20 (the affected area) on a weekday morning, car drivers is only 25% of the total... I guess that's what part of 'vast majority of people' I don't understand.

Over 30% of downtown commutes are done by walking. Would that be true if we had a sidewalk network as extensive as our bike lane network? No chance. But in that scenario, people like you would be saying "building sidewalks which take away driving lanes is causing more pollutioN! the vast majority of people drive, so transit is the only option and sidewalks are a waste!!"

Kettel is playing a little free and loosely with the stats... Looking at the link he himself provided, biking (combined with walking) make up for only 11% of ALL trips made by residents of Toronto. Even on a ward by ward basis there are only a handfull where this number even approaches a 25 to 30% range, and surprise of all surprises they are largely central downtown wards, including those that surround the University...

To put it another way this means that with the exception of one or two wards some 75-90% of the residents of Toronto are taking the car or mass transit daily for their commute... and I don't care how else you spin it, by anybody's definition this represents the 'vast majority' of the people of Toronto, and this indicates that bikers are still a minority interest group here no matter how loudly and obnoxiously they want to disparage drivers or advocate for their own self interest.

I went to a city planning meeting last night and I imagine it's similar to most of the places in the city: most of the people there wanted bike lanes in their neighbourhood, and they wanted the streets to be safer for their children (ie, traffic to be slower and more responsive to pedestrians). It's when people see an area as a place to drive through that they want everything removed from their path, planning and figures be damned.

Nobody is taking issue with the idea of bike lanes on side streets or bike paths etc... The issue is that of removing lanes of traffic on city arterials to accommodate 11% of city residents who ride their bike, creating futher gridlock(when gridlock is already intolerable to begin with) for the 90% who don't. This does not make any sense. It is clear that the issue of mass transit has to be addressed first before a better network of bike lanes can be created throughout the city.

Bike lanes are bad because...

Bike lanes are good because I bike.

Bike lanes are good because everybody else should bike too.

Bike lanes are good because people who drive cars are evil and lazy and selfish.

Yeah, we've heard the compelling case for more bike lanes...

 

[kettal]

Kettel is playing a little free and loosely with the stats... Looking at the link he himself provided, biking (combined with walking) make up for only 11% of ALL trips made by residents of Toronto. Even on a ward by ward basis there are only a handfull where this number even approaches a 25 to 30% range, and surprise of all surprises they are largely central downtown wards, including those that surround the University...

Go back and read the quote again. I said downtown and I said ward 20.

If we were putting bike lanes on Hwy 401, then perhaps suburban mode share would be relevant, but we're not; we're talking about downtown.

To put it another way this means that with the exception of one or two wards some 75-90% of the residents of Toronto are taking the car or mass transit daily for their commute... and I don't care how else you spin it, by anybody's definition this represents the 'vast majority' of the people of Toronto, and this indicates that bikers are still a minority interest group here no matter how loudly and obnoxiously they want to disparage drivers or advocate for their own self interest.

By this same methodology, pedestrians are a minority interest group. Should sidewalks be removed?

 

[GraphicMatt]

And do you know how few people actually travel by boat in this city? Let's fill in that waste of space lake and Get Toronto Moving again.

 

[grey]

I am sick and tired of cyclists all over my airstrip. They are a hazard to landing airplanes! Airport gridlock is already bad enough. One of these days there will be an accident and the politicans at city hall will have blood on their hands.

 

[MisterF]

Anyone that's spent a good amount of time in NYC can tell you that most New yorkers don't drive. And that NYC is A LOT warmer and receives less snow than Toronto.

New York is warmer by a whopping 4 degrees in winter. Montreal, with all its cycling infrastucture, is colder than Toronto by the same amount.

 

[GraphicMatt]

Toronto is a barren wintery apocalypse eleven months of the year with temperatures approaching Absolute Zero and we'd be better served building reserved lanes for dogsleds than useless bikes.

 

[PinkLucy]

But then we'd need a pooper scooper patrol.

 

[Joe]

Bike lanes are good because I bike.

Bike lanes are good because everybody else should bike too.

Bike lanes are good because people who drive cars are evil and lazy and selfish.

Yeah, we've heard the compelling case for more bike lanes...

No one is saying that.

I agree with your first 2 points...but:

- Lots of cyclists also own cars and drive in the city too.

- No one is asking for University (or Jarvis, or Bloor, or Danforth, or any other "arterial") to be car-free. Cyclists are asking for some safe space on the roads to commute in ... which will allow us to not "impede" people driving on the rest of the street.