Commentary
The old saying that all politics is local is proving most true when it comes to bike lanes in Canada’s major cities.
What should be the most hyper-local of topics has turned into a wider municipal, provincial and, potentially, Supreme Court of Canada matter.
On Oct. 13, the Ontario provincial government began removing a controversial portion of a bike lane on Toronto’s Bloor Street West.
When the government first announced these plans, cycling activists took the province to court. The court sided with them that this decision created an unconstitutional risk to cyclist safety. But then the Ontario Court of Appeal overturned that decision on the grounds that the trial judge had waded into policymaking and political decisions. These same activist groups are now seeking to escalate that very appeal all the way up to the federal Supreme Court.
It’s quite remarkable that someone would argue they have a right to a particular piece of community infrastructure designed just for them, and that if they don’t get exactly what they want they can take it all the way up to the highest court.
It’s not only happening in Toronto, though. In Alberta, the provincial government is planning legislation that will give them power to block bike lanes in cities such as Calgary and Edmonton.
In Quebec, the new mayor of Montreal is conducting an audit of the city’s 1,000 kilometres of bike lane that sets the stage for a bigger showdown with activists. The Montreal neighbourhood of Loyola is already planning to remove a lane to bring back car parking.
It should be no surprise that public frustration and political backlash toward bike lanes has increased in recent years. That’s because the number of kilometres of lanes themselves has since increased and people are feeling the effects.
The City of Toronto installed an additional 40 kilometres of bike lanes during the COVID-19 era, when traffic was minimal. When people returned to regular life, they found their commutes much worse.
The political situation has become one of idealism versus realism. Bicycle activists see themselves on some sort of a righteous moral crusade that combines a number of social and environmental causes. Meanwhile, most people who want to scale the lanes back are focused on making the city functional and livable.
When I ran for mayor of Toronto in 2023, I campaigned on ensuring there were no new bike lanes on major roads, and considered removal of those already on such streets. Since then, the provincial government adopted a similar position, and one of the leading candidates in the current mayoral race is promising the same.
This is the opposite of ideological. It’s pragmatism. Yonge Street and Bloor Street are the major X and Y axis streets in Toronto, Canada’s largest city. In some respects, they are the signature urban streets of Canada. Yet with the current bike lanes on them they are one-lane roads, with rigid concrete block dividers that make it difficult for emergency vehicles to pass by.
Compare that to other major cities like Manhattan and Paris. Sure, they have bike lanes on their marquee streets—but those streets also have a number of vehicle lanes on them as well as large sidewalks.
The heated rhetoric of cycling activists accuse people such as myself of “hate” towards cyclists or argue that we are “anti-bike” in general, whatever that means. But this may be a form of projection. They assume that those wishing to pause or remove the lanes bring the same emotionally charged perspective as they do.
This shouldn’t be an emotional issue, though. This is really just about making our cities functional and workable for the benefit of all. There are some bike lanes in Toronto that have worked quite well for decades. The ones on Harbord and St. George streets come to mind, which generate significant usage with very little community harm. Nobody is calling for these lanes to be removed.
Cities are very complex and dynamic places and the swift and efficient movement of people and goods throughout them is a hallmark of a well-run and livable community. Traffic and gridlock consistently rank high in public opinion surveys about quality of life concerns.
A few years ago I spoke with an executive from one of the leading food distribution companies about the challenges of delivery to small Toronto stores and restaurants. He said that they had stopped delivery to some locations that had bike lanes in front of them because of the immense logistical challenges they presented. This is unfortunate for both the company and the restaurant.
One of the more bizarre things cycling advocates do is post to social media photos of vehicles stopped in bike lanes, with a chorus of voices chiming in to complain as if it is the greatest of offences. Yes, ideally the lanes would be clear all the time. But minor inconveniences do happen in life.
Pedestrians and drivers have to deal with others blocking their preferred right-of-way all the time. You either wait until the path clears or go around it. Or I suppose you can choose to pick a fight. But that shows a lack of self-awareness of the give and take of living in a big city. Then again, I guess so does trying to take a bike lane battle all the way to the Supreme Court.
Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
English (US) · 
Turkish (TR) · 