Ooh we got a fancy hat cop
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From London, UK. It's well established you can't reduce traffic by removing bike lanes. As it appears it can't be stopped, I hope at least people have data on traffic with it for comparison with after removal. Such a retrograde step. Unfortunately the only way to change it is for people to choose different politicians. There was a similar story in Tower Hamlets in London but the people elected the mayor again 😞 It needs much noise and campaigning to make small change sadly.
@Pionir oh, we have plenty of data. The bike lanes began as pilot projects where the city collected data on traffic, travel times, injuries, etc., before & after installation. And we'll undoubtedly collect data on the effects.
@nev
Champaign, Illinois, USA
I think Doug Ford should be put in a cage and transported to where he's having the bike lanes ripped out and kept there for at least 12 hours daily so he can suffer the consequences of his actions by breathing the polluted air from there being more cars on the road. People like him do utterly counterproductive measures like this and never suffer the consequences of their actions.
Lest any USians think this sort of thing can't or doesn't happen here I give you Indiana's ban on light rail, enacted in 2014 and still in effect. https://law.justia.com/codes/indiana/title-8/article-25/chapter-4/section-8-25-4-9/ It's why Indianapolis has had to go with BRT instead, and the state has threatened to ban that, too.
@Taffer apparently this firm is very friendly with the Premier
@nev (Born in Toronto but barely remember it; moved to US when I was 2.) I heard about that (Climate Towns? Not Just Bikes?) and it kinda fills me with rage.
What I think I understand is that people are so steeped in Car Culture that they can't think of any other vehicle as a form of transportation -- the mindset is, like...
- Bikes, buses, and trolleys only ever add congestion; nobody who owns a car would ever walk, bike, or take a bus or trolley if they didn't have to -- much less willingly give up car-ownership and have to do that all the time.
- Trolley tracks and bike and bus lanes cost taxpayers money which would be better spent making more roads.
- The costs of maintaining and policing car infra -- roads, bridges, traffic lights -- and of cleaning up after accidents, of medical care for the injured, of the lost lives... and of car ownership itself -- is just "how things have always been and must ever be".
...and "conservative" politicians love to play on that kind of ignorance in order to "fix" problems in ways that appeal to the ignorant while actually making it worse.
...and I think that's what is happeneng here. A few people know better, but enough people take the con at face value that they support it and will vote for the jerk who made it happen.
Hopefully education is happening now, and will accelerate locally after this incident, and "removing non-car infra" will stop being a viable campaign platform pillar.
1. From #Edmonton / #yeg here.
2. Absolute bullshit.
Watching closely because Alberta is next; the UCP has signaled that they will be legislating bike lane removals here and in Calgary soon.
In the meantime, they have already vastly overstepped their jurisdiction by ordering Edmonton to repeal its recent zoning bylaw overhaul (basically making multi-unit housing illegal across most of the city once again) and to re-implement parking minimums city-wide.
Inspired by your protest. ✊
@Daveography idk how it works in AB, can the Leg make the city repeal by-laws?
@nev It's bad, obviously, and unfortunately very similar to the situation in Berlin, Germany, where the popular bike lane on Kantstraße is still in danger of being removed. At least here the weekly protests seem to have helped postpone the final decion regarding the removal.
https://berlin.adfc.de/artikel/radfahren-auf-der-kantstrasse-aber-bitte-nur-sicher
@nev calling in from Cardiff in the UK and I think it's a stupid idea to strip out bike lanes. Cars take up so much space and every inch you give them takes away from anyone else who wants to share that space. Cars are big chunks of metal, they're loud, polluting and encourage a mindset of selfish individualism. Giving road space to car drivers isn't just taking away from others, it is forcing others to remain away from the area entirely.
@nev I'd be interested to know the difference in respiratory conditions and casualties before and after the lanes removal.
@BigTittyBimbo well, we probably have stats from beforethey were put in, which was relatively recently after many years of activism
@nev
Hi! I'm from Sweden and while it's stupid to remove bike lanes I also think it's silly that a local government doesn't have authority over its own roads. "Municipal self-governance" is an important principle in Sweden. If a municipal road must be rebuilt it's the decision of the municipality only.
@violanders here, a municipality is a "creature of the province". The provincial government has forcibly merged municipalities before. Provincial legislation controls what taxes the city can implement, our zoning laws, etc. A sufficiently driven Premier could do pretty much anything.
@nev I moved from Toronto to the Netherlands, so maybe I'm not in the requested audience :D. The very idea that the province has ANY power to do this pisses me off so much.
It's maybe even worse than when Rob singlehandedly cancelled Transit City and none of the parties involved even questioned it.
@xinit hahahah oh I promise, there was questioning
@nev 1) Montréal and 2) The best evidence we have shows that removing non-automobile transport modalities will increase automobile traffic.
@nev I don't know much about Ontario or Toronto, and certainly nothing about this specific incident. But in my neck of the woods, when a regional authority suddenly takes an interest in local traffic, often something else is going on https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Lee_lane_closure_scandal
@srol lol. In this case there is little more to it than the Premier not liking to see bike lanes on his way to work.
@nev
I'm in Eastern PA, USA, semi rural area.
Removing bike lanes to reduce traffic sounds rather counter-intuitive to me. But then, unlike most government officials, I know about the benefits of bikes and bike lanes.
@JessMahler Yeah I was like, if they're going to reduce traffic why not get rid of the *car* lanes...? I guess what they're really saying is, they want to get rid of the bike lane so there'll be more room for cars. @nev
I know it's rare for locals to want outsiders to weigh in but I'd like to hear from people not from Toronto: what do you think about the provincial government removing bike lanes along a major street in Canada's largest city, purportedly to reduce traffic?
Up-to-date Star story (🎁)
#bikeTO #BikeTooter #Toronto
The Toronto Star