Takethetooker

It turns out doing a bike lane on Bloor isn’t a new idea.

A scrawled reference prompted a quick look in the Urban Affairs library at the end of March for Route Selection Study for on-street Bicycle Lanes done for the former City of Toronto in 1992 by the firm Marshall Macklin Monaghan.

It had an astounding conclusion: Bloor was #1!

"The recommended east-west route for Phase I implementation is Bloor St. The route section extends from Spadina Avenue to Broadview Avenue." (p.  60)
Another mind-blower: "Bloor/Danforth was the most popular bicycle route according to the 1990 Bike to Work Survey. It is an ideal route due to the fact that there are few streetcar track crossings, it is the most direct east-west route that spans the entire City, it has a relatively flat gradient, and has excellent potential for utilization based upon 1990 origin/destination data."

So Bloor/Danforth edged out College/Carlton and Harbord/Wellesley didn’t even get on the original list of 6 east-west streets (including Queen).
This study of Bloor examined road widths, the broader street context, and the overall situation for car parking. In the BYBIA segment of Bloor, "patrons can be adequately accommodated in off-street parking lots."  There was no mention the subway’s contribution to area accessibility either.

This detailed 16-year-old affirmation of Bloor as a great bike route should knock away any priority the BYBIA feels they have to this key segment of Bloor.
Yes, that group has spent a lot of resource in looking at things and developing their plans, and it’s good they’re willing to invest in the urban environment beyond what the City seems unable to do with its $8.2 billion budget.

But quite clearly the cyclists have had some dibs on the street some years before any Bloor Transformation Project.

So it’s Great news to have this found out ahead of any public meetings about the plan, though tender seems to have been issued and closed.

But it’s also angering that it surfaces now, as it’s been three longer years for some of us in suggesting a "crazy" idea: a long bikeway on Bloor.

This study can’t be unknown to some at City Hall: Dan Egan’s name is on the report’s cover page, and the local rep Councillor Rae was first elected in 1991.
It would have been readily available to photocopy to us, the former Network subcommittee, the TCAC/TCC, or to give to Works Committee for the "communication" about takethetooker which never really happened, though this is now being rolled into the larger study of Bloor/Danforth from Victoria Park to Royal York Council Ok’ed in the fall.

The cut back Toronto Cycling Advisory Committee meets on Monday night and there may again be some Bloor St. discussion, though it’s not a distinct  Agenda Item. They may have opinions expressed in motions, if Councillor Heaps will let them through. (The Simplified Rules of Procedure hand a lot of power to the Councillor Chair)

The Road Alteration Report did not go to April 8’s  TEYCommunity Council: perhaps a three-minute power point presentation at the TCAC meeting is all the "consultation" that this private paving party wishes to give to cyclists.

Does anybody know about how much public consultation and process there has been on this project?

I suspect it isn’t as full as the entirely publicly funded projects (with EAs!). There is a broad worry about how the BYBIA private priorities are perhaps altering public priorities, public space, and public process.

We say we want better biking; we say we want to fight climate change and smog; we say we need to improve public health; some of us know we have big problems of energy supply…

Even Councillor Heaps is saying "Any major arterial is more than capable of accommodating a bike lane" (current NOW Bike supplement p. 69).
While cyclists don’t own the street, and the white lines we have for bike lanes are inadequate, we don’t seem able to do a bike lane in a most key segment of the Toronto core with even a cheap white line, let alone exploring doing something for bikes that goes beyond a line to a more European, and bike-respecting bikeway.

What does it take?