City
Morning Brew: Highway Hog Spared, Suspect Hogtied, and Smogtown Sports
Photo: "conformity rd." by tomms, member of the blogTO Flickr pool.
What's happening in the GTA (and sometimes beyond):
On Jarvis, it's goodbye to alternating center car lane and hello to bike lanes. City council voted in favour of making the roadway change, and at an estimated cost of $6 million, I hope it makes for a vast improvement overall. Otherwise, it's just politicking.
Citizen's arrests are possible, but there are most certainly limits and restrictions on how they can be performed. Chasing down a suspected thief, roughing him up, tying him up at the hands and feet, and putting him in the back of a van until police arrive is not recommended.
Sports fans - mark June 22nd on your calendar. On that day, we're expecting to hear a Phoenix bankruptcy judge's decision on whether or not to allow Balsillie to bring the Coyotes NHL team to Hamilton, Ontario.
GO Transit is looking at replacing diesel trains with electrics. The study aims to begin in 2010, but any actual rail line conversion would take a long period of time (over the next decade or so). With the rate of expansion and sprawl into the greater Toronto area, and with our seriously troubling smog problems, this seems like a crucial, forward-thinking strategy.
And a tiny little pig, that is thought to have fallen from a truck on highway 401, was found injured and rescued by a Good Samaritan. The Toronto Humane Society says that she will be spared from future slaughter and will instead find a home somewhere less bacon-y, like a petting zoo or educational farm.
Discussion
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As both a regular biker and driver downtown, I think converting Jarvis is a good idea. It is silly street as is.
It's a shame, because all that's going to happen now is traffic will move onto Sherbourne and hit the residential area between Sherbourne & Mt. Pleasant. Other folks who use Jarvis to get to Yonge/Eg (of which there will probably be a few more cars driving downtown once the Tridel buildings are up and the proposed buildings on the corner of Duplex & Old Orchard) will just move onto Church, Yonge and possibly University.
It's a terrible decision for traffic management in the city. Honestly, It would have been more sensible to cut Church down to one lane each way and expand those sidewalks and add bike lanes over there.
Of course, planning in this city has nothing to do with the Official Plan; just what sounds right at the time.
Montreal had electrified lines into their station, shared by conventional trains. Also, I think some of the longer tunnels out west used to accommodate electric and diesel. It's done all over the world -- it's just newfangled to us.
How about 25 bucks for a 4 or 5 year license? Kick the money into new bike lanes/maintenance.
Toronto traffic is only going to get worse. And when it does, the world's worst drivers will only behave worse.
I am a cyclist and I still have my driver's license which I regularly pay for. My taxes pay for your roads and yet I get crammed into the shoulder with excessive potholes and cars coming within an inch of me in their hurry to get to the office.
We pay for your roads. You destroy the roads. We pay to fix them.
I hope they continue to add more spots for cyclists and go back to considering a fee for cars in the downtown core as London's been doing for years.
I hope they are going to make cyclist carry auto insurance as mandatory and give them tickets when they bike on side walk, run through red traffic light or against the traffic
Is Miller & all of them aware of these things they do to promote alternative transit that just don't work out? St. Clair streetcar anyone? Anyone who wants to get downtown that lives north of Bloor & East of Yonge generally take Jarvis. It's not just the small Moore Park/Rosedale population that it's written up as being. Now traffic is just going to get worse... for absolutely nothing.
As for locomotives to be used, if they can't do Overhead, then a 3rd rail could be used and the locomotive a dual power unit that can operate diesel only or electic only
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ALP-45DP
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EMD_DE30AC_and_DM30AC
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P32AC-DM#P32AC-DM
Will it increase traffic? Perhaps. If it's really that bad, it sucks that there aren't alternative, reliable means of getting into a gridlocked downtown core that doesn't include driving. ... wait.
This isn't about car-drivers getting the short end of the stick, this is about cyclists getting a bigger piece of the pie and sustainable transit (on foot or wheels) being encouraged. We pay the taxes for use of the street, nobody is licensed to use the road, drivers are licensed to operate three tonnes of deadly steel.
In regards to the suggestion of a bike license, I have no issue with obtaining one for a 5 year, one time payment-as long as they are enforced and those who obtain them MUST attend a bicycle safety session. Even today, some lovely cyclists in front of me decided to randomly stop on the street so they could have their kiss goodbye-all while I'm trying to stop, move around on my way and watch for traffic over my shoulder in every attempt to not hit them. Cyclists should be well trained to be sharing the road with vehicles, just as drivers in vehicles should be trained to share the road with cyclists.
The trial with pylons wouldn't replicate an actual conditions since they're an obstruction as opposed to repainting, etc. and so it's not a feasible option.
What about little kids? No longer allowed to ride around on bikes?
The emphasis should be on calming car traffic, improving bike accessibility and asking adult cyclists to be more responsible, not on licensing people who want to ride. Licenses haven't exactly done wonders for motorists, have they?
Compared to the state of things in countries where most drivers are poorly trained or completely unlicensed, yes, they have.
But isn't making a bike lane only really done by painting some lanes onto the road? I'm sure if it doesn't go over well they can repaint the road... Or maybe I'm too naive on the subject. Entirely possible. On that note, how is this bike lane thing going to cost 6 million? If there were concrete facts about the other portions of this rebeautifying & where the money was going, I'd likely be more supportive
@ keven - you are not alone in that. a friend got hit by a cyclist & because she has brittle bones broke her wrist. if there were a way she could trace the guy, she would have an excellent lawsuit opportunity.
I'm all for bike lanes, but honestly I feel like this wasn't thought through well enough.
It is incredibly stupid to shunt traffic off of an artery and on to side streets. More of the Miller/Giambrone war on cars and effective transportation. They are doing their best to destroy the city. Fun with Living Marxism!
On the diesel/electric issue - very easy for the trains to work together, it's just a massive, massive infrastructure project. It also risks making the air in Toronto worse (and increasing the Carbon load of train travel) if there isn't a massive investment in nuke plants. Our marginal watt of electricity comes from coal and natural gas, not clean sources (nukes are clean for the atmosphere, even if you're paranoid about storage). Electrification will require more energy to do the same job thanks to transmission losses and an increase in base load capacity. What it will do is to make the train corridor quieter and spread the pollution out over the entire region. Benefit for people who moved into marginal neighbourhoods beside the tracks, net negative for the city as a whole.
Take note novice cyclists: In order to successfully submit a claim against a motorist, you need to (1) take down the car's licence plate number, (2) take down the driver's licence number, (3) ensure you get the contact information of at least another witness.
Try attempting the above steps when you're a severely injured cyclist, your bike's broken, no one else is around (nor volunteers to witness), or, most likely, the driver takes off.
Contrary to your posting, simply taking down the license plate number from a car does very little for the injured cyclist.
The superficial vehicle damage a motorist receives from a cyclist pales in comparison to a cyclist's physical injuries from a motorist.
I'm confused at the logic used here. Jarvis is used as a commuter street. There are some streets that would be more compatible with bikes and others not. I know Miller wants Toronto to be more European but come on, Europe has a different infrastructure. We can only work with what we have and which are some suitable bike streets and not whatever road you stumble upon and force bike lanes down its throat.
I'm confused at the logic used here. Jarvis is used as a commuter street. There are some streets that would be more compatible with bikes and others not. I know Miller wants Toronto to be more European but come on, Europe has a different infrastructure. We can only work with what we have and which are some suitable bike streets and not whatever road you stumble upon and force bike lanes down its throat. Wonder what Jarvis would look like when vomiting traffic.
In the case of a hit-and-run (my scenario) a license plate number would be more than sufficient to make an arrest, which would later lead to a civil action on my part.
I'm unsure why you would believe that not having the driver's license number would leave you with no rights in a hit and run situation.
More bike lines are a necessary and welcome addition to Toronto's roads; I just don't think Jarvis was the right road to put them on.
Keven, it's a good idea, but how would it be implemented? Would all bikes, regardless of the age of the user, have to be licensed, or just those used by some other group (14+? 16+?)?
It seems that having a physical plate on a bike would be pretty hard to enforce, seeing as our cops are so busy busting teenagers smoking pot. ;)
Requiring cyclists to have permits would probably make us the laughingstock of the world. What's next? A licence to use a sharp knife?
Are you talking about a license that you carry in your wallet? or a little license plate that you hang off of your seat? Either way I don't see what good it does, what saftey it provides.
The reason drivers need to get licenses and pay extra fees is because driving is a PRIVILEGE, whereas using public roads via non-deadly environmentally-friendly modes of transportation like biking and walking is a RIGHT. Drivers think that the minuscule fees they pay (minuscule in comparison to the amount of money that must be poured into infrastructure, health care, environment protection to even somewhat mitigate the damage done by cars) entitles them to exclusive use of the roads. Nope, motorists are still guests on public roads and have more responsibilities and fewer rights to the road than cyclists and pedestrians - and for a good reason.
The money to repair the local roads, btw, is paid out of municipal taxes - and drivers pay WAY less than their share even if they are houseowners, because their vehicles do disproportionally more damage to the roads than my humble two-wheeled steed. Their unsustainable way to move themselves around gets heavily subsidized, and they think THEY are doing cyclists a favour by tolerating them on "their" roads. What an ignorant and disgustingly wrong stance.
Car drivers are licensed because there is a minimum competency level due to the damage that can be done by improperly driven vehicles, and to ensure that the rules of the road are known.
From some of the comments here, I'm starting to think there actually might be a war on cars. Might have to re-think my support for the Jarvis plan.
I don't know about licensing cyclists on public roadways (though, the suggestion isn't absurd), but it would be great if there was another way to ensure that cyclists know (and respect) the rules of the road. I also think that helmets should be mandatory for all cyclists using public roadways, and that they should wait their turn at lights like the rest of the vehicles.. no sliding up along the curb side. It is just dangerous where isn't a bike lane. Accordingly, I'm fine with cyclists riding in the middle of a lane like motorcyclists do.
It's unfortunate an unidentified cyclist took off after scraping your paint job. This, however, still pales in comparison to maimed or killed cyclists after being hit and run over by a motorist.
What's interesting to me is that they decided to add bike lanes to Jarvis St., even though the proposed curb lane width (3.6m) is actually narrower than those of Bloor St. (3.9m).
Really? So I have the RIGHT to go stand in the middle of a road anytime I want to? Go tell the Tamils that.
Municipalities to get some of the gas tax money, but don't think they neceessarily spend it on roads. "The City of Toronto will spend its entire allocation to upgrade public transit. This includes 712 new hybrid diesel buses, 156 new subway cars and a variety of other upgrades and improvements to the transit system." (quote from http://www.buildingcanada-chantierscanada.gc.ca/regions/on/gtf-fte-eng.html) So where does the money to fix the roads come from? To treat kids with asthma caused by your exhaust-spewing metal cage, and the patients with severe injuries caused by exhaust-spewing metal cages running into them? Truth is, even if the fees you experience as a car driver did go towards infrastructure maintenance etc., the gas tax is not nearly enough to fix all the damage done by the car, because car usage is unsustainable at the current levels, and no amount of money can fix the numerous problems it causes. So take your sense of entitlement and stuff it up your big fat car driver's gazoo.
"Despite the federal and provincial governments taking in approximately $7 billion from Ontario motorists each year, municipal governments are expected to fund most road repairs through property tax revenues."
You have a right to use a public road to travel where you need to go. Not to stand in the middle of it and making it difficult and dangerous for others to exercise the same right. The right to use a road does not equal to the right to do anything you feel like on the road at any time you feel like it. What a concept, eh?
They've already decided to go through with this and spend tons of $$$ on it with out our input so now they will make it seem like there is a real purpose to it and try and get as many people on board with it as possible
The right you have is a basic right to use public roads to go places on a contraption of your choosing, in particular a bicycle, if you wish. So it is a right. Now, tere are some restrictions placed on different modes of transportation: Everyone has to adhere to rules of the road, vehicles not meeting safety standards are banned, drivers of particularly dangerous vehicles need to be licensed and may have the license taken away from them (hence the term privilege).
"Car drivers are licensed because there is a minimum competency level due to the damage that can be done by improperly driven vehicles, and to ensure that the rules of the road are known."
Exactly. That's why it's a privilege to drive a motor vehicle on the road.
"From some of the comments here, I'm starting to think there actually might be a war on cars."
As another poster pointed out, what's wrong with that? Cars are causing lots of problems and damage communities. Places all over the world are looking at ways to discourage car use, especially in congested city centres, and encourage other forms of transportation. If you call that a war, fine, but I don't see anything wrong with this particular war.
"I don't know about licensing cyclists on public roadways (though, the suggestion isn't absurd), but it would be great if there was another way to ensure that cyclists know (and respect) the rules of the road."
Everyone's expected to know and respect the rules of the road. Licensing is not necessary for that. Right now, however, it's a little hypocritical to expect cyclists to respect the rules of the road, when other road users give so little respect to cyclists (yes, including the law-abiding ones). If you want cyclists to respect the rules, get the motorists to respect them too. If you think they already do, think again. Speeding is completely socially acceptable and done by the great majority of car drivers.
"Accordingly, I'm fine with cyclists riding in the middle of a lane like motorcyclists do."
The law already allows the cyclists to do that, if that's required for their safety. Yet, how many cyclists actually feel safe in exercising this right? And how can you expect a group such as cyclists to respect the rights of the very people who have complete disregard for cyclists' own rights and safety?
I'm a driver, cyclist AND pedestrian, and I'm most frightened walking around my office (Metro Hall) for fear of getting run over by a cyclist. Seriously, the bike couriers are the worst abusers of the road, even more-so than cars.
To be fair, bike couriers are smaller in numbers to other cyclists, but since they're on the road more often than anyone else, they're the most visible. They're actions, ultimately, taint the actions of law-abiding safe-cyclists... just as the actions of a minority of drivers who are aggressive (and not defensive) are at fault for most poor driving.
> how can you expect a group such as cyclists to respect the rights of the very people who have complete disregard for cyclists' own rights and safety?
I'm always amazed to see how many laws ALL cyclists violate: ignoring traffic lights, stop signs, cycling the wrong way on one-way streets, dangerously merging into traffic because they refused to stop at a red light etc. etc. etc. Those are just as bad as a driver not looking in their rear-view mirror before turning (if not worse), seeing as the cyclist is putting themselves into danger.
Don't get me wrong, chephy, I fully support reducing vehicular traffic from the downtown core; I just don't think the Jarvis solution is the right one. I've already suggested that I think Church St. would have benefitted significantly more from reduced traffic & bike lanes... would you dispute that?
Most riders will still chose a quieter street than be on a heavy traffic street because it has a bike lane.
See the Official Bike Plan for the City of Toronto: http://www.toronto.ca/cycling/bikeplan/pdf/chapter05.pdf
Head down to page 5. It's a beautiful map of the city, including a map of downtown Toronto. Jarvis is not on there. This is just another case of the City having a plan of action and then ignoring it.
Anyway, I still say that Church St. is a much better candidate for wider sidewalks & bike lanes.
And I repeat, you're wrong, unless of course you'd like to provide some sort of proof of this. If someone 'hits and runs' you, the plate is sufficient to prosecute and take civil action.
>It's unfortunate an unidentified cyclist took off after scraping your paint job. This, however, still pales in comparison to maimed or killed cyclists after being hit and run over by a motorist.
My paint job? Excuse me, where did I say I was driving a vehicle? I'm speaking as a pedestrian, I don't drive. I thought that was pretty clear in my post. I spoke of injuries. I'm pretty sure last time I checked, that if I was in a 5,000lb vehicle it's safe to assume I wouldn't have had any.
So can I get own a horse and ride it around the downtown core? and Let it do its thing in your bike lane? You know, like the cops do.
Insurance claims are made against your auto insurance, not through your driver's license.
As bill previously mentioned, Photo Radar. Photo Tolls.
Yet scores of pedestrians and other road users are not dying every year because they are hit by lawless bike messengers, are they? I agree that there is no excuse for some of the rude behaviour exhibited by some cyclists (my boyfried, an avid cyclist himself, got rather angry at a cyclist who shoved him out of the way and swore at him at a pedestrian crossing - all while running a red light too). However, I get angry whenever this tired beat-up argument of "cyclists break laws" comes up. First, drivers break laws too. Secondly, when the consequences of drivers' breaking the laws are far greater than the consequences of cyclists' breaking the law. Thirdly, if you're a driver who doesn't break laws, you will get respect and safety in return, while a cyclist sometimes will actually put himself in more risk if he chooses to obey certain laws. See below for what I mean here.
"I'm always amazed to see how many laws ALL cyclists violate: ignoring traffic lights, stop signs, cycling the wrong way on one-way streets, dangerously merging into traffic because they refused to stop at a red light etc. etc. etc."
You say you're a cyclist too. Since you say ALL cyclists violate these laws, do you do that too?..
I personally don't break laws if it would put anyone in danger or inconvenience law-abiding road users. I think it's wrong to break laws if that puts others in danger, or even just has potential to put someone in danger, or even just causes inconvenience for someone who was not breaking the law. Yet I have some understanding, say, for cyclist riding on one-way streets (if they do not endanger and inconvenience others as described above). The Annex and other downtown locations are a maze of one-way streets that is in place precisely to discourage vehicles going through there. Cyclists who try to follow the law will find it impossible to stay on smaller streets (since one-way directions change all the time), and are forced onto bigger arterials, where many feel threatened by drivers who disregard their right to be there. While I personally don't mind riding on larger streets, I can't blame other cyclists for choosing quieter one-way streets over arerials, even if they have to break the law while doing so.
Stop signs, especially four-way ones, are similar. They are placed on residential streets to make travelling there delibreately slow and painful for cars. Yet, it's even worse for cyclists who don't have a gas pedal to push after each stop, and who have to depend on momentum to keep going. So a law-abiding cyclist is faced with a tough dilemma: battle cars on big mean streets, or be forced to stop every 50 meters at a four-way stop that's there for the sole reason of making travelling on the street unpleasant and inefficient. Either option sounds rather unappealing, and I honestly can't expect people to respect a system that is so skewed against them.
"Don't get me wrong, chephy, I fully support reducing vehicular traffic from the downtown core; I just don't think the Jarvis solution is the right one."
Don't get me wrong either; I'm not for deliberate and reckless disregard for the law. I'm all for responsibile cycling. But if you load people with responsibilities, they have to have corresponding rights as well, which is not the case in the current cycling environment.
"I've already suggested that I think Church St. would have benefitted significantly more from reduced traffic & bike lanes... would you dispute that?"
I'm not sure if Church is necessarily the best candidate for bike lanes, due to the number of red lights one hits along the way. Cyclists want to travel fast too; they don't want to be on streets where they have to stop all the time. Drivers love their highways... cyclists do too!
In general, I find that Church St. already accommodates cycling pretty well, and the traffic volumes are already relatively low. I believe that bike infrastructure should go on streets that are not already quite cycling-friendly. Unfortunately, most bike lanes tend to go on quiet streets that need them least.
Case in point: Renforth Ave. bike lane in Etobicoke. The portion of Renforth that received a bike lane was already a spacious and relatievly quite road, and I'm sure that any minimally competent cyclist already felt quite happy and unthreatened there.
To push the case a bit further, I don't see why there couldn't be cycling infrastructure on all major roads. It makes sense: all roads have roads that cars feel at home on. Darn near all roads have sidewalks (and I believe that those that don't - should). Why shouldn't every road be designed to accommodate cyclists as well? It doesn't have to be bike lanes, btw. The simplest way to accommodate cyclists is a wide curb lane - it doesn't cost anything to build and it gives cyclists the same space as a bike lane while avoiding messing up traffic flow at intersections and allowing for car parking and stopping in the curb lane as necessary.
Enforcement? Well that's an entirely different issue lol.
I personally wouldn't mind if they ignored that Bike Plan. Other than the Scarborough portion (that actually has a reasonable grid of bike lanes planned out), most streets that made in onto Bike Plan as candidates for cycling infrastructure additions are there not because cyclists want those streets, but because motorists don't. That's sort of an insulting approach, actually.
Moreover, nowhere in the Bike Plan does it say that bike lanes must ONLY go on streets that are shown on the plan. The Plan outlines the minimum goal for bike lanes, not the maximum limit on them. A great idea, in my opinion, is to consider bike infrastructure (such as wide curb lanes) whenever any major road redesign or resurfacing comes up.
Quiter and quicker is awesome, but in my opinion quieter streets are slower and more trafficky streets are faster (that's why the traffic goes there in the first place). In my experience, most cyclists will choose a busier street if it has a safe bike lane and goes where they need to go, rather than try to find their way through confusing smaller streets that make navigation difficult and make you stop at every intersection.
Another big factor for cyclists is road surface. It has much more effect on bikes than on cars, and nothing will encourage cycling like a beautiful fast smoooooth bike lane. Right now there is no bike lane on Jarvis, and pavement is pretty bad in places, and the lanes are very narrow and feel threatening to most cyclists. Which is why few cyclists are on there. But build 'em and they'll come.
I'm not going to make up excuses for people not checking their blind spots, there simply isn't one. By the same token, when a cyclist breaks the law, they also are responsible for whatever happens to them. Period. End of story. It's not my fault as a driver that a car hit me because I went through a stop sign. It is my fault as a driver though if I doored a cyclist (which, from what I understand, is the most common "accident"). It's pretty black and white.
In the same frame of mind, if I'm walking and jaywalk in front of a moving vehicle, it's my own damned fault that I went flying. Not the car's.
So many people don't want to take responsibility for their actions (or for their "rights" as you call them). That's probably a good place to start. Drivers aren't going away. Hopefully, cyclists aren't either. Pointing a finger (which I'm guilty of in this discussion) and laying blame on one group or the other is counter-intuitive.
However, being a cyclist, driver and pedestrian does allow me to see the faults of everyone. I find that most people are either a cyclist OR a driver tend to miss that part.
Are we getting marked on this teach?
And this is where you lost me. Sorry they are the laws. YOU (any "you" not particularly "you") don't get to decide that they are not required because they won't put anyone in danger or inconvience other people. The laws are there so that there is a universal standard that everyone knows and can use to anticipate the behaviour of others.
A cyclist has loads to worry about when they are riding. What if the cyclist misses seeing the pedestrian when they go rolling through the stop sign on the small residential road?
Both drivers and cyclists break laws. So do people walking around. Guess what, they're ALL breaking the law. Doesn't make any of them right.
And this is where you lost me. Sorry they are the laws. YOU (any "you" not particularly "you") don't get to decide that they are not required because they won't put anyone in danger or inconvience other people. The laws are there so that there is a universal standard that everyone knows and can use to anticipate the behaviour of others.
A cyclist has loads to worry about when they are riding. What if the cyclist misses seeing the pedestrian when they go rolling through the stop sign on the small residential road?
Both drivers and cyclists break laws. So do people walking around. Guess what, they're ALL breaking the law. Doesn't make any of them right.