Yonge and Bloor streets to go car-free this summer

A large portion of Yonge and Bloor streets will be handed over to pedestrians, cyclists, and outdoor community events for two Sundays this August as part of an plan to create two temporary linear parks.

The Open Streets concept, which has been adopted in major cities such as New York and Los Angeles, promotes physical activity and allows businesses on the route to temporarily open onto the street (no outside vendors are allowed.) Toronto's event, the first of its kind in the city, will operate on Sundays two weeks apart: Aug 17th and 31st.

Bloor will be closed to auto traffic from Spadina to Parliament and Yonge from Bloor to Queen from 8 a.m. to noon. Intersecting streets will remain open and cars allowed to pass through the event.

The event has been in the works for more than a year. Originally, organizers planned to open up a larger portion of Bloor and Yonge, from High Park to Greenwood on the Danforth and Bloor south to Queens Quay, over a larger number of Sundays.

What do you think of the idea?

Correction: An earlier version of this post misstated the time of the events.

Chris Bateman is a staff writer at blogTO. Follow him on Twitter at @chrisbateman.