MB Toronto
Morning Brew: Licensing cyclists back under discussion, city to review free parking passes for councillors, behind the scenes at Roy Thomson Hall and the Flatiron Building, SkyDome architect Rod Robbie is dead, and Raptors win
The possibility of licenses for cyclists took a baby-step forward yesterday as the public works committee voted to have city staff and Toronto Police to come up with more effective strategies to enforce disparate bylaws against sidewalk cycling. The committee will reconvene in June, but in addition to the licensing ideas, other strategies suggested at the meeting were aggressive ticketing by police and the creation of a tattle-tale-like online database, which would allow citizens to report pedestrian-cyclist collisions. Are any of these good ideas?
The city seems to want to clean up parking in this town. In addition to the increased fine for drivers who park/stop on main streets during rush hour, free parking passes given to city councillors might be on the chopping block. The Toronto Parking Authority will review the 10-year-old policy this week. Councillors can thank Doug Ford who set an example by cutting up his own pass and urged the agency to review the perk.
Both the Star and the Torontoist share rare behind-the-scene glimpses of two of the city's most popular and acclaimed sites: The Flatiron building and Roy Thomson Hall. The Flatiron was recently sold to Commercial Realty Group for $15.29-million and will be open to prospective tenants this month. Roy Thomson Hall, which first opened in 1982, underwent a major renovation ten years ago, though apparently the musicians' break room smells like old sandwiches.
There's been a whole lot of New Year's resolutions going around for the city and now The Grid's Edward Keenan offers up his own: focusing on the TTC. Suggesting that no other area was more boondoggled by Rob Ford's administration than public transit, Keenan believes Ford should revive Transit City, or at least revert back to the old above-and-below-ground Eglinton plan and free up $4-billion.
IN BRIEF:
Photo by Alexandre Minev in the blogTO Flickr pool
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http://www.toronto.ca/cycling/safety/licensing/history.htm
Drivers aren't licenced for insurance purposes, that's an after effect. They're licenced for safety purposes. To get a licence you need to demonstrate the safe operation of the vehicle and an understanding of the rules of the road.
There's an age limit to driving that restricts the activity to adults (not quite, but let's say for the sake of argument.) No such age limit applies to cycling, and a bicycle is often one of young child's first tastes of mobility freedom.
So are we going to require children to have a bicycle licence? If we are, what's the annual fee going to be (because there will be one.) Will only wealthy kids able to ride?
If we're *not* going to licence children then what's the point? Children are the ones who could *most* benefit from safety training--and they should learn how to cycle safely--so leaving them out then defeats the purpose to a great extent.
If the law requires cyclists to carry insurance there's a whole question of costs. Bicycles are cheap, affordable transportation: adding an excessive insurance burden to them changes that, possibly dramatically and will exclude a wide array of people from using them. It's virtually impossible to get theft insurance on a bicycle now, so would the insurance only be required to cover personal liability?
Would licencing be handled by the DMV, or would we need a new agency to manage this? Is my Toronto licence transferable to other jurisdictions? What if I leave and then come back: do I have to get retested (and is it a road test or just a written test?)
It's easy for politicians to say "we should licence cyclists." Most of them haven't thought about the practicalities of the issue or the real reasons for doing so.
1. It will cost the city/province far more than it will make.
2. Our property taxes pay for infrastructure not licensing/insurance.
3. Cyclists already pay a disproportionally high % of their taxes for the roads compared to drivers.
4. Licensing and insuring cars doesn't seem to "educate" drivers any better. I see drivers blow through stop signs every single day on my commute.
5. Are we going to start insuring children to ride their bikes now? Do insurance companies really need more money?
Interesting that the city would consider a fee for cyclists but removed the only city-imposed fee for motor vehicles.
All this talk of cyclists breaking the law and no one seems to notice that driving laws are constantly broken. No driver ever seems to signal anymore - lane changes, left turns(!). Drivers run through stale yellows and early reds like never before. Have you ever seen a driver come to a complete stop at a stop sign?
The critics talk about cyclists on the sidewalk but how about cars parked on sidewalks, in bike lanes and waiting for lights in the bike boxes?
I remember once a driver parked on the sidewalk blocking a person in a wheelchair trying to get by complaining I was going the wrong way on my residential street. I think that story is the problem in microcosm. Cast the first stone...
It doesn't help that I've often seen bike cops ride on the sidewalks.
Licensing cyclists would be a huge blow to the vitality of this city, in my opinion.
Licensing is a Provincial issue, after all, and the Province rakes in $2.6 BILLION in gasoline taxes. Start hurting THAT cash cow, and bicycles will suddenly be part of the problem, not the solution.
To the myopic zealots that oppose any and all restrictions on bicycles, go to hell.
A few years back, whilst driving westbound on Bloor, approaching Sherbourne on a dark, rainy November night, I signalled and made a left onto a laneway that parallels Sherbourne, south off Bloor: a trip I had been doing every day for years.
As I've almost reached the concrete ramp on the south side of Bloor, out of the corner of my eye, I spot something moving. A bicycle, going the wrong way (westbound on the south side of Bloor) with no helmet and no lights of any kind, hit the front left fender of my car. Unhurt, he picks up his bike and starts kicking my car, hurling language that would cause a longshoreman to blush.
Getting out of my car, and rising to my full 6'2" height and raising my voice to match his, the punk recoiled, got on his bike and took off down the alley. I saw scratches and a dent on my fender. I gave chase - in my car. I called 9-1-1 and chased this a-hole for several blocks. He cleverly went down the wrong way where ever he could find a one way street, daring me to follow.
I eventually gave up on both pursuing him and 9-1-1 ever doing anything about it. So, I paid $400 to repair something that this jerk did.
Keep up the good work, folks. These and other tales are only adding to the simmering backlash the people with real lives and real jobs in this city will unleash one day.
Simply put, frequent bicycle users have nothing invested in the system. They have no insurance to jack up if they get too many moving violations. They may not even have a driver's license to penalize if they received moving violations. There are no plates to quickly identify them if they leave the scene of a crime (which is why a lot of drug pushers use bicycles!) For $40 (for an easily obtained stolen bicycle) you have instant transportation without contributing one damned thing to the system in place to allow people to move from one place to another.
And your numbers are legion? LOL You'd better hope not....
there is no critical mass, there is very few but very vocal people AKA "entitled cyclists" in this city. they are the ones who ruin it for everyone pedestrians, drivers, and other cyclists!
I wasn't championing riding on the side-walk. My point was more that you don't want cyclists on the road, you don't want cyclists on the side-walk... so please dear geniuses, share with us where you WOULD like cyclists to ride?
Your turn.... awaiting a smarmy reply... annnnd go!
When I ride a bike, my lunch I buy still has tax. When I buy something from a store after riding there, I pay tax on the purchase! I pay tax on my hydro, water, and cable bills. Heck... i pay lots of tax, just like you! We're not so different you see! Well, the one obvious difference is you are amazingly self righteous (and also think you're tougher than Zeus himself). Amazing stuff right?
As for the "backlash" you speak of, its already underway - our current city administration is doing all they can to continue making cycling less pleasant in this city. The thing I find so bizarre about the efforts to stop the so-called war on the car, is that by focusing all of those efforts on making alternatve modes of transportation (cycling, transit) less palatable or practical for more and more people, you're simply forcing those people into cars, which in turn will only make traffic even worse.
How is that beneficial to drivers?
10 people can be a critical mass related to some issues.
For every incident of a cyclist doing something foolish there is an equivalent rash decision by a driver. One of the worst is a driver turning left in front of a cyclist with the right of way.
Referring to the note above regarding the intersection of Bloor & Sherbourne. One afternoon I was cyling east on Bloor with a green light at Sherbourne when a westbound car decided to turn left. I jammed on my brakes, skidded sideways and ended up on my side in the middle of the intersection. The driver continued as if nothing had happened and, I suspect, didn't even notice. I'm afraid I did block the intersection temporarily as I picked myself up, gathered my belongings and walked to the nearest corner.
If we can't keep cars out of the downtown core or provide separated bike lanes, I think speed limits for cars should be lowered to 15 km/h within the core.
http://www.e-laws.gov.on.ca/html/statutes/english/elaws_statutes_90h08_e.htm#BK105
THIS ENTITLES ME TO BERATE ALL THE ASSHOLES BOTH CYCLIST AND MOTORIST.
I think that traffic, parking, and regular cops should be allowed and encouraged to stop and ticket cyclists that break the laws covering the operation of a vehicle on public roads. I also think that the cycling licence should go into effect for anyone 13 years of age, and be a prerequisite for getting the G1 license for operating a motor vehicle.
The average person (and I include myself in this group) is generally an idiot mostly concerned with their own convenience and pleasure. I think that it is the elected governments respinsability to catch and fine those that are stupid enough to behave so poorly in public that it deserves punishment..
Incidentally, the post on Jan 5 at 1:40 was mine, the others are somebody on blogTo who wants to play games. Dissent is now allowed, so every time I try to post, someone (a mod, perhaps?) uses my profile name to poke fun. Ah, well - the internet: you get what you pay for, I guess.
The usual suspects cannot seem to handle anything more than a linear argument. It does not matter whether the $2.6B or any portion of it is put back into Toronto's roads. What is significant is that motorists are a cash cow. Quebec is already making moves to tax electric cars because they recognize the $$$ they will lose.
Property taxes? So f'ing what! A motorists pours thousands of dollars every year into taxes that a cyclist does not. Green P parking and parking tags NET the city over $60M and provide hundreds of jobs in this city.
This is all moot. There are not enough cyclists to worry about. You guys certainly have an over-inflated opinion of your status.
Let's see how much more Montreal has to pump into BIXI this year. LOL
Then motorists (you and me included) should be asking what it is we are getting, in Toronto and in Ontario, for that money. If it's not clear then there is no relationship between how much motorists pay and the nebulous sense of entitlement to the roads that you and some other drivers seem to feel.
Again, cyclists are often car owners as well, and taxpayers in that capacity, so the absolute number of cyclists is irrelevant to the 'I pay more, I deserve more' argument.
And once again, Montreal's BIXI operation is separate from Toronto's and organized differently. What happens with their finances is completely irrelevant to Toronto, but I guess nothing matters as long you get to indulge in your tedious resorting to terms like 'the usual suspects' over and over when you can't be bothered to address facts and issues instead of your own fixations.
Radar detectors? Tweeting about locations of RIDE programmes? Cars and bikes blowing by open streetcar doors?
It seems many don't follow rules for the public good but so they won't get fined...