MB Toronto
Morning Brew: Group pitches convention centre casino, Stintz knocks PC transit plan, Google expands GTA StreetView, e-bikes on trails, and council gets a TV show
A development group is preparing to unveil plans for a casino in the Metro Toronto Convention Centre, according to the Globe and Mail. The complex, which involves adding three towers to the property, would include a gambling hall and hotel as well as office and residential units. Numerous other gambling groups are also mulling proposals.
TTC chair Karen Stintz doesn't think much of a plan by Progressive Conservative Leader Tim Hudak to hand over Toronto's subways to Metrolinx. In a post on her website, Stintz derided the PCs for selecting the best parts of the TTC without proposing any ways to pay for new transit. She did say, however, that a full merger would be worth talking about.
Google StreetView is now in Toronto Zoo and Yonge-Dundas Square but not, weirdly, several parts of the city's regular street grid. Though Google unveiled a massive worldwide update to its ground-level coverage, including a ski resort in Banff and the Niagara Parks Botanical Gardens, it left out parts of Etobicoke, Scarborough, and the area south of Greenwood and Danforth.
Should e-bikes be allowed to use Toronto's bike lanes and trails? A group of riders told the city's public works and infrastructure committee yesterday that riders feel don't feel safe in regular traffic and want equal access to the bikeway network. Right now, e-bikes and all other powered vehicles are banned from bike lanes.
The City of Toronto will air a bi-weekly television show on Rogers TV Cable starting October 16. Called "City Insider," the program will air "stories about City programs and services, new initiatives, events and the people that make up the Toronto Public Service." What, no table-thumping Rob Ford rhetoric?
IN OTHER NEWS:
- Anti-Islam pastor Terry Jones barred from entering Canada, debate goes on [Globe and Mail]
- Police Chief Bill Blair again warns of 'significant staff reductions' [National Post]
- Mystery Toronto woman may have Halifax connection [CBC]
Photo: "DSC_9379" by alexduncanphoto in the blogTO Flickr pool.
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Speaking of fake pedals, I've never seen an ebikes pedals actually in use, they are really under powered scooters. Let's treat them as such.
They should not be allowed on trails at all. I've seen 3 ebikes on the lakeshore trail and all 3 were riding dangerously fast.
E-bikers screw up the flow of bike lane traffic and are a hazard when they switch back and forth from bike lane to roadway. The worst part of it is that not only are almost all e-bikers ignorant of the current rule about no motorized anything in the bike lanes, they always give some kind of lame, self-serving excuse when you call them on it: 'It's technically a bike', 'But there are no emissions', etc.
So, yeah, just merge already. Ignoring Montreal and Calgary for a moment, which being Canadian are also stunted in their municipal thinking, take a look at the US. The ONLY city I can think of that still owns its core-city transit system is San Francisco, and I don't think anyone should use that basketcase of Muni-BART-Ace-Caltrain-regional buses as any kind of functional model. Everyone else is regional, period. Sure, the US system evolved from their cities going through a period of absolutely sucking, where every single transit system went bankrupt and had to be uploaded to the region due to virtually the entire non-destitute population leaving the city proper, but in modern urban-suburban North America the model works. You leave the TTC to focus on Toronto issues, but they would report to Metrolinx, whose board would be picked by a combination of the province and the municipalities and the unions. This is how the NYC regional agency does it:
http://www.mta.info/mta/leadership/board.htm#appointment
Can that many cities really be wrong?
My general rule is if you run on gas you don't belong in the bike lane, but electricity is fine.
That would have the effect of dropping 5 "Entertainment Districts" on the city in one small, concentrated space.
There, fixed it for you. You fell into a common trap: confusing motive power with fuel source.
If we were to reverse all the cuts and downloading that Mike Harris made to the TTC, things would be much better. Creating agencies like Metrolinx only creates more bureaucracy and waste. We need to stop voting for the same political parties that keep snubbing the GTA (e.g. the Conservatives and Liberals) McGuinty just wasted close to $1 Billion to cancel a power plant so he can win 4 seats in Mississauga. Meanwhile he refuses to sufficiently fund the TTC, or even fulfill his promises on Transit City. But the liberals keep winning seats in Toronto - at some point that has got to change.
Worst of all, riding one makes you look like a nerd.
Alot of people call ebikes, DUI bikes. Lose your license for doing something stupid? Get a ebikes. Alot of the ebikes riders (not all)really do fit the dui name though by the looks of them.
As a walker on trails, they can really startle you! You don't here the tell tale hum until they are right on you.
I often see two bikes riding together with passengers over at the Humber bridge. I yelled "your not supposed to be on trails" they stopped and looked like they wanted to start a Fight with me
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